unix books

[Thomas Maloney]

Greg Cook was kind enough to forward the list of recommended UNIX books people
sent him. I consolidated & formatted it to be a bit more readable. Comments are
those of the original senders. 

Tom Maloney        <<tjm at math.ams.com>>




================Intro's & Overviews=================

>The UNIX Programming Environment
    Author: Brian W. Kernighan and Rob Pike
    Publisher: Prentice-Hall
    1984, 357 pages, ISBN 0-13-937699-2, paperback: 0-13-937681-X

	- This book is what I call a classic.  Just buy it.
        - a good programmer's introduction.

>The Unix Environment
    Author: A.N.Walker.

        - An excellent user's introduction. I have a special affection for
          this book, as it introduced me to the plural forms VAXen and Unices.  

>Introducing The UNIX System
     Author: Henry McGilton and Rachel Morgan
     Publisher: McGraw-Hill Book Company
     1983, 556 pages, ISBN 0-07-045001-3

	- introductory for the most part, but far more extensive than Gauthier's
          book.  There are two chapters on editors and two on text formatting
          that are the best I have seen in this type book.  There is even a
          chapter on system management.  I believe there may be a new edition
          of this book out that has been substantially rewritten.

>The Design of the Unix Operating System
    Author: Maurice J. Bach
    Publisher: Prentice-Hall

        - is a good generic introduction to kernel operation.

>UNIX Shell Programming
    Author: Stephen G. Kochan and Patrick H. Wood
    Publisher: Hayden Book Company
    1985, 422 pages

	- I own this book, but I rarely crack it open.  I guess the main
          reason is that I am still a Bourne-again shell user.  For years I
          worked with a variety of systems where one might find csh and/or ksh.
          However, /bin/sh was the only common denominator.  I find that most
          often I refer to Kenighan and Pike for shell programming questions.
          However, they don't address the C Shell (csh) or Korn Shell (ksh).
          This book does offer a chapter on each.  In addition, this book may
          be more suited for a beginner than an experienced UNIX programmer.

>Life With UNIX
   Author: Don Libes and Sandy Ressler
   Publisher: Prentice-Hall
   1989, pp 350.  ISBN 0-13-536657-7.

        - A comprehensive overview of UNIX.  Major sections are:

	  UNIX in Time - Usual trash plus history of user groups,
		universities, with a comprehensive "who's who" in
		UNIX history.  Present & Future deals with where
		UNIX is now and where its going - companies,
		standards and dialects are treated at length.

	  UNIX Information - How people really learn about UNIX.
		Discussion of books, magazines, conferences, and, of
		course,	source code.

	  Inside UNIX - In-depth descriptions of UNIX from three
		different perspectives - user, programmer and
		adminstrator.

          Outside UNIX - Third-party stuff.  Discussions of how UNIX
		has prospered/withered in face of real-world problems.
		Underground - archives, USENET, public access UNIX,
		GNU, MINIX, public-domain and/or free software, etc.

          This book is quite unusual, not only because of its scope, but
          because it prints things that have never appeared in print (for one
          reason or another) - things that most people don't realize or find
          until years after they have used UNIX.  It is essentially a
          "reading between the lines" of all the other UNIX manuals, books
          and magazines.  Lastly, "Life With UNIX" is chock full of amusing
          UNIX stories and anecdotes, all designed to provide you with key
          insights into why UNIX is the way it is.  "Life with UNIX" is a
          must book for UNIX beginners to UNIX gurus.

================Berkeley=================

>An Introduction to Berkeley Unix
    Author: P. Wang
    Publisher: Wadsworth.

        - If you need a BSD oriented book, then I don't think you would find a
          more thorough introductory book.

>The Design and Implementation of the 4.3BSD Unix Operating System
    Author : Samuel J. Leffler, Marshall Kirk McKusick, Michael J. Karels,
 	     John S. Quarterman.
    Publisher :Addison-Wesley	(Berkley and SunOS)
    1988

        - seems to be a good book on kernel design for Berkeley Unix; I just
          started it myself. 
	- We should be hearing about this one any day now!!!  John Quarterman
          had informed me quite some time ago to expect this one in September.
          These are the primary people who are responsible for 4.3 BSD.

================System V=================

>A Practical Guide to Sys V Unix
   Author: Mark Sobell. 
   Publisher: Benjamin Cummings

        - ( I am not sure if this is the exact title)
	
>UNIX System V Bible
   Author: Stephen Prata and Donald Martin
   Publisher: Howard Sams & Company
   
================A System for the NeXT of us=================

>Threads of a New System
    Author: Prof Richard Rashid
    in the August 1986 _Unix Review_

        - an excellent introduction to the design of Mach, the sort-of
          object-oriented Unix which runs on the NeXT machine.

================Geeks, Gurus & Wizards=================

>Advanced UNIX: A Programmer's Guide
     Author: Stephen Prata
     Publisher: Howard W. Sams & Co., Indianapolis
     1985, 484 pages, ISBN: 067-22403-8.

        - Prata assumes you know how to login and use and editor.  It's very
          good for shell programing.

>Advanced UNIX Programming
     Author: Marc J. Rochkind
     Publisher: Prentice-Hall
     1985, 265 pages, ISBN 0-13-011818-4, paperback: 0-13-011800-1

	- Rochkind is a former Bell Labs UNIX guru who wrote SCCS back in the
          mid 70's.  This book is exactly what the title states, basically an
          extremely thorough treatment of programming using the UNIX System
          Call Interface.  System V, System III, V7, 4.2 BSD, and Xenix are
          all discussed.  The system calls are organized functionally into
          chapters that cover file i/o, terminal i/o, process control,
          interprocess communication, and miscellaneous calls.  The opening
          chapter is an overvview of fundamental concepts of UNIX.  Anytime
          I have a question on the usage of system calls I consult this book.
          The only problem with it is that it needs to be updated per
          System V Rel 3, 4.3 BSD and the efforts of Sun and AT&T to bring
          SunOS and System V together as well as the efforts in the UNIX 386
          world.

>Tricks of the UNIX Masters
    Author: Russel G Sage
    Publisher: Howard Sams & Co
    ISBN 0-672-22449-6. 

        - a "must add" to your list of UNIX books. For about $20, you'll get a
          lot of nifty little tricks & tips you won't pick up unless you've got
          a good UNIX guru to coach you.  The style is relaxed & aimed at a bit
          above the novice UNIX user (experienced programmer with sparse UNIX 
          exposure).

>UNIX System: Readings and Applications
     Vol 1: UNIX Time-Sharing System
     Vol.2: The UNIX System
     Author: AT&T
     Publisher: Prentice-Hall
     1987

	- These two volumes are reprints of the two volumes of the Bell
          Labs Technical Journal (now AT&T Tech J.) that were devoted to UNIX:
          Vol. 57, No. 6, Part 2, July-August, 1987, and
          Vol. 63, No. 8, October, 1984.

================C stuff=================

>C: A Reference Manual, 2nd Edition
    Author: Samuel P. Harbison and Guy L. Steele Jr.
    Publisher: Prentice-Hall
    1987, 404 pages, ISBN 0-13-109810-1, paperback: 0-13-109802-0

	- An excellent book on C.  It is not really an introductory level book,
          and is a great companion to K&R (2nd Ed.).  Both this book and
          K&R (2nd Ed.) cover the draft-proposed ANSI standards.  Where H&S
          really stands out is in the sections that cover the UNIX library
          calls.  If you have ever struggled with any of printf or scanf
          family of library calls in trying to figure out the conversion rules
          in the format string, this book is the answer.

>Efficient C
    Author: Thomas Plum and Jim Brodie
    Publisher: Plum Hall
    1985, 150 pages, ISBN 0-911537-05-8

	- This is a useful book.  Portability is one aspect of programming
          in C.  Efficiency is the other.  Many use C because it allows them the
          freedom to tie the programs down to the hardware in order to run
          efficiently. This book is an excellent guide and when combined with
          Jon Bentley's book on writting efficient programs gives one an
          excellent background in measuring programs and fine tuning them.

>Notes on the Draft C Standard
    Author: Thomas Plum
    Publisher: Plum Hall
    1987, 92 pages, ISBN 0-911537-06-6

	- Tom Plum is the Vice Chair of the ANSI X3J11 committee, so who 
          better to write this book than he?  However, as with any of the
          other C books that treat the ANSI C Standard, it does not cover the
          Standard in it's final form due to the fact that it has yet to be
          adopted.  However, the price is about $10, so it makes a good pickup
          to keep informed about the standard and how it differs from K&R C.

>The C Programmer's Handbook
    Author: M.I. Bolsky
    Publisher: AT&T Bell Labs and Prentice-Hall
    1985, 84 pages, ISBN 0-13-110073-4

	- This is a handbook for experience programmers, not a book for
          reading.  Information is intended as a quickie reference and is not
          that detailed.

>The C Puzzle Book: Puzzles for the C Programming Language
    Author: Alan R. Feuer
    Publisher: Prentice-Hall
    1982, 173, ISBN 0-13-109934-5 paperback: 0-13-109926-4

	- Exactly what the title indicates.  The puzzles are organized by
          chapter: basic arithmetic operators, assignment operators, logic and
          increment operators, bitwise operators, relational and conditional
          operators, operator precedence and evaluation.  The answers for all
          of the puzzles are also provided.  This is an excellent way to learn
          some of the more advanced expressions that can be concocted with C.

>The C Answer Book
    Author: Clovis L. Tondo and Scott E. Gimpel
    Publisher: Prentice-Hall
    1985, 209 pages, ISBN 0-13-109877-2

	- This book provides the answers to the exercises found in K&R.
          I believe that a second edition of this book has also been recently
          published corresponding with the 2nd edition of K&R.

>C Traps and Pitfalls
    Author: Andrew Koenig
    Publisher: Addison-Wesley
    1988, 147 pages, ISBN:201-17928-8

	- Andrew published a BTL Technical Memorandum by this title several
          years back.  Later it was published as a Technical Report.  It has
          now been expanded into a book.  I read the TR and it was excellent.
          I just recently finished the book and would recommend it to anyone
          who uses C.

>Portable C and UNIX System Programming
    Author: J.E. Lapin
    Publisher: Prentice-Hall
    1987, 249 pages, ISBN 0-13-686494-5

	- A useful book, mostly because there are no others written on
          this topic, yet......

>How to Wri
    Publisher: Prentice Hall
    to be released.

	- I'm waiting!

================Misc/Unknown=================

>UNIX Papers
     Author: The Waite Group Editors
     Publisher: Howard W. Sams & Co, Indianapolis
     1987, 518 pages, ISBN: 0-672-22578-6.

        - This is a collection of papers.  Some of the them are introductions
          and others cover more arcane bits of knowledge.

>Writing a Unix Device Driver
    Author: Janet I. Egan and Thomas J. Teixeira

        - Masscomp with appendixes on BSD and Xenix

>(no title given)
     297 pages, ISBN 0-8359-8164-9, paperback: 0-8359-8162-2

	- introductory level book, extremely basic and easy reading.  I read
          this on a plane trip between Newark, NJ and Columbus, OH before I
          ever worked seriously with UNIX.  Unlike, Rebecca Thomas and
          Jean Yates Tutorial style book this one does not require you to be
          sitting down in front of a crt in order to derive benefit from it.

>Unix for People

>Unix Power Tools


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