How Linux Works, 3rd Edition: What Every Superuser Should Know

his book is excellent and very underrated. It manages to explain complex processes in a very simple and clear way. The author does a great job breaking down complicated topics from the world of the Linux kernel, as well as general computing and networking concepts, using both theoretical explanations and helpful illustrations. I’m looking forward to continuing reading it, and I’m very happy that I decided to buy it. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in Linux or low-level computing.

Excellent book, well written with many of the nuances you might normally overlook. Goes into great detail. If you're planning to dive deep into Linux this is honestly a must have. Great for referencing also.

I think if you take your time to read and digest this book. You can learn a lot about how linux works in general and open the door dive deep on your own.

You need it

as listed

Arrived on time, as advertised, no issues. A great book. It covers all the concepts with good introductions and clear, detailed explanations. Solid writing.

UPDATE:after 3 months of study and this book greatly helped me pass my linux+ exam and setup labs. Amazing book i have only begun using linux about 4 weeks ago reasons of virtualization and hardware control and this is my first linux book that i have read i dont know if i recommend this to a beginner but this book help me understand the lingering questions i had, from the basics of command,file hierchy and disk partition and summary of the kernel linux system and i am in love, with the operating system, i have been referencing this book for the past week now and has been using arch linux, with the help of this book and the arch wiki i have made progress from installing the basic systems to setting up my first kvm/vfio passthrough. there is still a lot to learn.

I used this book for a Linux class. The chapters are logically organized and the writing is pretty easy to read and follow. Terms and definitions are well-defined with examples given. It's a compact book with about 450 pages including the index. Will keep this book to use as a reference in the future.

Good book to know the fundamentals of linux

I really enjoyed this book. It gives good easy to follow details about Linux. I feel anyone could read this book and be using Linux in no time very proficiently. Want to learn, or want to learn more this is definitely for you.

I have several problems with this book... First, it wasn't written from a server perspective. This book was written as if the reader is a superuser in a private pc, not in a server for several users. I state this because many topics would be missing otherwise, and the detail is lacking. I also didn't really like the style. The definitions are not clear nor precise. Also, too many times the author raises details, and sometimes writes whole subsections, just to say that the reality is much harder, and we don't need to worry about these aspects... Then why raise the topic in the first place. If the author would remove those sections in the 1st place, the text flow would not be lost. They are just a waste of space in the book. Second, and this is what really bother me... When the author talks about fsck, the curious reader, like me, may be tempted to follow the commands shown in the book... WHen I tried, the shell warned me that I could damaged the data, since fsck will not guarantee data integrity, only consistency, and may not even work if the file system was being used... How the () does the author show a bunch of commands, and not warn the reader about the consequences... Only AFTER these commands does the author in a note state that they should not 'be done lightly' (my wording). I'm grateful for the bash warnings. It's like showing the reader that there's a command like (don't run this!!!) 'rm -r *' and only then warning the reader of its consequences... Third, I don't think I really learned much... Most explanations I found superficial.

If you use Linux... get this book. In line with the open source mindset of DIY... this book will instruct you on the inner workings of the Linux OS. Highly highly recommended!!

Excellent livre, bien écrit et très agréable lire ; le seul, semble-t-il, qui décrive la face cachée de toutes les distributions LINUX, à savoir les process ou "démons" qui sont lancés en arrière-plan (systemd, dhcp, smtp,ntp etc.), et leur rôle : c'est très souvent leur mauvais paramétrage qui ruine le fonctionnement d'une installation. Ce texte fournit les détails du bootloader (GRUB, LILO), explique la différence entre UEFI et MBR, etc. Il décrit clairement le principe des firewalls ; il ne rentre, par contre, pas assez dans l'architecture des courrielleurs et le fonctionnement des e-mails (postfix, sendmail), mais du moins il en expose les principes. Pour comprendre la couche graphique et les fenêtres, vous pouvez compléter ce livre avec "X Power Tools" de Tyler.