Rating: 
Summary: Essential is the word
Review: If you are performing any level of system administration on any varient of Unix then this is a great book to have on your desk. It covers just about all aspects of system administration necessary for small to medium systems and networks.Each topic is dealt with first by an approachable description of what is going on, a discussion of the differences between different systems and some examples of commands or configuration files together with a discussion of what each example is doing and how it does it. It really is an easy way to work out what you need to do on your own system. The structure works equally well as an aide memoir or as a tutorial to a new topic and this is backed up by an effective index which seems to guide me to the right part of the book much more reliably than is the case in many computing texts. Although the book, even in its second edition, is now several years old, it is still relevant. The basics if the task do not change and, even if the task in hand has changed a little, reading and understanding the section in the book will leave you well placed to sort out minor variations which is not something that you would get from just plugging away at the man pages. The main thing that is missing as a result of this is coverage of completely new material, don't expect to find anything about IPv6 or running a webserver for example. That is not such a big problem though as if you are dealing with these issues, you will almost certainly need books on those subjects as well as a general admin book. For me, it is simple, this is a book that lives on my desk and not on my bookshelf. It helps me out with my mixed network of Linux, Solaris, SunOS and FreeBSD.
Rating: 
Summary: A Nice Sys Admin "manual"
Review: What I like a lot about this book is not only the usual wealth of information you come to expect with any O'Reilly book, but also the "sidebars" contained throughout the book that offer light-hearded, "common-sense" tips about being a sysadmin. The cover of this book features an armadillo, and I like the analogy. I briefly was a system administrator, and you do need to have a thick skin like the armadillo to do this kind of job! Each chapter is very descriptive of specific commands. There is good info on system startup and the section on troubleshooting system crashes is excellent. Also contained are sections on adding users and groups, system security issues, mounting and unmounting filesystems, data backup and recovery issues, a chapter on writing scripts to do some of the "menail sy admin tasks," and even a chapter on TCP/IP Network Management. The book also explains the "differencies" in various Unix OS's. Different Unix OS (AIX, SunOS, System V, and Solaris have their own little idiosyncracies at times) may have different ways or commands to do a particular task and this book makes a point to explain them all in great detail. Even though the book is a few years old, it still contains valuable information about UNIX system administration.
Rating:
Summary: Why didn't I read this earlier? Very Comprehensive
Review: Many books on Unix/Linux will cover a wide array of aspects, but nearly all of them will touch those topics, and give a brief overview. This is great for the casual user, but for the system administrator, you need a more thorough grounding in Unix. This book is the answer. This book is very comprehensive because it includes every major flavor of Unix, even more obscure ones (like SCO Unix) and covers each aspect in fine detail. When it talks about filesystems, it includes all kinds of relevant details a SysAdmin will need to know, and even some extras to make life more convenient. The best part of this book is Aeleen's personal touch. Being a SysAdmin of many years, she puts all kinds of personal (and relevant) anecdotes as well as her philosophical view of System Administration. I like the 7 virtues of the System Administrator. This is a clever touch that one should keep in mind when administering a Unix system. In short, this book is a must have for all Unix System Administrators. I can't imagine a better book on this subject. Hopefully you will enjoy it too. :)
Rating:
Summary: A must-have, and NOT just for admins.
Review: Did you know the "-p" option of "mkdir" can create several directory levels at once: "mkdir -p all/these/at/once" ? Or that you can use "cp -p" to preserve the modification times of the original file? Ever use "man -k <keyword>"? After thirteen years of Unix, I learned many new tricks including commands I never used before but now can't live without, like xargs. I now have a 100% rock-solid understanding of Unix file system permissions, including SUID, SGID, sticky bit, etc. Many formerly nebulous areas are now crystal clear. Someone criticized this book for harping too much on SCO, a less popular version of Unix. It's true, but those parts are well-marked and quickly skipped. I have bought some mediocre O'Reilly books, but this is an *old-fashioned* one, i.e., it's chock-full of precious tidbits and lucid explanations. It's a major confidence-booster, mandatory for aspiring power users and developers. (If you are really doing system administration then the Nemeth, et. al. book is also a must-have; it's more pure admin. If you feel you must choose between the two books, get off it and buy both!) This will give you some knowledge your local admins don't have. If you work in a competitive environment, this is some serious armament.
Rating: 
Summary: Out-of-date, Tries to cover too many flavors of Unix at once
Review: The book is much too broad to be very useful. Though it has a few good chapters, too much time is spent on trying to make sure that an example is handled for every different style of Unix, especially some of the older or more off-the-beaten path Unices, such as Irix or SCO. It also doesn't help that when you get to a topic that you get interested in, you're just given the suggestion to buy another O'Reilly book that discusses it. The Nemeth book (UNIX System Administration Handbook) is much better, because it covers examples in more popular versions of Unix, and because the latest edition is much closer to today's view of the Unix world.
Rating:
Summary: The first book to buy for your personal library
Review: I really liked how the author organized this book by task, and then provided an explanation of each task in Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, Linux, etc. A very well organized, easy to follow reference that should be on every UNIX System Administrators bookshelf. The beginning SysAdmin should find it very educational. Intermediate SysAdmins should find this book to be an essential reference. Advanced SysAdmins may want to teach out of this book. All in all, well worth your time.
Rating:
Summary: Most useful sysadmin reference
Review: I use this book more than probably all my other reference materials put together. This book provides information across most UNIX platforms ie Linux,AIX, Solaris, HPUX etc. This is a must have for Sys Admins of all levels.
Rating:
Summary: Shouldn't Be Your First Book...
Review: Your first book should be "UNIX System Administration Handbook" by Nemeth, Snyder, Seebass, & Hein. I always turn to that book first. I am not sure I would buy Frisch's "Essential System Administration" again. Definitly try to get it used if you do buy it. Looking in this book is often a last resort, and often if I haven't found the answer in my other two books, then it normally isn't in this one either. It is a big book, much of which I feel is fluff, but if this was your only book on the topic, you would still be ok. The wording just isn't as clear as I'd prefer.
Rating:
Summary: Hard to follow unless you already knew
Review: This book is hard to follow unless you already know about Unix. I think myself as intermediate user at least since I am using Unix since in engineering school. This book is still not quite easy to follow sometimes. On page 80 (about find): "The specified permission mode is XORED with the file's permission setting" I do not know what the author means (I don't know if it is error. ). It seems to me her presentation is more hard to understand (I am foreigner and it makes more difficult to me!) This is just one example. There are many examples which is not clear (My feeling is the author does not think very carefully when she wrote or how to present the materials better). If you already know the stuffs, you will be fine. If not, then you spend ton of times to figure out what the auther really means. So if I a file permission 777
find / -perm -777 So 777 XORed 777, I got 000. (The author said the specified permission mode is XORED with the file's permission setting). I don't follow what she means. Unfortunately, there are not many choice for Unix books. Either I have to dig very deep into the Unix OS which I don't have time to do it right now (I mean to learn the Unix OS from the C structure and implementations)
Rating:
Summary: A pretty useful book.
Review: This book is generalized, but in a good way (for once). Instead of a lot of fluff and only touching a little bit on various software and how to do the most basic stripped down installs of things that have little to do with Unix, other than it can "run" on a Unix system, it actually covers a lot of ground. It covers a lot of topics and aspects, like it should be expected. There's parts that could be improved and it's biased towards some platforms over others, but for general knowledge and insight, it can offer a lot.
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