Linux Shell Scripting with Bash

Rating:
Summary: Overall, this book covers some good topics...
Review: ...but the proofreader should be fired! Also, the author needs to stick to the topic of Bash scripting and leave out the references, intentional and unintentional, to Korn shell scripting. While I do appreciate the tips about how to write Bash scripts that are backward-compatible with the Korn shell, the author has at times began a topic about a Bash feature, then in the next paragraph suddenly and unexpectantly refers to the Korn shell, giving the impression that the feature applies to the Korn shell rather than the Bash shell. After re-reading the passage several times it becomes apparent that the author may have meant to refer to the Bash shell all along, or that the feature is applicable to the Bash shell - either way, it is never explicitly stated and occasionally leaves the reader wondering how the reference to the Korn shell is relevant to the discussion. There are also several typographic errors in both the text and the code snippets. If you have any experience writing Bash scripts, you should be able to spot the errors and make the necessary corrections with little effort. If you are new to Bash scripting, then you might have to use the trial-and-error approach to find and remove the typos.

Typographical errors aside, the author covers, or at least touches on, every major area you will need to know to write effective Bash scripts. The author guides you from the fundamentals, such as declaring scalar variables, arrays, and control logic(branching and loops), to function declaration and definition, all the way up to network and database access scripts.

Overall, the content of this book warrants adding it to your library, just be mindful of the typos. I would also recommend obtaining a copy of the free "Advanced Bash Scripting Guide", and especially the book "Wicked Cool Shell Scripts" by Dave Taylor.



Rating:
Summary: simple
Review: Amongst recent computer books, this is a rarity. There seems to be only 1 diagram in the entire book. No GUIs to pretty up the scene. In this sense, the book is a throwback to those texts of the 80s. Strictly command line and file I/O.

Bash under linux is shown by the book to be not that different from an earlier Bourne shell. Or even the more rudimentary C shell. The various chapters discuss such items as defining variables and thence using these to build up expressions in a script. Burtch methodically shows how to increase the complexity of your scripting.

If some of you come from an earlier unix background, and have scripted there, then the book is reassuring. It should validate that most of your expertise carries over into bash and linux. Sure, there might be some new material. But the book shows that a typical script is not that different from a unix script of 20 years ago.

Rating:
Summary: 3 weeks and still not shipped!
Review: It's darn long to get this book shipped, Im sure it worth it, so buy it godamn! That way it can be shipped more often and more faster :P

Rating:
Summary: Solid foundation for Bash/Linux Scripting
Review: This book, unlike some of the other Bash books on the market, has very accessible and complete examples. It goes beyond simple explanations, but manages to start with the most basic concepts. My only complaint is that it is very text-heavy. Anyone who used Bash on a regular basis, even if they think they are advanced, will find something useful in this book - but if you are new to Bash, the text might be a little too dense. Easier to read than the man pages, and worth the effort, but it will take effort.

Overall, one of the best current books on the subject.

Rating:
Summary: Outstanding
Review: This is by far the best book I have ever read about Linux Shell Scripting with Bash. It was easy to understand and follow. The author provided the reader with real-life examples making learning fun. I highly recommend this book.

Rating:
Summary: Well-motivated guide to use of Bash for scripting
Review: This is pretty comprehensive book that guides the reader on how to use Bash for a wide variety of purposes.

It is very well-motivated; each chapter introduces the area it examines with an interesting anecdote, and presents a reasonably rich set of examples of how to use Bash along with other Unix tools to solve the problem at hand.

It is not solely about Bash; it shows the use of process control tools like ps, kill, and such, text manipulation tools like grep, sort, cut, sed, and such, and version control using CVS. This is all well and proper: One of the major uses of shell scripting is to paste together other programs, and these examples support that.

Well done...

Rating:
Summary: typos typos and typos
Review: You would find quite a lot of typos, such as missing quotes, incorrect quote-types, merged characters (-- become a lightly longer -), in this book.