Rating:  Summary: One of the funniest books I've ever read Review: I can't believe this book is out of print. Get a copy before it vanishes forever. If you've ever suffered through cryptic Unix commands, man pages, or error messages, only to be told by some self-righteous Unix apologist that these problems are *your fault* and that Unix is *perfect and beyond criticism*, you'll love this book. If you think that Unix is perfect and beyond criticism, you'll hate the book. Don't get me wrong--I don't hate Unix, and probably the authors don't either. The real, and well-deserved, target of the satire are the self-righteous apologists.
Rating:  Summary: The bugs is still out there. Review: I've gone thru most of the samples quote in the book. What I had found were the bugs are still out there. I can crashed Solaris 2.6 and 7 easily as an innocent user without any admin right. There I don't agree with that these patches are long ago fixed. No they are not. So whoever need to support Unix should read this book and try to apply the examples to their Unix system. (Of course, not the production one.)
Rating:  Summary: Gonna try Linux? Read this first. Review: If bookstore's "Computing" section had a "Self-help" sub-category, this book would be in it. For many of us forced to deal with Unix, it is like being in an "anti-World" where hackery is prized and honored; a world where english is shunned for martian words like "awk", "grep", "chdir" and such and where we'd all gladly pay $100 to "buy a vowel" for commands like "rm", "cd", "cp", etc. A world where "bugs" are viewed as "features" to be preserved over time. If you are disgusted by Unix, it is this book that will reassure you that you are not alone and that the emperor Unix truly does not have any clothes on. Those who do not learn from this history, are doomed to repeat it with Linux.
Rating:  Summary: Gonna try Linux? Read this first. Review: If. like me, you're a "Windows person" thinking on testing the waters of Linux, I recommend two things: 1) Read this book 2) Convince yourself, if you can, that Linux has improved Unix. This is a wonderful book and should be reprinted. It would be a hilarious book if it weren't for the fact that all the Unix-disasters, misadventures and kludges it describes have been costing money and causing mayhem for thirty years! Now we read about Linux "looming large" in our future. Read this book to find out why that might not be so attractive.
Rating:  Summary: Reading this book is like drinking the coolaid... Review: My students once asked me if Unix is a conservative O/S or a liberal O/S. After much discussion, we concluded it is a liberterian O/S. It's all about freedom and responsibility. You can't have one without the other. As to this book, it's full of lies and outdated, over-simplified examples. I had to double check to see if it was written by the same people who now run the Democratic Party as it tries to make its feeble point by spreading fear and misinformation. Granted, Unix isn't for everybody. Neither is driving a car. That's why we have Macs and busses. I challenge any of you out there who dislike Unix to take one of my classes. Your Unixphobic attitudes can be overcome with the proper education. It's interesting to note that Unix is stronger than ever while you can't find this book anymore. dak
Rating:  Summary: critics Review: This book is a very entertaining read--hilarious, and largely historically accurate. If you know and love UNIX, you will love this book. If you only know macOS or windows, you'll be lost. Bear in mind that most of these essays were accurate in 1988, but are now historical footnotes (and valuable as such). This is no longer fertile ground for anti-UNIX arguments, despite some of the above comments by the less-informed. Find one used, and enjoy!
Rating:  Summary: (good) coach or (bad) critics Review: this book is as out of date as THE unix it addressed. most bugs, annoying features, old design philosophy and stupid practices are fixed long ago, why still blame the naughty behavior of kid when he has already grown up? like Dennis Ritchie said in "Anit-Foreword", "they are intoxicated by metophor". it's easier to be a critic, and it's much fun to watch critic nailing a coach. (that's why i give this book 3 stars, it's really fun to read). but it would be a better book if it not just shows the bad things, but gives some solutions too. however to haters, this could be a too high requirement. another question, what's UNIX? is it something with a buggy shell? is it something using sendmail? or is it something gives programmers the joy and freedom they dreamed about? almost everything in computer science is trade-off. UNIX is created by the programmers and for the programmers. it pleases some very much, which means it will be hated by someone else very much. but it's better than something else in this world which wants to be loved by everyone and control everything, including our mind. this is not a good review, but not bad either. just like this book, just like UNIX, just like most things we see everyday.
Rating:  Summary: Entertaining and often even true -- now free! Review: This is a breezy book poking fun at the foibles of Unix. As a sarcastic screed, it is not at all balanced or fair or reasonable, or even necessarily historically accurate. But it is valuable. (...)It is valuable because in many ways it is a catalog of design errors that you can make when putting together a system -- any system. Designers of new systems should be able to learn from it. It is valuable because it shows you how over time design decisions and compromises that seemed reasonable can come to seem ridiculous. It is valuable because it really does show you that "Worse is Better". That is, Unix really did survive, and all the 'better' systems like Multics and Tenex failed (and of course they weren't necessarily better across the board). There is a lesson here for engineers who don't understand that making the 'best' product by some narrow technical definition does NOT guarantee market success. It is valuable because it documents some of the *alternatives* to doing things the Unix way. Not enough to substitute for studying Multics and whatever, but valuable nonetheless. It is valuable because many of the analyses of Unix apply to other systems, certainly including MS-DOS and Windows. Yes, Windows does some things better, and some things worse. But you're smart; you can figure out how to transpose the analysis. Finally, it is valuable because it punctures the pretensions of those who hold up Unix (and Linux) as images of perfection. Worth reading.
Rating:  Summary: Entertaining and often even true -- now free! Review: This is a breezy book poking fun at the foibles of Unix. As a sarcastic screed, it is not at all balanced or fair or reasonable, or even necessarily historically accurate. But it is valuable. (...)It is valuable because in many ways it is a catalog of design errors that you can make when putting together a system -- any system. Designers of new systems should be able to learn from it. It is valuable because it shows you how over time design decisions and compromises that seemed reasonable can come to seem ridiculous. It is valuable because it really does show you that "Worse is Better". That is, Unix really did survive, and all the 'better' systems like Multics and Tenex failed (and of course they weren't necessarily better across the board). There is a lesson here for engineers who don't understand that making the 'best' product by some narrow technical definition does NOT guarantee market success. It is valuable because it documents some of the *alternatives* to doing things the Unix way. Not enough to substitute for studying Multics and whatever, but valuable nonetheless. It is valuable because many of the analyses of Unix apply to other systems, certainly including MS-DOS and Windows. Yes, Windows does some things better, and some things worse. But you're smart; you can figure out how to transpose the analysis. Finally, it is valuable because it punctures the pretensions of those who hold up Unix (and Linux) as images of perfection. Worth reading.
Rating:  Summary: The Truth about Unix Review: Unix is a certainly a powerful operating system, but it is not the embodiment of divine perfection, as too many people seem to assume. If you're going to be using Unix, or programming on Unix, this book is an invaluable road map to the pitfalls that lie ahead, to save you from having to discover them all for yourself. No Unix user should be without it.
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