Eric Steven Raymond Thyrsus Enterprises

esr@thyrsus.com

1.20 2001-06-14 esr Removed "Practical Unix Security"; it's five years old and the material is now covered better by other books. 1.19 2001-06-14 esr Added Ross Anderson's "Security Engineering". Corected ISBNs. 2000 Eric S. Raymond Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the Open Publication License, version 2.0. This document lists the books I think are most valuable to a person trying to learn Unix (especially Linux) top to bottom. This document lists what I consider to be the essential book-length references for learning Unix (especially Linux) and how to program under it. New versions of the Linux Reading List HOWTO will be periodically posted to comp.os.linux.answers. They will also be uploaded to various Linux WWW and FTP sites, including the LDP home page. You can also view the latest version of this on the World Wide Web via the URL http://sunsite.unc.edu/LDP/HOWTO/Reading-List-HOWTO.html. If you have questions or comments about this document (or just want to suggest a book that you think should be on it), please feel free to mail Eric S. Raymond, at esr@thyrsus.com. I welcome any suggestions or criticisms. For on-line HOWTOs, magazines, and other non-book material, see the Linux Documentation Project home page. Some years ago I wrote a less Linux-focused Unix bibliography that may still be of some interest and retains a certain amusement value. You can find the Loginataka here. SAGE, the System Administrator's Guild, maintains an excellent list of relevant books. Comments not in quotes below are either mine, or I have seen no reason to change them from those of Jim Haynes (previous maintainer of this document). Comments sent in by others are in quotes, and have the name of the commentator before them (JH is Jim Haynes). "See" URLs attached to publishing information point directly into the publisher's web catalog and typically take you to a page containing a cover shot, blurbs, and ordering information. Books that don't have these lack them because the publisher is using frames and the catalog pages can't be bookmarked. Topic listings go roughly from the outside in (culture to user-land programming to kernel programming to hardware). Within sections I have tried to list the most useful books first insofar as I am familiar with them. It's just an embarrassing coincidence that this lists one of my books first, honest! (Suggestions for a better organization cheerfully accepted.) Third Edition Eric S.Raymond 1996 ISBN 0-262-68092-0 MIT Press 547pp. Um, er. A guide to Internet culture. Lots of people like it. HTML at the Jargon File Resource Page. Order here. Peter H.Salus 1994 ISBN 0-201-54777-5 Addison-Wesley 255pp. Linux is part of the Unix tradition. This book is an oral history of Unix -- how it originated, how it evolved, how it spread -- by the people who were there. Anniversary Edition Frederic P.Brooks 1995 ISBN 0-201-83595-9 Addison-Wesley The one book on software engineering everyone should read. Alan Cox: "This I'd recommend not for its technical value but for its application of common sense and reality to computing projects." JH: "Ah, yes. What if Linus had been given 200 programmers and had been told to produce Linux in 3 months!" Order here. AT&T 1978 July-August 1978, Vol. 57, No. 6, part 2 416pp. Many early papers on Unix, including Ritchie & Thompson, "The UNIX Time Sharing System"; Thompson, "UNIX Implementation"; Ritchie, "A Retrospective"; Bourne, "The UNIX Shell"... MattWelsh 1997 Linux Documentation Project Available on the LDP home page, or directly at http://linuxdoc.org/LDP/gs/. How to bring up Linux. Explains a lot of Linux basics. Covers basic system administration. LarsWirzenius 1997 Linux Documentation Project Available on the LDP home page, or directly at http://linuxdoc.org/LDP/sag/. An excellent first book on how to maintain and administer a Linux system. Second Edition Jessica P.Hekman 1999 ISBN 1-56592-585-8 O'Reilly & Associates According to O'Reilly, "The Desktop Reference for Linux". For Linux users this obsoletes their "Unix In a Nutshell" which was SVr4/Solaris-oriented. Order here. Third Edition MattWelsh 1999 ISBN 1-56592-469-X O'Reilly & Associates Everything you need in order to understand, install, and use the Linux operating system. Excellent beginner's book. Order here. Mark G.Sobel 1998 ISBN 0-201-32569-1 Addison-Wesley 1015pp. Just what the title says -- practical tutorials in basic Unix, shells, editors, mail programs, networking, Web tools, and utilities. Covers some system administration fundamentals. (This appears to be a repackaging of 1997's ``A Practical Guide to Linux'' from the same author, without Caldera OpenLinux Lite included.) Second Edition AeleenFrisch 1995 ISBN 1-56592-127-5 O'Reilly & Associates More in-depth coverage of normal system-administration tasks. Not Linux-specific but contains Linux material. Order here. A Guide to Building Dependable Distributed Systems RossAnderson 2001 0-471-38922-6 Wiley The best book I've ever seen on technological security measures and general computer security. The section on "How to Steal a Painting" and physical alarm systems is worth the price of admission by itself. Intrusion Prevention, Detection, and Recovery BobToxen 2000 ISBN 0-13-028187-5 Prentice-Hall This is excellent work, the standard by which future Linux security books will be judged. I wrote a foreword for it. Combines step-by-step practical instructions on hardining a Linux system with good theory on attack paths, rings of protection, and security analysis. Describes many counters for specific exploits. Third Edition LarryWall TomChristiansen JonOrwant 2000 ISBN 0-596-00027-8 O'Reilly & Associates 1104pp. Shell (as a programming language for more than trivial scripting) is dead. Perl rules in its place (though it is now being strongly challenged by Python). This is the third edition of the definitive Perl book. Order here. Emmanuel Pierre keeps a short list of Perl books. First Edition MarkLutz 1997 ISBN 0-56592-197-6 O'Reilly & Associates 880pp. The next step beyond Perl. Python is beautifully designed, has better integration with C, and scales up more gracefully to large projects. Order here. Fourth Edition ChuckMusciano BillKennedy 2000 ISBN 0-596-00026-X O'Reilly & Associates 680pp. The best HTML tutorial/reference I have ever seen, and the only HTML book you need unless you also want to do CGI. I don't know of any other book on HTML that comes within miles of this one for comprehensiveness, depth, and quality of organization. Order here. BrianKernighan RobPike 1984 ISBN 0-13-937681-X Prentice-Hall A true classic -- possibly the best single-book exposition of the Unix philosophy. Useful for learning shell programming. MichaelGoossens FrankMittelbach AlexanderSamarin 1994 ISBN 0-201-54199-8 Addison-Wesley 530pp. `If you are one of those users who would like to know how LaTeX can be extended to create the nicest documents possible without becoming a (La)TeX guru, then this book is for you' --- from the Preface. Bruce Thompson adds: "A very nice book providing a lot of information about the new extensions to LaTeX, provides a large number of examples showing precisely how your document's layout can be manipulated" Order here. LeslieLamport 1994 ISBN 0-201-52983-1 Addison-Wesley 256pp. Bruce Thompson: "The ultimate reference on LaTeX 2.09 by its author. A new edition covering LaTeX2e (the version included in the current TeX/LaTeX distribution) is in preparation. LaTeX 2.09 is fully supported by LaTeX2e. A must for anyone wanting to use LaTeX. Provides a gentle introduction to document preparation and the various tools that LaTeX provides for producing professional quality documents. Lots of examples." Order here. DonaldKnuth 1986 ISBN 0-201-13448-9 Addison-Wesley 496pp. Bruce Thompson: "The definitive user's guide and complete reference manual for TeX. Probably not needed for casual LaTeX use, but a fascinating book nonetheless." I'll strengthen that by adding that this book is not for the faint of heart. Order here. DonaldKnuth 1986 ISBN 0-201-13444-6 Addison-Wesley 386pp. Bruce Thompson: "The definitive user's guide and reference manual for METAFONT, the companion program to TeX for designing fonts. An excellent work if you're planning to design your own fonts for use in TeX and LaTeX. METAFONT is included with the normal TeX/LaTeX distribution." This book is definitely not for the faint of heart. Order here. BrianKernighan RobPike 1999 ISBN 0-201-61586-X Addison-Wesley An excellent treatise on writing high-quality programs, surely destined to become a classic of the field. Order here. (Second Edition) JonBentley 2000 ISBN 0-201-65788-0 Addison-Wesley These are selected essays from Bentley's column in the Communications of the ACM. He discusses a wide variety of issues in program improvement, often focusing on program efficiency. Order here. JonBentley 1982 ISBN 0-13-970251-2 or 0-13-970244-X Prentice-Hall This book presents Bentley's methodology and set of rules for improving program efficiency, and includes a large number of examples. (Second Edition) BrianKernighan RobPike 1988 ISBN 0-13-110362-8 Addison-Wesley 272pp. The improved second edition, covering ANSI C, of the original classic C book coauthored by C's designer, "K&R". Still the best! SteveHeller 1996 ISBN 0-12-339097-4 Academic Press 508pp. The best introductory book on C++ I have seen. Now available on the Web. DonaldLewine 1992 ISBN 0-937175-73-0 O'Reilly & Associates 607pp. Linux hews very close to the letter of the POSIX standard (non-conformance is considered a bug and swiftly fixed). This excellent reference for POSIX is thus also an excellent reference for the Linux kernel API. Order here. RichardStevens 1992 ISBN 0-201-56317-7 Addison-Wesley A book on general Unix programming that is every bit as good as Stevens's classic on network programming. Michael K.Johnson Erik W.Troan 1998 ISBN 0-201-308215 Addison-Wesley The best single reference to the Linux API. Covers the features that aren't generic Unix or Posix. RichardStevens 1998 ISBN 0-13-490012-X Prentice-Hall Everything you might want to know about the subject. Generally regarded as definitive on the basics. RichardStevens 1998 ISBN 0-13-081081-9 Prentice-Hall Ditto... OlafKirch 1995 ISBN 1-56592-087-2 O'Reilly & Associates Available on the LDP home page, or directly at http://www.linuxdoc.org/LDP/nag/nag.html. An excellent first book on how to maintain and administer a networked Linux system. CraigHunt 1992 ISBN 0-937175-82-X O'Reilly & Associates 472pp. Less Linux-specific than the Kirch book. Features deeper coverage of the TCP/IP core, including routing and BGP. Order here. Second Edition PaulAlbiz CricketLiu 1998 ISBN 1-56592-512-2 502pp. O'Reilly & Associates In-depth coverage of DNS, useful for people running complicated multiple-subnet installations. Covers BIND library programming. Order here. Second Edition BryanCostales EricAllman 1997 ISBN 1-56592-222-0 1050pp. O'Reilly & Associates An exhaustive (and exhausting) guide to Linux's and Unix's default mail-transfer agent. Order here. Maurice J.Bach 1996 ISBN 0-13-201799-7 470pp. Prentice-Hall The book that got Linus started. Order here. Andrew S.Tanenbaum 1987 ISBN 0-13-638677-6 940pp. Prentice-Hall Alan Cox likes this book. Tanenbaum designed Minix, which is the system Linus bootstrapped Linux up from. Order here. RémyCard ÈricDumas FrankMével 1998 ISBN 0-471-98141-9 John Wiley & Sons (Translated from the French language edition of "Programmation Linux 2.0"; same authors; 1997; Éditions Eyrolles; Paris, France.) A very interesting and informative examination of the operation of the kernel that fills in the gap between the POSIX interface and "The Design of the Unix Operating System" and the Linux source code. A good understanding of the design and operation of a Unix OS is a pre-requisite, but this book is an excellent help to going beyond that general understanding into actual work. The primary author is one of the core developers for the ext2 filesystem, and the Linux Kernel book shows a firm grasp of the matter and clear explanations and structure. It's surprisingly readable for something working at such a low level. The book does seem to have suffered a little in the translation to English -- there are a few typos and grammatical mistakes, but it's quite readable. (The code example files are charmingly still named in French.) The book is current to Linux 2.0.35 and foreshadows 2.1 and 2.2. Network protocol implementations are not covered. Michael K.Johnson Linux Documentation Project Available on the LDP home page, or directly at http://linuxdoc.org/LDP/khg/. According to the author, this has been superseded by Alessandro Rubini's book (see below) but it remains a useful supplement. AlessandroRubini 1998 ISBN 1-56592-292-1 O'Reilly & Associates 442pp. Everything you need to know about writing device drivers under Linux; kernel APIs, interrupt handling, the module interface. Includes many examples. Order here. (Second Edition) MichaelBeck HaroldBohme MirkoDziadka UlrichKunitz 1998 ISBN 0-201-33143-8 Addison-Wesley 480pp. A guide to Linux kernel programming; covers 2.0. Covers the architecture of the Linux core and network layer as well as driver construction. Order here. Marshall KirkMcKusick KeithBostic Michael J.Karels John S.Quarterman 1996 ISBN 0-201-54979-4 Addison-Wesley The successor to a classic book on the implementation of the 4.3 BSD kernel, which influenced Linux's design (especially near sockets and networking). This book covers the 4.4BSD base of BSD/OS, FreeBSD, and NetBSD. Order here. Intel Corporation 1986 ISBN 1-55512-022-9 Part I. Applications Programming, data types, memory model, instruction set. Part II. Systems Programming, architecture, memory management, protection, multitasking, I/O, exceptions and interrupts, initialization, coprocessing and multiprocessing. Part III. Compatibility (with earlier x86 machines). Part IV. Instruction Set Intel Corporation 1987 ISBN 1-55512-023-7 This explains the 386 features for operating system writers. It includes a chapter on Unix implementation. A lot of the 80386 architecture seems to have been designed with Multics in mind; the features are not used by DOS or by Unix. John H.Crawford Patrick P.Gelsinger 1987 ISBN 0-89588-381-3 774pp. This is the book the Jolitzes used when they ported BSD to the 386 architecture. Intel Corporation 1986 ISBN 1-55512-024-5 Pin connections, timing, waveforms, block diagrams, voltages, all that kind of stuff. Hans-PeterMessmer 1993 ISBN 0-201-62424-9 1000pp. Addison-Wesley JH: "Covers the more recent stuff like EIDE and PCI." This document is copyright 1999 by Eric S. Raymond. You may use, disseminate, and reproduce it freely, provided you: Do not omit or alter this copyright notice. Do not omit or alter or omit the version number and date. Do not omit or alter the document's pointer to the current WWW version. Clearly mark any condensed, altered or versions as such. These restrictions are intended to protect potential readers from stale or mangled versions. If you think you have a good case for an exception, ask me. This was originally a mini-HOWTO maintained by Jim Haynes. I have changed the emphasis somewhat, trying to make it more a standalone document and less reliant on the various USENET bibliographic postings. The unattributed mini-reviews are mine rather than his.