Jon's Blurb for Think Unix

I had to write this book: I tried not to, but there was no getting around it. Unfortunately, most introductions to Unix stink: they spend lots of time trying to get you to learn all sorts of meaningless details about how to run a particular command.

What they never did was give you a framework so that you could learn Unix on your own.

That is, most Unix tutorials are like phrasebooks: they contain a number of predigested commands that you are obligated to memorize and repeat without any deep understanding of why. Think Unix tries to be more like a language textbook: sure, you learn some vocabulary (ie, individual commands), but what's important is that you learn how to put it all together to do new things, to think thoughts that the writers of a phrasebook could never imagine.

The first thing the book does is teach you how to teach yourself: the entire first chapter is dedicated to learning how to read and where to find the right documentation. Most computer people think that everyone is born knowing how to interpret documentation, but it's not the case: it is a learned skill, and it can be taught.

If it's not obvious, I'm very excited by this approach. If it excites you too, then this is probably the Unix book for you. It assumes that you've used a computer before and that you're fairly comfortable learning new applications, sometimes without documentation. If you're the sort of person who clicks through the menus in your word processor to find the feature that you want, if you sometimes click on something just to find out what it does, this is the book for you. It assumes no prior Unix experience and is in general very approachable.

There's stuff in here for Unix experts too, but it's not a book about system administration. It's a book for new users who want to understand what's going on, why things work the way they do, and how to get the most out of the system: it's for readers who want to learn to Think Unix.

My Think Unix page is here.

Jon Lasser <jon@lasser.org>
130 Harvard Ave E. #615, Seattle, WA 98102
AIM: jonathanlasser

Last Modified: Sunday, 30-Jan-2005 21:41:15 EST