So I was just cleaning out my closet and a little book fell out that I
think everyone entering the Unix/Linux world should read. It is
informative and entertaining at the same time, and perhaps would help
people coming over from Windows or even Mac backgrounds to understand
some things about why Linux is the way it is. The book is:
_In the Beginning Was the Command Line_, by Neal Stephenson (and if you
haven't read his works of fiction, specifically Cryptonomicon, you owe
it to yourself to check that out, too!).
Anyway, he has a great analogy of Unix-like systems: the Milwaukee Hole
Hawg drill. Read on and prepare to laugh:
http://www.spack.org/wiki/InTheBeginningWasTheCommandLine#head-62039bc67006079c7cf85da7d41bfefe9f9a0bc7
His description of trembling a bit before picking up the Hole Hawg
reminds me of my feelings of trepidation after logging in as root on
someone's mission-critical Linux box for the first time, and seeing that
cursor blinking there waiting to execute my every command...
:)
--
pkm ~ http://paulmcnett.com
©2007 Paul McNett |
