Mark G. Sobell - A Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Since Im in an educational environment, I found the content of Sobells book to be right on target and very helpful for anyone managing Linux in the enterprise. His style of writing is very clear. He builds up to the chapter exercises, which I find to be relevant to real-world scenarios a user or admin would encounter. An IT/IS student would find this book a valuable complement to their education. The vast amount of information is extremely well balanced and Sobell manages to present the content without complicated asides and meandering prose. This is a must have for anyone managing Linux systems in a networked environment or anyone running a Linux server. I would also highly recommend it to an experienced computer user who is moving to the Linux platform.

Mary Norbury
IT Director
Barbara Davis Center
University of Colorado at Denver
from a review posted on slashdot.org

I had the chance to use your UNIX books when I when was in college years ago at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, CA. I have to say that your books are among the best! Theyre quality books that teach the theoretical aspects and applications of the operating system.

Benton Chan
IS Engineer

The book has more than lived up to my expectations from the many reviews I read, even though it targets FC2. I have found something very rare with your book: It doesnt read like the standard technical text, it reads more like a story. Its a pleasure to read and hard to put down. Did I say that?! :-)

David Hopkins
Business Process Architect

Thanks for your work and for the book you wrote. There are really few books that can help people to become more efficient administrators of different workstations. We hope (in Russia) that you will continue bringing us a new level of understanding of Linux/UNIX systems.

Anton Petukhov

Mark Sobell has written a book as approachable as it is authoritative.

Jeffrey Bianchine
Advocate, Author, Journalist

Excellent reference book, well suited for the sysadmin of a Linux cluster, or the owner of a PC contemplating installing a recent stable Linux. Dont be put off by the daunting heft of the book. Sobell has striven to be as inclusive as possible, in trying to anticipate your system administration needs.

Wes Boudville
Inventor

A Practical Guide to Red Hat Linux is a brilliant book. Thank you Mark Sobell.

C. Pozrikidis
University of California at San Diego

This book presents the best overview of the Linux operating system that I have found.... [It] should be very helpful and understandable no matter what the readers background: traditional UNIX user, new Linux devotee, or even Windows user. Each topic is presented in a clear, complete fashion and very few assumptions are made about what the reader knows.... The book is extremely useful as a reference, as it contains a 70-page glossary of terms and is very well indexed. It is organized in such a way that the reader can focus on simple tasks without having to wade through more advanced topics until they are ready.

Cam Marshall
Marshall Information Service LLC
Member of Front Range UNIX
Users Group [FRUUG]
Boulder, Colorado

Conclusively, this is THE book to get if you are a new Linux user and you just got into RH/Fedora world. Theres no other book that discusses so many different topics and in such depth.

Eugenia Loli-Queru
Editor in Chief
OSNews.com

This book is a very useful tool for anyone who wants to look under the hood so to speak, and really start putting the power of Linux to work. What I find particularly frustrating about man pages is that they never include examples. Sobell, on the other hand, outlines very clearly what the command does and then gives several common, easy-to-understand examples that make it a breeze to start shell programming on ones own. As with Sobells other works, this is simple, straightforward, and easy to read. Its a great book and will stay on the shelf at easy arms reach for a long time.

Ray Bartlett
Travel Writer

Overall I found this book to be quite excellent, and it has earned a spot on the very front of my bookshelf. It covers the real guts of Linuxthe command line and its utilitiesand does so very well. Its strongest points are the outstanding use of examples, and the Command Reference section. Highly recommended for Linux users of all skill levels. Well done to Mark Sobell and Prentice Hall for this outstanding book!

Dan Clough
Electronics Engineer and
Slackware Linux User

Totally unlike most Linux books, this book avoids discussing everything via GUI and jumps right into making the power of the command line your friend.

Bjorn Tipling
Software Engineer
ask.com

This book is the best distro-agnostic, foundational Linux reference Ive ever seen, out of dozens of Linux-related books Ive read. Finding this book was a real stroke of luck. If you want to really understand how to get things done at the command line, where the power and flexibility of free UNIX-like OSes really live, this book is among the best tools youll find toward that end.

Chad Perrin
Writer, TechRepublic

I currently own one of your books, A Practical Guide to Linux. I believe this book is one of the most comprehensive and, as the title says, practical guides to Linux I have ever read. I consider myself a novice and I come back to this book over and over again.

Albert J. Nguyen

Thank you for writing a book to help me get away from Windows XP and to never touch Windows Vista. The book is great; I am learning a lot of new concepts and commands. Linux is definitely getting easier to use.

James Moritz

I am so impressed by how Mark Sobell can approach a complex topic in such an understandable manner. His command examples are especially useful in providing a novice (or even an advanced) administrator with a cookbook on how to accomplish real-world tasks on Linux. He is truly an inspired technical writer!

George Vish II
Senior Education Consultant
Hewlett-Packard Company

Overall, I think its a great, comprehensive Ubuntu book thatll be a valuable resource for people of all technical levels.

John Dong
Ubuntu Forum Council Member
Backports Team Leader

The JumpStart sections really offer a quick way to get things up and running, allowing you to dig into the details of the book later.

Scott Mann
Aztek Networks

I would so love to be able to use this book to teach a class about not just Ubuntu or Linux but about computers in general. It is thorough and well written with good illustrations that explain important concepts for computer usage.

Nathan Eckenrode
New York Local Community Team

Ubuntu is gaining popularity at the rate alcohol did during Prohibition, and its great to see a well-known author write a book on the latest and greatest version. Not only does it contain Ubuntu-specific information, but it also touches on general computer-related topics, which will help the average computer user to better understand whats going on in the background. Great work, Mark!

Daniel R. Arfsten
Pro/ENGINEER Drafter/Designer

I read a lot of Linux technical information every day, but Im rarely impressed by tech books. I usually prefer online information sources instead. Mark Sobells books are a notable exception. Theyre clearly written, technically accurate, comprehensive, and actually enjoyable to read.