Product Description

This is a guide to figuring out the BSD Unix system and Mac-specific components that are making your life difficult and to help ease you into the Unix inside Mac OS X. The book includes such topics as: a quick overview of the Terminal application; understanding open directory (LDAP) and NetInfo; issues related to using the GNU C Compiler 9 GCC; library linking and porting Unix software; an overview of Mac OSX?s filesystem and startup processes; creating and installing packages using Fink; building the Darwin kernel; and running X Windows on top of Mac OS X. The book wraps up with a quick manpage-style reference to the "Missing Manual Pages" - commands that come with Mac OSX although there are no manpages.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #789944 in Books
• Published on: 2002-10-10
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 216 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
It's about time: Mac OS X for Unix Geeks arrives on the scene none too soon for UNIX aficionados who, having heard that the latest editions of Mac OS are based on a UNIX variant, want to see how the platform compares to more venerable versions of the eminently configurable operating system. This book highlights some key differences between the Darwin environment and more conventional UNIXs, enabling people with UNIX experience to take advantage of it as they learn the Mac OS X way of doing things at the command line.

This slim volume neither aims to teach its readers UNIX nor introduces them to the Mac, but rather to show how Apple has implemented UNIX. It's a fast read that assumes--as the title implies--rather a lot of UNIX knowledge. With that requirement satisfied and this book in hand, you're likely to discover aspects of Aqua much more quickly than you otherwise would have.

The authors spend lots of time explaining how administrative tasks--such as managing groups, users and passwords--are handled in the Mac OS environment. They document netinfo fully, and call attention to its limitations (such as its inability to create home directories for users) by explaining how to do the job on the command line. They also cover C programming in the Darwin universe at greater length than any other book, providing explicit instructions for such important tasks as creating header files and linking static libraries. A guide to the command line (they call the reference section "The Missing Manpages") provides good value at this book's conclusion. --David Wall, Amazon.com

Review
"Vital starting point for UNIX power-users new to Mac OS X." Computer Shopper, July (5 stars)

From the Publisher
If you're one of the many Unix developers drawn to Mac OS X for its BSD core, you'll find yourself in surprisingly unfamiliar territory. Even if you're an experienced Mac user, Mac OS X is unlike earlier Macs, and it's radically different from the Unix you've used before, too.

Enter "Mac OS X for Unix Geeks" by Brian Jepson and Ernest E. Rothman, two Unix geeks who found themselves in the same place you are. Their new book is your guide to figuring out the BSD Unix system and Mac-specific components that are making your life difficult and to help ease you into the Unix inside Mac OS X.