Essential System Administration, Third Edition

SSH, The Secure Shell: The Definitive Guide

Administration

Practical Unix & Internet Security, 3rd Edition

Format: Paperback
Author: Simson Garfinkel
ReleaseDate: 28 February, 2003
Publisher: O'Reilly Media
Rating:

Excellent Guide
Excellent Security Guide to day to day security issues at my workplace. This book is just what I was looking for. Information about TPC and UDP ports and their security risks have been very useful.

This book must be part of every UNIX System Security Profesional.

Order a wrong edition
So I end up in buying 2 books, 2nd and 3rd editions, because I need the 3rd edition for my class. I saw that there is a bargain of another paperback edition on the page of 3rd edition, so I didn't recheck whether it is 3rd edition. It would be better to put edition number up in the page, not only paperback or library binding! .

A mile wide, several inches deep, great for filling in gaps
As some point out, you can probably find everything in this book online, but then again you can find anything online, so why buy any books at all? I don't like giving 5 stars; this book left me no choice. I hate to repeat the cliche, but if you can only buy one security book this year and you are a *nix geek, this should be it, hands down.

The strength of this book lies in several areas. First, the authors probably have 50+ years experience between them and it shows. You really get the impression that they've "been there, done that". But they don't try and "wow" you with their intelligence and they aren't condescending, in fact they write quite clearly.

The "mile wide" crack I made in the title refers to the fact that this book covers everything from physical security and social engineering, to how to setup up integrity checking with tripwire and use PAM. Basically I found this book to be invaluable because while I could breeze through certain sections, there was a ton of material that I needed more knowledge about, but either never got around to it, or didn't even know I was lacking. An example is NFS. I knew I needed more background about NFS because I work in infosec, but every place I've ever worked has banned NFS outright, which makes it a little more difficult to learn. . . . Another 2 technologies pop into my mind: LDAP and PAM. I knew what they were, but now I know how to set up the basics and can branch out on my own.

In our infosec world it's simply not possible to know everything. This book gives the reader a solid grounding in a ton of stuff, which enables him to go out and Google around intelligently for more advanced information. In a pinch it can also be used as an anti-theft device since it weighs in at 900+ pages and is quite heavy.