Classic Shell Scripting

Automating UNIX and Linux Administration (The Expert's Voice)

sed & awk (2nd Edition)

Mastering UNIX Shell Scripting

Linux Server Hacks

Shell

Wicked Cool Shell Scripts

Format: Paperback
Author: Dave Taylor
ReleaseDate: 15 January, 2004
Publisher: No Starch Press
Rating:

As we say in Maine, "Wicked Good!"
There is one book however that sits on my office desk and has never made it to the library - Wicked Cool Shell Scripts. I have spent thousands of dollars on computer and technical references; I have a library full of them. I have read, referenced and recommended it many times.

The book is extremely informative and is written in such a way that it can be very valuable, whether your a brand new shell script programmer or are an experienced administrator looking for a better way to accomplish a task. I have used ideas and methods from the book to streamline tasks that I do regularly and to improve the scripts I already use. It has been, by far, the best investment in a reference book I have ever made and was enjoyable enough to read cover to cover.

If your IT reference shelf is full, throw something out and fill the space with this book.

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Lots of unnecessary material, and what's good is already available out there
All scripts here use bash--the author rejects csh because of Tom Christiansen's classic essay "Csh Programming Considered Harmful" and the Korn shell because he considers it fine for interactive use but not so good for scripting. WICKED COOL SHELL SCRIPTS is a collection of pre-made bash scripts for various tasks similar to one of O'Reilly's "cookbooks".

The basic format of each entry is first the problem--what the user wants to do--then the code, followed sometimes by an explanation and advice on hacking the code. The book is not really an introduction to Bash scripting. If you want a systematic primer I'd recommend O'Reilly's LEARNING THE BASH SHELL or any of a dozen libre tutorials.

Some of the scripts are useful and solve problems I've occasionally faced. For example, the GNU units program can't do temperature conversions, but a script is given here which uses bc to provide a solution. Quite elegant is a script with which the user can find the time anywhere in the world by querying in a friendly manner the system's zoneinfo files. In spite of some neat gimmicks, however, I don't think I can really recommend the book unless you're someone about to take a voyage on the south seas and won't have Internet access. Many of these scripts can be found on the Web, and far too many scripts here solve problems already long solved by available programs. The author describes a secure version of locate, when slocate is already easily installable on most *nix systems. A script for rotating log files is done when metalog and other common log programs do this automatically. Take out all these unnecessary scripts, and the amount of useful content in the book turns out to be very low indeed.

Inspiring and a great reference, too
It's written clearly and simply enough for almost anyone to understand it, and anyone will find some use for at least a few of the scripts presented. I'd recommend this book highly for anyone who wants to understand scripting even just a little bit, or just be more of a power-user of Linux, Unix, or OS X. For more hardcore scripters, it may not have anything new in the code, but the book's approach to automating tasks is still pretty inspiring.

I'm an IT Manager with a lot of experience in admin, less in programming. But how can you avoid having to understand shell scripting? You can't, but like everything else, if you do it rarely it's hard to remember everything--and you don't always think "I can write a script to do that" even when it's the best solution to a problem.

Mostly in the past I've only edited existing scripts, or written half-baked ones to automate a single repetitive task (for file in * . . . ). Since buying this book, I'm saving myself time and even making a little money writing scripts, and I'm thoroughly enjoying every minute of it. I feel like I'm getting smarter again, and this book is a big part of that.

I think it'll also be especially helpful to OS X users who want to be more knowledgeable about Unix and what their computers are capable of now. Other good targets are webmasters, administrators of small to medium-sized networks (including home networks), and anyone who just wants to be more of a power-user.

You know what I like best about this book? It reminds me of the time when the computer users I knew ALL knew how to program--when the point of using a computer was to program it. We're still there, we just forgot about it. You can be that powerful of a user, still, and this book will get you there.