266 lines
6.8 KiB
HTML
266 lines
6.8 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
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<HTML
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><HEAD
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><TITLE
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>Introduction</TITLE
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><META
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NAME="GENERATOR"
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CONTENT="Modular DocBook HTML Stylesheet Version 1.7"><LINK
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REL="HOME"
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TITLE="Linux System Administrators Guide"
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TITLE="Typographical Conventions"
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TITLE="Linux or GNU/Linux, that is the question."
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><TR
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><TH
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COLSPAN="3"
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ALIGN="center"
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>Linux System Administrators Guide: </TH
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></TR
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><TR
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><TD
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WIDTH="10%"
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ALIGN="left"
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><A
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ACCESSKEY="P"
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>Prev</A
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>Next</A
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><HR
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ALIGN="LEFT"
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WIDTH="100%"></DIV
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><DIV
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CLASS="CHAPTER"
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><H1
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><A
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NAME="INTRO"
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></A
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>Chapter 1. Introduction</H1
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><DIV
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CLASS="TOC"
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><DL
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><DT
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><B
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>Table of Contents</B
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></DT
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><DT
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>1.1. <A
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HREF="gnu-or-not.html"
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>Linux or GNU/Linux, that is the question.</A
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></DT
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><DT
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>1.2. <A
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HREF="x186.html"
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>Trademarks</A
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></DT
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></DL
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></DIV
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><A
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NAME="AEN143"
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></A
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><BLOCKQUOTE
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CLASS="BLOCKQUOTE"
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><P
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><SPAN
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CLASS="QUOTE"
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>"In the beginning, the file was without
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form, and void; and emptiness was upon the face of the bits.
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And the Fingers of the Author moved upon the face of the
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keyboard. And the Author said, Let there be words, and there
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were words."</SPAN
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></P
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></BLOCKQUOTE
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><P
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>The Linux System Administrator's Guide,
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describes the system administration aspects of using Linux.
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It is intended for people who know next to nothing about system
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administration (those saying ``what is it?''), but who have already
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mastered at least the basics of normal usage. This manual
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doesn't tell you how to install Linux; that is described in the
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Installation and Getting Started document. See below for more
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information about Linux manuals.</P
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><P
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>System administration covers all the things that you have to
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do to keep a computer system in usable order. It includes
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things like backing up files (and restoring them if necessary),
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installing new programs, creating accounts for users (and deleting
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them when no longer needed), making certain that the filesystem
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is not corrupted, and so on. If a computer were, say, a house,
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system administration would be called maintenance, and would
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include cleaning, fixing broken windows, and other such things.
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</P
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><P
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>The structure of this manual is such that many of the
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chapters should be usable independently, so if you need information
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about backups, for example, you can read just that chapter. However,
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this manual is first and foremost a tutorial and can be read
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sequentially or as a whole.</P
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><P
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>This manual is not intended to be used completely
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independently. Plenty of the rest of the Linux documentation is also
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important for system administrators. After all, a system
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administrator is just a user with special privileges and duties.
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Very useful resources are the manual pages, which should always be
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consulted when you are not familiar with a command. If you do not
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know which command you need, then the <B
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CLASS="COMMAND"
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>apropos</B
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>
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command can be used. Consult its manual page for more details.</P
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><P
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>While this manual is targeted at Linux, a general principle
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has been that it should be useful with other UNIX based operating
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systems as well. Unfortunately, since there is so much variance
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between different versions of UNIX in general, and in system
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administration in particular, there is little hope to cover
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all variants. Even covering all possibilities for Linux is
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difficult, due to the nature of its development.</P
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><P
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>There is no one official Linux distribution, so different
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people have different setups and many people have a setup they
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have built up themselves. This book is not targeted at any
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one distribution. Distributions can and do vary considerably.
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When possible, differences have been noted and alternatives
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given. For a list of distributions
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and some of their differences see
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<A
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HREF="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Linux_distributions"
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TARGET="_top"
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> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_Linux_distributions</A
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>.
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</P
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><P
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>In trying to describe how things work, rather than just
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listing ``five easy steps'' for each task, there is much information
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here that is not necessary for everyone, but those parts are marked
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as such and can be skipped if you use a preconfigured system.
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Reading everything will, naturally, increase your understanding of
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the system and should make using and administering it more
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productive.</P
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><P
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>Understanding is the key to success with Linux. This book
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could just provide recipes, but what would you do when confronted by
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a problem this book had no recipe for? If the book can provide
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understanding, then recipes are not required. The answers will be self
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evident.</P
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><P
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>Like all other Linux related development, the work
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to write this manual was done on a volunteer basis: I did it because
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I thought it might be fun and because I felt it should be done.
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However, like all volunteer work, there is a limit to how much time,
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knowledge and experience people have. This means that the manual is
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not necessarily as good as it would be if a wizard had been paid
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handsomely to write it
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and had spent millennia to perfect it. Be warned.</P
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><P
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>One particular point where corners have been cut is that
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many things that are already well documented in other freely
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available manuals are not always covered here. This applies
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especially to program specific documentation, such as all the
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details of using <B
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CLASS="COMMAND"
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>mkfs</B
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>. Only the purpose of the
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program and as much of its usage as is necessary for the purposes of
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this manual is described. For further information, consult these
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other manuals. Usually, all of the referred to documentation is
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part of the full Linux
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documentation set.</P
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></DIV
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><DIV
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CLASS="NAVFOOTER"
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><HR
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ALIGN="LEFT"
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><TR
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><TD
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WIDTH="33%"
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ALIGN="left"
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VALIGN="top"
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><A
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HREF="typo-conventions.html"
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ACCESSKEY="P"
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>Prev</A
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></TD
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><TD
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ALIGN="center"
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VALIGN="top"
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><A
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HREF="index.html"
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ACCESSKEY="H"
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>Home</A
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></TD
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><TD
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VALIGN="top"
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><A
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HREF="gnu-or-not.html"
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ACCESSKEY="N"
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>Next</A
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></TD
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></TR
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><TR
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><TD
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WIDTH="33%"
|
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ALIGN="left"
|
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VALIGN="top"
|
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>Typographical Conventions</TD
|
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><TD
|
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WIDTH="34%"
|
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ALIGN="center"
|
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VALIGN="top"
|
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> </TD
|
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><TD
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WIDTH="33%"
|
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ALIGN="right"
|
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VALIGN="top"
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>Linux or GNU/Linux, that is the question.</TD
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></TR
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></DIV
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></BODY
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></HTML
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> |