(Part 3) Top products from r/linuxquestions

Many people may disagree with me, but as a Linux user on the younger side of the spectrum, I have to say there was one thing that really worked for me to finally switch for good- books.

There's tons of wikis and forums and of course Reddit to ask questions, but it is hard to get good answers. You may end up paying for books (unless you look on the internet for books) but it doesn't beat having a hard copy in front of you. It boils down to a time vs money trade off. The only wiki I would follow is one directly from the developers that act as documentation, not a community wiki. Also worth nothing certain wikis are more tied to linux and the kernel than others, meaning some are comparable/interchangable with the distro you may be using. Still, a novice would not easily put this together.

Forums are also useless unless you have the configuration mentioned in the post or that forum curates tutorials from a specific build they showcase and you as a user decided to build your system to their specifications. There's way too many variables trying to follow online guides, some of which may be out of date.

This i've realized is very true with things like Iommu grouping and PCI Passthrough for kernel based virtual machines. At that point you start modifying in your root directory, things like your kernel booting parameters and what drivers or hardware you're gonna bind or unbind from your system. While that does boil down to having the right hardware, you have to know what you're digging into your kernel for if you dont follow a guide with the same exact parts that are being passthrough or the cpus or chipsets are different.

Books are especially handy when you have a borked system, like you're in a bash prompt or an initramfs prompt or grub and need to get into a bootable part of the system. Linux takes practice. Sometimes its easier to page through a book than to search through forums.

Another thing about being an intermediate or expert Linux user is that you don't care much about distros or what other users or communities do. It wont matter as under the hood it's all the same, spare the desktop and the package managers. Once you're out of that mentality you just care about getting whatever you want done. I'm not one of those guys that's super gung-ho FOSS and open source. I just use what gets the job done. Also from a security perspective, yes Linux is in theory MORE secure but anything can be hardened or left vulnerable. It's more configuration tied than many uses and forums or threads lead it on to be.

My workload involves talking to servers and quite a bit of programming and scripting, in a variety of capacities. That's what led me to linux over the competitors, but I'm not so prudent to never ever want to use the competitor again or have a computer with it. With understanding Linux more, I use it more as a tool than to be part of the philosophy or community, though that enthusiasm pushes for new developments in the kernel.

I'm assuming you're a novice but comfortable enough in linux to get through certain things:

In any computer related thing, always TEST a deployment or feature first- From your linux system, use KVM or Virtualbox/vmware to spin up a few linux VMs, could even be a copy of your current image. This way any tweaks or things you want to test or try out is in an environment you can start over in.

The quickest way to "intermediate-expert" Linux IMO is learning system administration.

My go to book for this is "The Unix and Linux System Administration Handbook 5th edition"

https://www.amazon.com/UNIX-Linux-System-Administration-Handbook/dp/0134277554/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=The+Unix+and+Linux+System+Administration+Handbook+5th+edition&qid=1564448656&s=books&sr=1-1

This edition is updated recently to cover newer kernel features such as could environments and virtualization. This book also helps when learning BSD based stuff such as MacOS or FreeBSD.

Another good read for a "quick and dirty" understanding of Linux is "Linux Basics for Hackers" It does focus on a very niche distro and talks about tools that are not on all Linux systems BUT it does a good concise overview of intermediate things related to Linux (despite being called a beginners book).

https://www.amazon.com/Linux-Basics-Hackers-Networking-Scripting/dp/1593278551/ref=sr_1_3?crid=396AV036T1Y0Q&keywords=linux+basics+for+hackers&qid=1564448845&s=books&sprefix=linux+bas%2Cstripbooks%2C119&sr=1-3

There's also "How Linux works" but I cannot vouch for this book from personal use, I see it posted across various threads often. Never read this particular one myself.

https://www.amazon.com/How-Linux-Works-2nd-Superuser/dp/1593275676/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2/137-6604082-4373447?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=1593275676&pd_rd_r=feffef24-d3c3-400d-a807-24d8fa39cd1e&pd_rd_w=8GX0o&pd_rd_wg=3AMRB&pf_rd_p=a2006322-0bc0-4db9-a08e-d168c18ce6f0&pf_rd_r=WBQKPADCVSABMCMSRRA1&psc=1&refRID=WBQKPADCVSABMCMSRRA1

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If you want a more programming oriented approach, if you're confortable with the C language, then you can always look at these books:

The Linux Programming Interface

https://www.amazon.com/Linux-Programming-Interface-System-Handbook/dp/1593272200/ref=zg_bs_3866_1?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=5YN3316W22YQ4TSMM967

Unix Network Programming VOL 1.

https://www.amazon.com/Unix-Network-Programming-Sockets-Networking/dp/0131411551/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=Unix+Network+Programming+VOL+1.&qid=1564448362&s=books&sr=1-1

Advanced Programming in the Unix Environment

https://www.amazon.com/Advanced-Programming-UNIX-Environment-3rd/dp/0321637739/ref=zg_bs_3866_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=5YN3316W22YQ4TSMM967

These books would take you to understanding the kernel level processes and make your own and modify your own system.

As many have mentioned, you can go into these things with "Linux from scratch" but it's also feasible to do Linux from scratch by copy/pasting commands. Unless you tinker and fail at certain things (hence do it on a vm before doing it to the main system) you won't learn properly. I think the sysadmin approach is "safer" of the two options but to each their own.

There are a couple things i'd recommend to start with. First, figure out how you learn best. For me it's physical books. I get bored and distracted with videos and pdf's get forgotten about. I'd definitely getting some decent reference material. Here are some of my favorites:

• The Python Pocket Reference
  
  
• The Bash Pocket Reference
  
  
• The Linux Pocket Reference
  
  
• The Linux Bible
  
  
• Literally anything by No Starch Press They're excellent books, fun to read and look great on a shelf.
  
  
  Kali on a raspberry pi is fine but i would not recommend starting with Kali. It's not a beginners Distro. If you can, i'd recommend picking up a cheap 2.5" hard drive for your laptop and swapping it with the Windows drive, or dual booting works too. Install a linux distro and eat your dogfood. Ubuntu and Linux Mint are great for beginners, with Mint and the cinnamon desktop being very similar to Windows 7.
  
  Centos or Fedora are also good. Fedora is based on Red Hat Enterprise linux, so it's very similar to what you'd find in an business enterprise environment. Centos takes it further though. It's literally just RHEL without branding or paid support.
  
  All of these (apart from RHEL) are free and all would be a good jumping off point. The only real difference between them all is the package manager and Desktop environment. Red Hat uses 'yum' while Debian uses 'apt'.
  
  Once you find one you like start practicing. Nearly all utilities you'll find will have a graphical user interface but the command line is always going to be more extensible/powerful. If nothing else get the Linux and Bash pocket references and test administering your own system. Try using the command line for python instead of IDLE. Learn to reboot/shutdown, install/update/upgrade/search with your package manager, try to make your system faster and document everything you do. EVERYTHING.
  
  You'll be a pro in no time.
  
  (I'm serious about the documenting. It's important. If you don't believe me check out some of the stories u/patches765 posts in r/talesfromtechsupport. It's like documentation is his superpower.)

When you say you want to make a simplistic OS, do you mean you want to put together a simplistic Linux distro, or you want to code an OS from scratch?

In former case DSL might be your friend (Damn Small Linux):
http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/. There are other similar distros that might fit under 25 megabyte, google is your friend. As already mentioned by somebody else linuxfromscratch.org is another option. If you go with LFS, you want to look at minimal libraries instead of standard GNU libs for C library and standard system applications. For example you would like to get https://www.uclibc.org/ for c library (or some other similar, there are few) and say busybox https://www.busybox.net/ for your system apps. There other "micro" versions of some popular software (X server etc) which you might wish to consider if you are going completely custom route.

If I was you, I wouldn't do it, since many others have same thoughts as you and have already put effort and hours into making it, so why repeating all that work if you can just get a distro like DSL and install it and simply customize/change what you dislike. If you want it as an educational experience than certainly go for it, LFS might be very rewarding in that case.

If you want to code your own kernel and OS, than you might wish to take a CS class about OS:s, Tanenbaum is your eternal friend:
https://www.amazon.com/Modern-Operating-Systems-Andrew-Tanenbaum/dp/013359162X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1498831929&sr=8-1&keywords=andrew+tanenbaum

https://www.amazon.com/Structured-Computer-Organization-Andrew-Tanenbaum/dp/0132916525/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1498831929&sr=8-4&keywords=andrew+tanenbaum

And don't forget Google ...

Linux or *nix programming in general basically means C programming using system calls. If you are interested in this kind of stuff one of the best books I've ever read on the subject was the Advanced UNIX Programming by Marc Rochkind. Obviously, you have to have a fairly strong C background in order to read this book, but if you want to get into Linux programming this is one of the best books out there in my opinion.

Shell scripting is fine to know (and probably you should) but that doesn't count as Linux programming, the shell is just a tool targeted to the user aka sysadmin to help them manage their system more effectively.

Wow, I honestly didn't expect that to be such touchy subject.

You may find some benefit from this book.

Regarding your response:
My complaints as you put it, are in your mind. I have no significant attachment regarding the outcome of that reference. I used it as an example of a problem insofar as sustainability and waste are concerned.

Your comment regarding a victim complex i'll let pass with this reply: I said many consider that culture, of note is that I never included myself in that grouping and again what would be the point of a discussion if I was included. There wouldn't be any point.

This post has been centered around a singular problem. The level of tacit knowledge to perform basic tasks is too high in linux (in mine, and others opinion) and growing from that discussion has been an unfortunate focus on an attitude issue or culture if you will.
"A projection", as you say, is simply an issue being all in your head (i.e. skewed perception), but others have recognized this very issue being a problem and thus this particular characterization is without merit.

I wouldn't call standing my ground, and calling out bad behavior as being sensitive, though I can see how some might see it that way.
As for ego, I don't have much of that, which I think is a good thing as it allows flexibility in finding solutions others would miss. I do appreciate people staying on topic during a discussion though.

I am familiar with the book. Its a nice piece of philosophy but there are significant issues with its use as a communication tool.

Positive beliefs can have a profound impact on people which is generally considered good, but assuming others will use that same belief to interpret communication is a poor assumption. Its only valid so long as everyone holds that belief, not everyone does, and some say they do when they don't.

A better approach is being specific, and respectful. It goes without saying that going off on tangent when one feels their beliefs are threatened is bad behavior.

Also, I feel I have to correct a notion you put forth about the tree branch in your post. Ambiguous communication isn't one meaning, or the other, its both and then its left up to the person receiving the communication to decide which meaning is correct based on context and what they know of the person.

When one assumes only a single meaning applies, when there is another that is equally valid, it is flawed logic and any subsequent response based upon such a premise is incorrect and not valid.

Additionally, while we are on the subject of flawed logic, fallacy arguments really have no place in intelligent discussion.

You seem intelligent, and so I'm assuming your aware of its uses in manipulating the direction of a conversation. It comes at great risk for one very important fact that is often overlooked.

That fact is that people don't like being manipulated, and it is not uncommon for there to be extreme negative sentiment towards the source once people realize its happened.

A perfect example would be, "how many people do you know like Michael Moore films?"

Best guess not many, his movies quickly lose their allure as one picks up on the subtle tactics used in the films to manipulate the viewer towards that viewpoint.

All that aside, if you have something to discuss that is germane to the topic at hand, please feel free.

Understanding the Linux Kernel is great and, obviously, very specific to Linux.

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Linus has cited that he read Bach's book about the design and implementation of UNIX as inspiration for the development of Linux.

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Read both and really enjoyed them! I hope you like!

Sure - we are working through this right now along with a lot of supplemental material the teacher has put together himself - the book is fine on its own though.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1530506565/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

While you could technically jump straight into this and start messing around with the pen testing applications, I'd strongly recommend working through the book from my original post as you'll have a strong foundation of what you are actually doing and what to do when things go wrong or aren't working exactly right.

We also use this book, however I'd probably not recommend spending the money unless you have worked through both books and really want to get into pen testing. Even then I probably wouldn't recommend it as its just a reference book or "cheat sheet" of popular commands, locations of files like passwords, etc. etc. Its made to be taken out to the field and as a small reference book if you forget something and don't have time for google. We are using it because we are actually doing pen testing in random labs where we walk into a room for the first time and have two hours to exploit various things. Ill link it anyway though just in case:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1494295504/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

There is another book we haven't bought but he may have us pick up and if that happens ill link it as well. Hope this all helped and good luck!


edit: I forgot about this - we will be using some of this once we've finished the second book in a few weeks:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/1787120236/ref=sspa_dk_detail_1?psc=1&pd_rd_i=1787120236&pd_rd_wg=ER8Ij&pd_rd_r=XXN8MBMYPHSMXCBYGQX8&pd_rd_w=lHcrS

This book is freakin awesome, i've used it and it's an amazing start and teaches you all sorts of stuff. I don't know how much information you actually know about the command line but this has helped me a lot. This book I have heard was pretty good but I unfortunatly haven't made my way to reading it. besides those two and actually installing and forcing yourself to use it everday there isn't much else you can do.

I'd recommend the sed & awk O'Reilly book. It's a great guide to sed, as well as getting really comfortable with regular expressions.

You could use the disc that comes with this.

https://www.amazon.com/Hacking-Art-Exploitation-Jon-Erickson/dp/1593271441

Debian or Ubuntu LTS is fine.

Learning to program on Linux would be helpful.

Edit: worth mentioning that Ubuntu is based on Debian.

Try "Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution", by Steven Levy. https://www.amazon.com/Hackers-Heroes-Computer-Revolution-Anniversary/dp/1449388396 . It is not solely focused on Unix, but it tells a lot about the early evolution of computers, and the wizards who made them work. It's been years since I read it, but I recall it being a great read.

>I can troubleshoot problems with my computer by myself.

A helpful resource is the book 'Self Service Linux'. It goes into detail about using the available tools to troubleshoot problems.

>I have a NVIDIA GPU. I don't know if Nouveau is worth using.

If you're not gaming nouveau should be good enough.

Edit: I just did a google search for Self Service Linux expecting to get an Amazon link and instead the first result is a pdf for the complete book. I'm assuming it's OK to put it here.

https://ptgmedia.pearsoncmg.com/images/013147751X/downloads/013147751X_book.pdf

• The Practice of System and Network Administration
  
• UNIX and Linux System Administration Handbook (4th Edition)
  
• Serverfault - What is the single most influential book every sysadmin should read?
  
  That ought to get you started ;)

Reading something like UNIX Sys Admin Handbook couldn't hurt.

Either works. If your trying to land a job working with Linux, read " The Linux Command Line" if you want to understand Linux try "how Linux works"

Also check out "Devops troubleshooting" - https://www.amazon.com/dp/0321832043/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_lhVJzbGBZ02RN

Check out "LPI in a nutshell" - https://www.amazon.com/dp/0596005288/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_NiVJzbQ3C4ZZ1

Thank you, I think I'll give the book a try.
I've also found a more up to date version, but it's not available yet.

http://www.amazon.com/Design-Implementation-FreeBSD-Operating-System/dp/0321968972/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1418830375&sr=8-1&keywords=BSD

http://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Linux-Kernel-Third-Daniel/dp/0596005652/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1418830402&sr=8-1&keywords=kernel

http://www.amazon.com/Linux-Kernel-Development-Robert-Love/dp/0672329468/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1418830420&sr=8-2&keywords=kernel

http://www.amazon.com/Art-Linux-Kernel-Design-Implementation-ebook/dp/B00L2EBELM/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1418830446&sr=8-3&keywords=kernel

http://www.amazon.com/Professional-Kernel-Architecture-Wolfgang-Mauerer/dp/0470343435/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1418830461&sr=8-5&keywords=kernel