Fedora is one of the more popular distributions of Linux, and like any flavor of Linux has it's own taste. Being a community version sponsored by RedHat, it is a well established distribution of Linux and will continue to be in the forseeable future. Therefore, a premise for the book certainly exists, and given that Fedora doesn't offer RedHat's documentation and support, it's handy to have a book that assists people with Fedora Linux.
The author states in the Preface:
...The book is written for experienced computer users, regardless of their previous experience with Linux. It covers both desktop and server configurations , and is ideally suited to an administrator or power user migrating from another environment, such as Windows, Mac OS X, or Unix...
The book is targeted for Fedora Core 6; the author claims that it should be useful to users of Fedora Core 5 and Fedora Core 7 as well. That's a reasonable assumption; I tossed Fedora Core 6 on one of my machines and swung right in, getting my hands a little dirty within the 608 pages.
Between the covers, the author is thorough - even pointing people to Red Hat's commercial distribution of Linux if they are likely to need more than community support. That's something one rarely sees in a book related to learning to use an operating system, and in this instance it is commendable.
The installation section does a good job of walking the new user through obtaining and installing Fedora. The trick of defragmenting a Microsoft Windows partition for dual booting might be in there, but I seem to have missed it - and it is good practice to defragment before dual booting. Maybe resizing the Windows partitions does this for you nowadays, I am not sure. Chapter 10, Advanced Installation, is referred to for more involved installations.
Chapters 2 through 9 cover the Fedora desktop, using Fedora on your notebook, basic system management, package management, storage administration, network services, securing your system and an introduction to the Fedora Community.
While I did go through the book, I spent most of my time playing in Chapter 7 with network servers - probably my weakest point with Linux. I successfully set up the CUPs Print Server the first time by following the instructions, which to me is of great value. I'd tried a few years ago and somehow... never managed to finish it. Now I'm CUPs qualified. Lookout.
Overall, I came away impressed mainly with the author's ability to engage the reader (me); most of the book seemed like a conversation where most of the questions I would have were answered before I asked them. That sort of writing is invaluable in an introductory book to... anything. Whenever I fiddled with something by using the book, I came away with a smile. While it's difficult to judge whether an absolutely new Linux user would find the book as friendly, I have seen and read much more unfriendly documentation. The consistency of pointing to additional resources throughout the book was not lost on me; things change and doing that assures that the book is less likely to be dated quickly.
Chris Tyler did an outstanding job of lining up the nuts and bolts so that the reader can connect them - and with more than adequate links to further resources, the value of the book is well within the limits of it's cost. If you're Fedora-curious and want a nice 'HOW-TO' book next to you, this is definitely your book. Fedora Linux: A Complete Guide to Red Hat's Community Distribution
Chris Tyler did an outstanding job of lining up the nuts and bolts so that the reader can connect them - and with more than adequate links to further resources, the value of the book is well within the limits of it's cost. If you're Fedora-curious and want a nice 'HOW-TO' book next to you, this is definitely your book. Fedora Linux: A Complete Guide to Red Hat's Community Distribution
Nov 11, 2006 by Taran Rampersad
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