Buy it now

By Ben Gerber
The Official Ubuntu Book, brought to you by a number of folks who actively write or document Ubuntu and is a great book for those looking to move from OSX or Windows to Ubuntu. If you’re a novice or intermediate Ubuntu user then this book is for you. If you consider yourself an expert, you can still pick up a few things but most of what you’ll find here, you’ll already know.

The book starts with a an interesting introduction written by Mark Shuttleworth giving a light explanation of why he started the Ubuntu project and a few of his thoughts on the Open Source movement in general.

The book is divided into nine chapters which bring users through an explanation of OSS and a history of how the Ubuntu project got started, installation, using Ubuntu, Ubuntu Server, Kubuntu, administration, troubleshooting and how to become involved in the community.

In addition to this there are four appendices covering the command line, the Ubuntu Foundation documents, the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Open Publication License and Ubuntu equivalents to Windows programs.

This book isn’t as weighty as other Linux tomes I’ve encountered. For what it is, I feel that this is a good thing. It’s not intimidating in the least. It’s written in a friendly and intelligent style that assumes the reader isn’t an expert but is capable of picking up a new OS rather quickly.

The chapters are very concise, and while it would be impossible to cover every aspect of any Linux distribution in a single, 450 page book, the authors cover all of the essentials and touch on a great deal more besides. This gives the user a solid foundation in running Ubuntu and the tools and knowledge to seek out further information.

The troubleshooting section is at first a bit daunting, but a quick read through shows clear and concise answers to many of the major problems (video, networking, modems, file-system) that end users may come up against.

The server section is a bit light, but then the aim of this book isn’t to create a Linux sysadmin, but to inform folks about Ubuntu and to a lesser extent to dispel the myth that Ubuntu is a desktop only distribution.

The book is full of links pointing to further reading, community sites and external documentation that users and sysadmins alike will find helpful. There’s also an interesting section on how the Ubuntu project works, from it’s philosophy to it’s structure, as well as ways to get involved.

Pros: Well written in an easy to follow format. Full of information for folks new to Linux or just new to Ubuntu. Even non-technical users would find this a very helpful resource.

Cons: Writing about an OS with a 6 month release schedule is a bit tricky. This book will be a bit out of date later this month as far as Edgy Eft is concerned, however 6.06 LTS will be around until late 2009 meaning this book will still be relevant for the next three years.

So should you go out and buy this book? If you’re a Linux/Ubuntu expert then you can probably forgo it. Anyone else who’s interested in Ubuntu either as a primary operating system, or as a means to learn a lot more about Linux should pick this up. It’s a great reference and has everything you’ll need from install to working productively in one easy place. It also comes with the Ubuntu 6.06 LTS DVD, saving the new user from trying to download and burn a copy – a time saver in the least.