Product Description

Authoritative prep guide for the Sun Solaris 8 Operating Environment System Administration Part 1 certification exam. Focuses entirely on the Solaris 8 platform. Softcover.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1313522 in Books
• Published on: 2001-10-22
• Released on: 2008-02-02
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

Amazon.com Review
The classic way of breaking into Unix system administration is by getting a job in a university's computer lab, where you keep an eye on machines and users and in the process learn the essentials of what may be the world's most reliable operating system. If you've managed to bypass that career path and still want to prepare yourself for a career in Unix, consider a professional certification. Sun Certified System Administrator for Solaris 8 Study Guide will prepare you for Sun Microsystems' entry-level Solaris certification by teaching you the fundamentals of Unix. You may find this book too basic if you've worked with Solaris or another Unix variant on the job--much of the coverage consists of basic command usage--but you'll welcome its friendly approach if you've not done a lot of work with Unix.

Author Peter Gregory likes to head his sections with task-oriented titles ("Creating Files Using Output Redirection") and then explore the task with a combination of command-line listings and text commentary. He'll typically show a generic case explicitly, then list alternative switches and options as bullet points. This listing method isn't particularly conducive to memorization, but it's OK for reference. More useful for test prep: The mini-quizzes at the end of each chapter, most of whose questions give some facts and ask which of several options is true. --David Wall

Topics covered: The basics of Sun Solaris administration and of Unix administration generally, including file management, user administration, process-watching, kernel recompilation, and troubleshooting.

From the Back Cover

The authoritative prep guide for the Sun Solaris 8 Operating Environment System Administration Part I certification exam!

• The only exam prep guide for the Solaris 8 Operating Environment endorsed by Sun Educational Services!
• Contains self-assessment questions approved by the exam's creators
• Comprehensive coverage of day-to-day system administration
• Security, backup and recovery, installation, disks, troubleshooting, and much more

This start-to-finish guide to the certification exam for the Solaris 8 platform is the only prep guide endorsed by Sun Educational Services—and the only book containing self-assessment questions approved by the exam's creators!

Focused entirely on the Solaris 8 platform, it's both an exceptionally authoritative study guide and an outstanding day-to-day reference for every sysadmin using the latest, most powerful version of the Solaris Operating Environment. Long-time UNIX authority Peter H. Gregory presents comprehensive coverage of essential concepts of the Solaris platform and day-to-day user administration, including:

• Files, file systems, disks, and backup/recovery
• Installation, initialization and shutdown, boot PROMs, and the Solaris platform kernel
• Command syntax, shell commands, and vi editing-including hundreds of real-world examples
• Security, processes, remote communications, and user administration
• Analyzing and troubleshooting hardware and software
• Graphical user interfaces

Whether you're currently preparing for the Sun Solaris 8 Operating Environment certification exam or migrating to the Solaris 8 platform from earlier versions, you won't find a more authoritative, useful resource.

About the Author

PETER H. GREGORY is manager of Security Strategy at AT&T Wireless in Redmond, Washington. He has served as computing systems and security architect, system administrator, network engineer, webmaster, and network software engineer for AT&T Wireless. Previously, he was lead software development engineer for a UNIX-based casino management product. His previous books include Solaris Security (Prentice Hall PTR/Sun Microsystems Press).

Customer Reviews

Useful- but Seriously Flawed
This book is a frustrating one to review, partly because the author did a credible job with 98% of the effort needed to write a good study guide, but failed with the final 2%. I might also note I just passed the first exam for the SCSA, and this book was helpful to that end. But I would feel sorry for anyone who relied on it to learn the Solaris operating system: the proof-reading and editing of this book were just not up to par. The author is a respected member of the Unix community and certainly knows his material. But, because of sloppy editing and inattention to detail, the reader will come across truly amazing facts. Just one example occurs in the section pertaining to cpio. There the reader will learn that,

"cpio performs three functions; they are:

1. Copy in. cpio creates an archive. ...

2. Copy out. cpio reads from an archive. ..."

As anyone familiar with this venerable Unix command knows, the copy out mode creates a cpio archive: the author has the meanings of copy in and copy out reversed. Later in the discussion he corrects his error, but the net effect is one of confusion to the reader. A second example is one could charitably be ascribed to a typo, except that it is repeated numerous times throughout the discussion: the book notes the role played by the vi configuration command "set showmodes". vi has no such command- the correct option is "showmode". A minor point perhaps, but indicative of the manner in which this book has been proofread and edited.

The discussion of shells is quite cursory- probably acceptable given the book's purpose as a study guide, given that Sun, in its infinite wisdom, considers the vi command to be much more important than an understanding of shells when bestowing the SCSA certification. But author discusses only three shells: the Bourne, Korn, and C-Shell. Solaris 8 also comes with the tcsh and zsh shells, which the book fails to mention. In the book's defense, it may be that these shells are not addressed in the certification objectives.

The author spends a considerable amount of ink- and risks drawing undue reader attention to- information lifted from man pages, particularly the more obscure options used on various commands. Now as one who prefers reading from a book than from a screen, I find it useful to have some of these options documented in printed text. But the author makes unsufficient effort to distinguish important options and those rarely used. Despite what one might hear to the contrary, my certification test, at least, did not cover the rarely used options. Much of this is material that a reader whose goal is to pass the certification test could dispense with, even though it could be useful a reference material.

A final gripe- one that could easily have been corrected- appeared repeatedly thoughout this book. The organization follows a well-trod path of describing a command, then giving examples of the command in action, followed by a discussion of the examples. The examples were generally well-chosen, while the discussion frequently follows the format: "the first example illustrates ... the seconds shows ... the third ...". Except by the times you have several examples, the reader may scratch his head wondering which examples pertains to the part of the discussion he is currently reading, particularly if he is reviewing the material. I suppose it would have been extra work to have made it easy for the reader to readily identify which example corresponded to a particular portion of the discussion.

This reviewer also used the Syngress/Osborne book in his test preparation. It had far fewer of the irritating flaws, with less filler than this book. Moveover, the Syngress book has much more in the way of visual aids that make reading a book easier on the eye, and does a better job of pointing out things that are likely to trip up someone taking the cert test. The Syngress book also covers both SCSA exams, making it a better value in this reviewer's opinion. That said, this book does cover the material needed to pass the first of the Sun SCSA certification tests. If you read and absorb what is in this book, you should have no difficulty passing the exam. But the Syngress book is a better choice.

Below-Average Sun Microsystems Press Publication
While the book did cover the necessary objectives as published by Sun Microsystems at time of printing for Solaris 8 (SunOS5.8), the title is misleading. Upon reading the title, the audience is led to think that the text reviews material covered by both Parts I and II of the Sun Certified System Administrator (SCSA) exam, and that is simply not so. The publication covers only Part I.

In addition, it does so with some notable errors, misprints, and typographical errors. The review and editing of the text before publication must have been done with very cursory effort.

In summary, money on a study guide for studying up on the material for the SunOS5.8 exams would be better spent on another publication. I have the greatest respect for Mr. Peter H. Gregory, but this book simply does not live up to his reputation nor Sun's endorsement of this volume as the official study guide.

(By the way, the latest objectives for the exam, Parts I and II, are always available for review at:

suned.sun.com/US/certification/solaris/solaris_exam_objectives.html.)

SCSA Solaris 8 - only covers test 1 of 2
Easy to read; well-organized and illustrated. Not just pictures of man pages; a definite asset for study for the first SCSA test. It covers the Sun objectives for the first test only - it tells you that on the back (not front) cover of the book. If you are looking for a single book that will help you pass both tests, this is not it.