Rock River Linux Users Group - Book Reviews
Essential System Administration by Eileen Frish   Oreilly Publishing
ISBN:

How do you become a systems administrator the young neophyte asks.... Well you can go to school.... No you really can't do that because there are very few programs that teach this sort of thing. In the meantime, you can self-educate. There are a growing number of books that have appeared on the scene in the last few years,  that specifically address the issue of Unix/Linux systems administration. One of the best general purpose books that I've found is "Essential System Administration" 3rd. Edition, by Eileen Frisch.

I have seen this book before, but I never had the opportunity to read it very carefully. Last year I taught an Advanced Unix class. I needed to look for some reasonable texts which captured the essence of system administration, its tasks, and suggestions for developing good professional habits. Ms. Frisch's book was one I chose.

The  problem with texts that cover Systems Administration is the spectrum that must be addressed.. Linux is helping level consolidate the  systems administration field, but there are still many variants of Unix that must be covered. I found Essential System Administration to cover many of the points that should be generically known by any competent systems administrator. It is divided into topical areas such as "The Unix Way", "Backup and Recovery", or "Printing". The approach means that someone can literally make use of this book immediately without having to read it cover to cover first.  The coverage of topics is pretty thorough.

Thorough it may be, Essential System Administration doesn't contain all the answers. It couldn't nor should it, but be warned that you may find commands that are not included in this book. These omissions are in no way a statement that the book fails its task. Like I said previously, I have used this as a textbook in a college class on advance Unix, and I will continue to do so. If you are a fledgling Unix System Administrator you must include this book in your library......


Rating:  3.5 out 5

Linux Security Cookbook by Barrett, Silverman, and Byrnes Oreilly Publishing
ISBN:  0-596-00391-9

In our current, fast-paced world it seems that there is never enough time to allow for learning new and innovative techniques to help do your job. Sadly, computer security is no exception. First, you have the technology which is doing everything except standing still. Second, we look at the enormity surrounding any computer issue and we see that computer security is changing and evolving faster then anything. Books can't normally keep up with the pace of technology changes and if they get lucky and do stay current they are typically so dry that we would rather use then as a sedative instead  of a learning tool.

Linux Security Handbook is the exception to the rule. Instead of being as long as "War and Peace", we find a book that is 311 pages long and in which any topic can be covered very quickly. There are 9 chapters that cover most current Linux security topic areas. Within each chapter we find a series of sub-sections that are designed to be more like recipes for security instead of exhaustive analysises of security techniques. You might ask the question first off if this is a bad direction. I can answer by saying if you are a busy Linux administrator with many machines to support and little time, this book is just right. If on the other hand you are trying to learn every theory or technique of breaking into a Linux box  then it is the wrong tool. Compare the books's approach to a textbook on Statistics. A Mathematics major will want a Statistics textbook that will show you how you ultimately derive all the cool Statistics equations that are used prevalently for research while a Psychology major will only  want the equations. Linux Security Cookbook is a tool for applied Linux security techniques.

The Chapter 1  begins with what every systems administrator should do with a new system, namely take a snapshot using "tripwire", of its current state. You have no idea how many administrators don't make the time to do this. Justifications are many, but omitting this step is just plain laziness. We hear that being lazy is sometimes good, well not at this point. The step can be omitted if the machine is sitting at home and not connected to the Internet, but all other situations should be baselined. The value of this step won't be seen right away, however if you ever suspect a break-in has occurred it will provide a reference point for comparison. By periodically, checking against the snapshot you will also be able to pinpoint when a break in has occurred.

Chapter 2 goes into IPCHAINS and IPTABLES administration. You may not need this if you are not running a Linux based firewall, but if you do need it, you will find a good collection or tips and hints. Chapter 3 goes into Network Access Control. How many times have you installed a new system and suddenly realized that once you went back to your office and tried to connect using something like rlogin that the protocol was turned off. Chapter 3 will help you understand what you need to do to help control network access to your system. By the way, I in no way endorse the use of the insecure rlogin or the other r-command tools.

Chapter 4 delves into the world of Authentication Techniques and Infrastructure. Here we go into issues like the use of Kerberos or configuring ssl. These are important techniques, particularly if you are working within a larger organization that uses the Internet and also wants to keep a great degree of control over who can connect your equipment.

Chapter 5 starts getting really practical for the run of the mill systems administrator. Here we go into details discussing the proper configuration for password files, using sudo, and limiting root access. The topics in this section are very important if you want to make sure that your system is secured to a controllable detail.

Chapter 6 discusses a topic that people tend to forget, the topic of Protecting Outgoing Network Connections. If the connection is outbound why do I care. Well lets see there could be the proprietary information that you send out occasionally in the form of login authtication data, passwords, credit card numbers, or other important information.  This chapter will show the best way to keep things secure using ssh, sftp, and scp.

Chapter 7 takes us into the area of file level security. Ever wanted to learn about gnupg? This chapter is one of the longest, but it provides a lot of data that can be invaluable in a dynamic systems environment. Chapter 8 gets us to protecting email. The author does a good job of looking at a number of different major mail clients that an average user might use under linux. The only mailer that was absent was kmail, and while I don't use it personally I was still surprised to find the omission.

Chapter 9 is the longest chapter and the one that deals with testing and monitoring the security settings of a system. There are 42 different sections which run the gamut from detection suspicions account activity to filling out  a security incident report. You will learn how to  monitor conditions on your system then use the syslog daemon to log suspicious activity. There are many keys in this chapter to help keep your system running smoothly.

Linux Security Cookbook is very convenient and handy. It approaches security issues as a series of recipes that can be used to cook up a solution for your security needs. If you are looking for a book that explains all the issues and nuances around a security topic then this is the wrong book. On the other hand if you want a quick solution to help protect against a problem of possibly to help identify a problem then this book is for you.

 Rating:  3.5 out 5

Ruby In a Nutshell by Matsumoto Oreilly Publishing
ISBN:

Rating: 

SSH
ISBN:
 Rating: 


Unix Power Tools by Powers, Peek, Loukides  & Oreilly Publishing
ISBN:

Rating:  3.5 out 5

Best viewed with an Open, Standards Compliant Browser