Digital UNIX System Administrator's Guide
Tru64 UNIX (a.k.a. Digital UNIX) system administration for beginners.
TABLE OF CONTENTS Digital UNIX System Administrator's Guide
Chapter 1: Introduction to Digital UNIX System Administration
OVERVIEW
For all the advances in computing architectures and operating systems, complex computers still require a great deal of care and feeding. No operating system typifies this statement more than UNIX. UNIX is a mature operating system that runs on a wide range of systems from small single-user desktops to the world's fastest supercomputers. The broad spectrum of applications that run on UNIX range from banking and financial applications to telecommunications and manufacturing processes. Simply put, UNIX is everywhere. However, for all its success in the marketplace and all the development work the various UNIX vendors lavish on fancy graphical user interfaces and dynamic this and automatic that, a UNIX system still, almost thirty years after its creation, cannot manage itself. Enter the UNIX System Administrator.
1.1 WHAT IS UNIX SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION?
A UNIX system administrator is the individual whose responsibility it is to manage the complex collection of hardware and software that is a UNIX system. The UNIX operating system comprises a wide variety of services and processes that must be kept running and available and equally distributed among the system's users. A typical day for a UNIX system administrator may include installing systems, creating user accounts, stringing cables, troubleshooting and replacing failed hardware, performing system backups, and any of a hundred other tasks. UNIX system administration is frequently a thankless task. If everything is running smoothly, users and management often forget about the hard work that goes on behind the scenes. However, when a problem occurs and the system...
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