Hi I've landed an entry level job in a s/w company.I've not yet started working.But they told me it would be good if i know unix very well.I don't have any idea abt unix.and now i realise it is very vast.It would be nice if somebody can tell me what i should be learning in unix.I don't think i'll be working in the administration part.But as far as a developer is concerned what should i be trying to learn.I really am confused and i don't have the least idea of what to learn.Any help would be greatly appreciated.And thanks in advance
This really depends on what development work you will be doing on UNIX. Sometimes it requires an in depth knowledge of how UNIX works, other times the proprietary software that a developer uses simply runs over the operating system and little is needed to be known about what is going on underneath - let us know what your work is about.
As far as helping you now, you can look into navigating in a UNIX environment:
http://caad.arch.ethz.ch/~patrick/LOCAL/teach/unix/
Those two links are a basic and slightly more complex UNIX tutorial and should make you comfortable with moving around any UNIX OS.
http://physinfo.ulb.ac.be/cit_courseware/unix/ostart.htm
That link will give you a basic introduction into system aspects of UNIX on a generic level.
As I said give us more details of what you will be concentrating and I'm sure someone will be able to help!
Regards.
Hi,
I feel your pain.
My advise would be to get yourself the
Unix In a Nutshell (Desktop Quick reference) by Arnold Robbins
and published by O'Reilly.
Experiment with the commands
e.g
ls * (lists everthing in the directory)
cp file1 file2 (copies file1 and creates an identical file called file2)
rm file2 (removes file 2)
vi file1 (opens file 1)
press escape and i, to insert text into file 1
escape and 'x', deletes text
esacpe and semi-colon and w, saves the text you entered
Also check out the web for Unix tutorials
Good luck
Mark
The best way to learn is to slowly start using unix for your day to day things. Such as setting up a email client on an unix system and using it to send and recieve emails. I did this some time ago and I've been picking up on dir structure and how unix applications work. Unix is a hands on OS, it's not very standard so it requires you to get your hands into it to really learn it. Ever place worked so far runs a diffrent flavor/version of unix with tweaks so it's important to get really strong on the basics.
O'Reilly makes some really good Unix books, and they are relatively cheap. Pick up Essential System Administration by Aeleen Frisch. It's awesome.
In reply to your query, I have found several useful books such as the following:
�The UNIX Hater's Guide
�UNIX for Dummies
�And tonnes more @ your local book store!
I found that UNIX for dummies was very infomative and, best of all, used humor! Something that all
UNIX programmers need once in a while 
The best way i think is to lean while you work. If you dont have any task assigned, think of aomething and start working on it nad u leran that in the best and all possible ways ...
Happy learning ..