-----

CS 5: Unix textbooks and guides

-----

The Web Pages

The course home page and the notes make extensive use of Javascript, Java, and Macromedia's Shockwave plug-in. Unfortunately, only a limited number of browsers seem to support all these features correctly enough to render all parts of the course pages. At present we recommend Netscape Communicator 4.01 on the Macintosh, or either Communicator or Navigator 4.0 under Windows 95. The Unix version of Communicator will also work for most things, though it insists on beeping each time you type a character while interacting with the sample Java programs. Navigator 3.0 for Windows 95 will work for most things, but may make errors displaying floating point numbers in the sample java programs. Navigator 3.0 for Macintosh has the same problem, and also has problems with the Javascript code used in the course home page.

Internet explorer 3.0 on all platforms has a variety of problems. We have not yet tested Internet Explorer 4.0, though we have been told anecdotally that it works.

Java Textbooks

There are no required texts for the course. It is possible to do the entire course using only the information in the course web pages. If you would like additional examples of Java code, the following book is available from Huntley bookstore.

John R. Hubbard, Schaum's Outline of Theory and Problems of Programming with Java, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1999.

Further on-line Java information can be found at:

Unix Reference

The web pages contain a brief introductory document about Unix, and you have received Pine and Emacs cheat sheets in your packet from Academic computing (available on-line at Emacs quick reference (pdf) and Pine quick reference (pdf)).

These quick guides, however, are limited. You may wish to buy some of the following books. In particular, we recommend buying one of the first two books if you are unfamiliar with Unix. These books will serve you well, as you will be using Unix machines throughout your time at HMC.

Learning the UNIX Operating System, Jerry Peek, Grace Todino,and John Strang, O'Reilly & Associates, 1997. Buy the book from Amazon.com
UNIX in a Nutshell: System V v 2.0 edition, Dan Gilly and Mike Loukides, O'Reilly & Associates, 1995. Buy the book from Amazon.com
What You Need to Know When You Can't Find Your UNIX System Administrator, Linda Mui, O'Reilly & Associates, 1995. Buy the book from Amazon.com
Learning GNU Emacs, Debra Cameron, Bill Rosenblatt, and Eric Raymond, O'Reilly & Associates, 1996. Buy the book from Amazon.com

Please note: Clicking on one of the Amazon links above will take you directly to Amazon.com's web site to order that book. Any book purchased via one of these links will generate a 15% commission for the Computer Science department, which will be placed in the CS student activities fund. The money will directly benefit neither the faculty nor the department.

This page is maintained by Margaret Fleck.