The Sudonomicon

An Introduction to Unix Systems for the Cautious and Weary

Many think they know Unix. Few realize that what they know is just a shell. Beneath it lie mysteries both bewildering and wonderful: ports, processes, permissions, files that are not files, and components built atop other, older components that occasionally rise to the surface like ancient sea creatures believed long extinct.

Like such creatures, Unix will outlive those who mock it. Welcome, then, to a world in which the strange will become familiar, and the familiar, strange. Welcome, thrice welcome, to Unix systems programming.

Lessons

1. Introduction
2. The Filesystem
3. Processes
4. Running Jobs
5. Logging
6. HTTP
7. Authentication
8. Shell Variables
9. Packages and Virtual Environments
10. Networking
11. Certificates
12. SSH
13. Virtualization
14. Conclusion

Appendices

1. License
2. Code of Conduct
3. Contributing
4. Bibliography
5. Glossary

Acknowledgments

Greg Wilson is a programmer, author, and educator based in Toronto, Canada. He was the co-founder and first Executive Director of Software Carpentry and received ACM SIGSOFT's Influential Educator Award in 2020.

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