There are way too many computer book authors who simply do not know how to write. Bill McCarty is not one of these. He has written an erxcellet book that eplains debian on a very basic level. This is a good book because it delivers exactly what it promises to deliver. It is an introduction to linux and it encourages new users to "have fun" and "be patient." It is outdated, though. For Linux, a good book needs to be more recent that 2000 to be relevant. This book is older than that. The effective birthday of Debian was in 1993. Highly recommended book!

For an absolute beginner this is ok. However too much reliance is given to the How-to's and internet for problem solving, a PS2 mouse works with /dev/psaux which wasn't easy to find out. The installation guide is pretty good, you will appreciate it the first time you install linux, but if you enjoy playing and try different distro's you won't need it very quickly. The introduction to sysadmin is equally useful at a basic level for a home machine. So if you haven't tried linux this is as good a start as any I have read, but you only need one beginner's book, then i believe the Rute Manual which has now been printed is the way to go.

While it's nice to have a book cover the Debian specific installation procedure, too much space was wasted on repeating instructions like "with the arrow key, highlight 'Ok' and hit the Enter key". Too much space in this book is taken up with these trivial instructions, over and over again, it becomes tedius to read. If we didn't have to read about hitting the arrow and Enter keys with every little step, this book otherwise has some useful Debian specific information in it. Too bad the book couldn't have been packed with more useful info and fewer instructions on how to highlight a menu item.

This book is aimed for the very novice Linux user, who comes for
the first time to the world of Unix. From that perspective this book
could deserve one start more, but not more. The starting chapers covers
the installation process with screen prints from the debian installer and
they can't get clearer than that. But, In my opinion they do not add
any value to the book, because the Debian installation dialogs are
almost self explanatory and you don't need a book to show the
pictures.

The part of the installation could have better server on concentrating
on setting up multi-boot system with various Win32 (Win9x,NT,2000)
combinations. THAT would have certaily deserved a star.

Setting up the X server is not "piece of cake", and the book
should definitely have devoted much more pages on it. You can almost
bet that you can't get X server working properly from Debian
installation with all those varoous video/3D cards and different
monitors (just count how many combinations are there). This chaper
is ESSENTIAL for any new Linux user that wants to see Graphical GUI.
Well, therte is not much information what to do if X fails to start.
(Btw, GNOME window manager is presented, not KDE)

Other Chapters in the book are average, medicode tratment of the
topics wich are by no means specific to Debian system: Use
administration, system services, learnign to use the basic shell
commands.

The Networking part may be appropriate in the US market, where
Modem (PPP) connections are in majority, but for European users,
the ISDN, LAN, WAN, Cable Modem are more for hte present. The book
only coves PPP and LAN. Authors should have covered ISDN as well,
because that's much harder than modem PPP.

In short, This is 2 start book. You're better served with something
more in depth book that a) you can refer all the time to get
problems solved b) or goes more deeper on the details of the specific
Linux distribution.

This book does not give you very good overview what is so special
with "debian".

You're much more better served with Michael Kofler's "Linux" book,
which gives in depth discussion and comparision of various Linux
system. It's one of the best Linux books around.
You can use it with Debian as well.

I used the book to install debian linux. I must say that this book does help a lot in making the installation easy. The only thing that one must do extra work is when installing the linux on newer machines (especially with the Windows Me already running). I just wish that Bill McCarty does a little more elaboration on /dev files and troubleshooting. Anyway it is a good book.