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UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers
Sink or Swim
Post 309 by Neo on Tuesday 21st of November 2000 05:24:35 PM
11-21-2000
Administrator
The paraphrase or interpretation of our posts to the tune "trial-by-fire" and "sink-or-swim" is somewhat misleading, but interesting 
Throughout all the posts, the advice has been to get the foundation texts (and the references are provided below),
build your own UNIX system(s) and learn step-by-step. As PxT says, the limiting factor is your own personal motivation to learn.
If you have not bought the texts, built your own systems, learned to code, or learned the basics of the UNIX operating system (or plan to before moving into the UNIX field) I suggest that seeking a UNIX job is not for you.
UNIX is a vast field which requires a great amount of personal motivation, late night wrangling, reading, and hands on practice. There is no trial-by-fire or sink-or-swim. If you follow the suggested path, you will be an expert. There are no shortcuts to learning a powerful infrastructure such as UNIX, network programming, C or C++, shell programming, etc. These are skills which are acquired by fire, not tried by fire. First, you must acquire the skills.
One analogy is martial arts training. At a good school, two years of training gives a black belt. The black belt is a symbol of learning the basics; not of finality. The black belt signifies some (small degree) of acquired knowledge. A yellow belt who gets into the ring with a 'second degree black belt' is a fool and no 'real' black belt would allow that to happen.
UNIX is very similar. Only a foolish novice tries to pass themselves off a black belt and get into a job which requires advanced "black belt" UNIX skills. There is no sink-or-swim and no trial-by-fire. There is only hard work, patience, practice and more hard work. If you follow the advice in the threads on which books to study and build you own systems, you will progress. There are no shortcuts to becoming a UNIX master just like there are no shortcuts to becoming a master of any other discipline.
My sincere apologies if this post is too direct and has an impatient tone. That is not my intent. It is difficult, for me, to explain to someone that there are no shortcuts in life and we are only limited by the barriers that we create as individuals. One does not 'jump to UNIX', one 'becomes familiar with the UNIX operating system and environment'. Just like golf, you don't just go out, buy clubs, shoes and balls and then play par golf. There is no 'sink or swim' in golf, you practice, learn to play, progress, and practice more. It's just Zen, really, and in this context, Zen means 'understanding things for what they actually are, not what we want them to be'.
[Edited by Neo on 11-21-2000 at 11:15 PM]
Throughout all the posts, the advice has been to get the foundation texts (and the references are provided below),Quote:
If you have not bought the texts, built your own systems, learned to code, or learned the basics of the UNIX operating system (or plan to before moving into the UNIX field) I suggest that seeking a UNIX job is not for you.
UNIX is a vast field which requires a great amount of personal motivation, late night wrangling, reading, and hands on practice. There is no trial-by-fire or sink-or-swim. If you follow the suggested path, you will be an expert. There are no shortcuts to learning a powerful infrastructure such as UNIX, network programming, C or C++, shell programming, etc. These are skills which are acquired by fire, not tried by fire. First, you must acquire the skills.
One analogy is martial arts training. At a good school, two years of training gives a black belt. The black belt is a symbol of learning the basics; not of finality. The black belt signifies some (small degree) of acquired knowledge. A yellow belt who gets into the ring with a 'second degree black belt' is a fool and no 'real' black belt would allow that to happen.
UNIX is very similar. Only a foolish novice tries to pass themselves off a black belt and get into a job which requires advanced "black belt" UNIX skills. There is no sink-or-swim and no trial-by-fire. There is only hard work, patience, practice and more hard work. If you follow the advice in the threads on which books to study and build you own systems, you will progress. There are no shortcuts to becoming a UNIX master just like there are no shortcuts to becoming a master of any other discipline.
My sincere apologies if this post is too direct and has an impatient tone. That is not my intent. It is difficult, for me, to explain to someone that there are no shortcuts in life and we are only limited by the barriers that we create as individuals. One does not 'jump to UNIX', one 'becomes familiar with the UNIX operating system and environment'. Just like golf, you don't just go out, buy clubs, shoes and balls and then play par golf. There is no 'sink or swim' in golf, you practice, learn to play, progress, and practice more. It's just Zen, really, and in this context, Zen means 'understanding things for what they actually are, not what we want them to be'.
[Edited by Neo on 11-21-2000 at 11:15 PM]
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LEARN ABOUT OSF1
learn
learn(1) General Commands Manual learn(1) NAME
learn - Provides computer-aided instruction for the C shell SYNOPSIS
learn [-directory] [subject] [lesson] The learn command provides computer-aided instruction courses and practice in the use of Tru64 UNIX. OPTIONS
Allows you to exercise a script in a nonstandard place. DESCRIPTION
To get started, enter learn; if this is the first time that you are invoking the learn command, you are guided through a series of ques- tions to determine what type of instruction you want to receive. If you have used learn before and left your last session without completing a subject, the program uses information in $HOME/.learnrc to start you up in the same place you left off. To bypass questions, enter a subject or lesson. In order to enter a lesson, you must know the lesson number that you received in a previ- ous learn command session. If you do not know the lesson number, enter the lesson number as a subject. The learn command searches for the first lesson containing the subject you specified. If the lesson is a - (dash), learn prompts for each lesson; this is useful for debug- ging. You can specify the following subjects: files editor vi morefiles macros eqn C SUBCOMMANDS
There are a few special commands. The bye command terminates a learn session, and the where command tells you of your progress (where m tells you more.) The again command redisplays the text of the lesson and again lesson lets you review lesson. The hint command prints the last part of the lesson script used to evaluate a response, while hint m prints the entire lesson script. This is useful for debugging lessons and might possibly give you an idea about what is expected. EXAMPLES
To take the online lesson about files, enter: learn files You are then prompted for further input. FILES
Playpen directories. Start-up information. SEE ALSO
Commands: csh(1), ex(1) learn(1)