Table of Contents

Introduction....................................................................................................................................... vii

1. Changes To This Manual .................................................................................................... vii

2. Finding Appropriate Documentation .................................................................................viii

2.1. Documentation For First Time Linux Users.......................................................viii

2.2. For the More Experienced ..................................................................................... x

2.3. Documentation for Linux Gurus............................................................................ x

3. Document Conventions......................................................................................................... x

4. Using the Mouse ................................................................................................................xiii

5. Copying and Pasting Text With X......................................................................................xiii

6. More to Come ....................................................................................................................xiii

6.1. We Need Feedback! ............................................................................................xiii

7. Sign Up for Support ........................................................................................................... xiv

I. System Reference........................................................................................................................... xv

1. File System Structure.......................................................................................................... 17

1.1. Why Share a Common Structure?........................................................................ 17

1.2. Overview of File System Hierarchy Standard (FHS) .......................................... 17

1.3. Special File Locations.......................................................................................... 21

2. The

proc

File System......................................................................................................... 23

2.1. A Virtual File System........................................................................................... 23

2.2. Top level Files in the

proc

Filesystem................................................................ 24

2.3. Directories in

/proc/

.......................................................................................... 37

2.4. Using

sysctl

...................................................................................................... 52

2.5. Additional Resources ........................................................................................... 52

3. Boot Process, Init, and Shutdown ....................................................................................... 55

3.1. The Boot Process ................................................................................................. 55

3.2. A Detailed Look at the Boot Process................................................................... 55

3.3. Running Programs at Boot Time ......................................................................... 60

3.4. Differences in the Boot Process of Other Architectures ...................................... 60

3.5. SysV Init .............................................................................................................. 60

3.6. Init Runlevels ....................................................................................................... 61

3.7. The

/etc/sysconfig/

Directory...................................................................... 62

3.8. Shutting Down ..................................................................................................... 74

4. Boot Loaders....................................................................................................................... 77

4.1. Boot Loaders and System Architecture ............................................................... 77

4.2. GRUB................................................................................................................... 77

4.3. Installing GRUB .................................................................................................. 78

4.4. GRUB Terminology ............................................................................................. 79

4.5. GRUB Interfaces.................................................................................................. 80

4.6. GRUB Commands ............................................................................................... 81

4.7. GRUB Menu Configuration File.......................................................................... 82

4.8. LILO .................................................................................................................... 84

4.9. Options in

/etc/lilo.conf

............................................................................. 85

4.10. Changing Runlevels at Boot Time ..................................................................... 86

4.11. Additional Resources ......................................................................................... 87

5. Users and Groups................................................................................................................ 89

5.1. Tools for User and Group Creation...................................................................... 89

5.2. Standard Users ..................................................................................................... 89

5.3. Standard Groups................................................................................................... 91

5.4. User Private Groups ............................................................................................. 92

5.5. Shadow Utilities................................................................................................... 94

6. The X Window System ....................................................................................................... 97

6.1. The Power of X .................................................................................................... 97

6.2. XFree86................................................................................................................ 97

6.3. Desktop Environments and Window Managers................................................. 102