BEBAS.vLSM.org
We wrote the contract with our publisher to have the copyright
revert to us once the book went out of print. So yes, we have the
right to publish it online. Feel free to mirror it where ever you
want, print it out, and bind it.
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* Due to being announced on Slashdot.org, the book has gotten a lot of fresh attention. I've added this page
so that those downloading the book can be aware of some history before starting their read.
* This book is ten years old. I started work on it in 1992 (maybe even 1991) while I was a professor at
Stanford. My co-editors took over after I started work at Microsoft (So no, it's not a Microsoft
conspiracy.) A lot has happened in the intervening decade.
* This book's target audience was people who themselves have noticed certain weaknesses in Unix at that
time and could relate to our stories. Our goal was humor. Many readers have told us we succeeded in this.
Even Eric Raymond liked it (his name is in the acknowledgements).
* The book is not meant to be balanced, it is a screed, pure and simple. Is it over the top? Yes.
* Do I have any regrets? Yes, that the funniest item in the book probably isn't anything we wrote, but is
Dennis Ritchie's anti-forword (We had asked Dennis to write a forword, thinking that since he was doing Plan 9
at that time, it would give him an opportunity to talk about how he had moved on from Unix and fixed its
flaws in his next OS (We were young and had a lot chutzpah then.) He read the Preface, and then sent back
his essay. We thought it was great and tremendously funny, so we added it in (with permission). To this day,
I don't know if he expected us to publish it.)
* If you enjoyed reading this book and felt it was worth the price of a least a movie and popcorn, send a $10
check to your favorite charity.
(From Daniel Weise's HomeBrewPage).
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