Using csh & tcsh (Nutshell Handbooks)

This book is for learning how to use the tcsh and csh shells from the command line, not for scripting. If you want scripting look elsewhere. You will be as disappointed as all of the one and two star reviewers you see here. However, in particular if you want information on the turbo C shell (tcsh), this is one of the few books on the subject, even if it is 13 years old. As with all O'Reilly books on Unix, in particular the ones written before the year 2000, this one knows its audience and has plenty of practical information. Turbo refers to speed though, not clarity. If you are not willing to memorize some shortcuts that are not exactly straightforward looking, maybe you should stick with plain old C shell (csh). The table of contents can be hard to find for this old book, so I include it next:Part I, Learning the BasicsChapter 1, Introduction, discusses the purpose of the shell and describes how to change your login shell to one of those discussed in this handbook.Chapter 2, A Shell Primer, provides a summary of introductory essentials. If you already know something about running commands, you can skim this chapter as a review or skip it.Chapter 3, Using the Shell Effectively, is an overview of many of the facilities that the shell provides to help you work more efficiently--easy, practical ways to get more out of the command line. Often, even experienced users are not aware of all of these features. This chapter gives you a glimpse of the kinds of techniques that are covered in detail in the rest of the book.Part II, Becoming More EfficientChapter 4, The Shell Startup Files, describes ~/.cshrc and ~/.login, the files that the shell uses to initialize your working environment. This chapter also provides guidelines for modifying the startup files to suit your preferences.Chapter 5, Setting Up Your Terminal, discusses how to find out what your terminal's special characters are (e.g., for backspacing) and how to change them if you don't like the default settings.Chapter 6, Using Your Command History, discusses how to type less by using your command history.Chapter 7, The tcsh Command-Line Editor, describes the facilities offered by the editor which enable you to edit commands interactively.Chapter 8, Using Aliases To Create Command Shortcuts, discusses how to type less by using the shell's alias mechanism to create command shortcuts.Chapter 9, File-Naming Shortcuts, describes ways in which the shell can supply filename arguments for you so that you don't have to type them all out yourself.Chapter 10, Filename and Programmed Completion, describes how to use the shell for completing filenames after you type just the leading prefix. It also discusses how tcsh can complete other types of words besides filenames and how to set up programmed completions.Chapter 11, Quoting and Special Characters, describes the shell's quoting rules. By following these rules, you can type any characters in a command line, even special ones, without having them misinterpreted.Chapter 12, Using Commands To Generate Arguments, discusses command substitution, a facility that lets you construct pieces of a command line from the output of other commands.Chapter 13, Navigating the File System, describes how to move around in the file system efficiently.Chapter 14, Keeping Track of Where You Are, describes how to stay informed about your current location in the file system.Chapter 15, Job Control, shows how to suspend, resume, and kill jobs; switch between jobs; and move jobs between the foreground and background.Part III, AppendixesAppendix A, Obtaining and Installing tcsh, describes how to make tcsh available on your system if you don't have the current version.Appendix B, csh and tcsh Quick Reference, is a summary of those features and capabilities of csh and tcsh described in this handbook.Appendix C, Other Sources of Information, contains pointers to other documentation. The most important of these references is the tcsh manual page. It's available in several forms, one of which can be navigated via hypertext links with a World Wide Web browser.All readers should start with Chapter 1. If necessary, change your login shell to csh or tcsh, using the instructions there. If you're a beginner, unfamiliar with the shell, or just want to review the basics of executing simple commands, you should then proceed to Chapter 2. If you're also having trouble figuring out how to do things like getting your terminal to backspace correctly, you may find it helpful to read Chapter 5.Chapter 3 is designed to "jump start" you into better use of the shell by presenting lots of shortcuts that save you time and effort. You'll quickly become a more fluent command-line user by applying the information you find here. For a more systematic and topical approach to the shell's capabilities, look at the chapters in Part II. They explain in greater detail the features of the shell that were briefly demonstrated in Chapter 3.Finally, use the index. The shell's features interrelate, so you'll often find that a particular capability can be applied in many different contexts, and most likely will be discussed in several places.

I do not understand the bad reviews either.With that said, as a long time sh users around the time the book was publshed someone changed my shell to csh on the server I was working on and would not allow be to set it back. So I bought the book to learn csh. I have moved on from that company, but because of how clearly the book was written and how it explained the unique aspects of csh/tcsh, I have stuck with tcsh as my preferred interactive shell ever since. Very easy to understand and get up to speed with csh/tcsh interactive use.

Good reference for CSH & TCSH.

An absolute novice might find this book useful...but the book is thin and skips a myriad of essential info for the power user. Not one of the better 'nutshell' books.

I've seen many books on unix shells, however almost all the other books focus on shell programming instead of actually using shell to work more effectively and efficiently. This book fills the gap (hence the name "Using...". I personally recommend Zsh if you are looking for the most comprehensive shell. However zsh is too comprehensive and there is no book on it. Tcsh shell is an EXCELLENT shell to do your work (type in commands, listing files, and etc). It has all the essential goodies: command line completion, command-line editor, history, and etc. It found it more friendly than ksh and less complex than bash and/or zsh. This book teaches you step by step how to use the shell to do your every day work effectively. The author explains everything clearly which is more than what I can say about many books that just touches a little bit of using the shell as a command interpreter aspect of the shell as if everyone spend more time writing the shell scripts than using the command line. These aspect of the csh/tcsh are the basis for similar utilities in the other shells: ksh, bash, and zsh. I find that even if you use bash or zsh, you'll appreciate the information in the book. The other reason the author didn't write much on programming is because c-shell is less frequently used in shell programming because of the now famous posting of "C shell programming considered harmful", which is also on the book's homepage. If you have the patience to read through the book, you will find it an excellent investment of time. (The only other book I would say this for sure is the "Learning the vi Editor."

A book for the basic UNIX user. Does NOT include anything about writing scripts for this shell! Worthless! Don't waste your money.Amazon likes to bury bad reviews because it negatively affects the sales of an item. When considering a product on Amazon you should ALWAYS look for the bad reviews. This will give you a more realistic impression of the quality of the product.