Ruby on Rails? What’s that?” asks my uncle. “You write about this
stuff for dummies? You mean those black and yellow books that everyone buys?”
“Yes, like the one I’m quoting you in,” I say. “Please check your spelling as
you speak.”

“I will. But what’s Ruby on Rails? Is it the 6:05 train to Poughkeepsie? Is it the
name of an old vaudeville act? Is it a pop singer? A rock band? Is it a rare
stone from India? Is it the codename of an informer in a political scandal?”
“No.” “Is it the name of an exotic cocktail? A species of bird? An animal act in a
circus? A John D. MacDonald title?” more...

Rails is a fantastic tool for web application development, but its Ajax-driven interfaces stop short of the richness you gain with a tool like Adobe Flex. Simply put, Flex is the most productive way to build the UI of rich Internet applications, and Rails is the most productive way to rapidly build a database-backed CRUD application. Together, they're an amazing combination.
Flexible Rails is a book about how to use Ruby on Rails and Adobe Flex to build next-generation rich Internet applications (RIAs). The book takes you to the leading edge of RIA development, presenting examples in Flex 3 more...

Designing BSD Rootkits introduces the fundamentals of programming and developing rootkits under the FreeBSD operating system. In addition to explaining rootkits and rootkit writing, the book aims to inspire readers to explore the FreeBSD kernel and gain a better understanding of the kernel and the FreeBSD operating system itself. Unlike titles on exploit writing or how to gain root access to a system, Designing BSD Rootkits focuses on maintaining root access long after gaining access to a computer. Written in a friendly, accessible style and sprinkled with geek humor and pop culture reference more...

Over the last few years, Linux has grown both as an operating system and a tool for personal and business use. Simultaneously becoming more user friendly and more powerful as a back-end system, Linux has achieved new plateaus: the newer filesystems have solidified, new commands and tools have appeared and become standard, and the desktop--including new desktop environments--have proved to be viable, stable, and readily accessible to even those who don't consider themselves computer gurus.

Whether you're using Linux for personal software projects, for a small office or home office (ofte more...

This book provides a unique balance of "big picture" principles that transcend specific software packages and version numbers, and very clear procedures on securing some of those software packages. An all-inclusive resource for Linux users who wish to harden their systems, the book covers general security as well as key services such as DNS, the Apache Web server, mail, file transfer, and secure shell.
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Bulletproof your system before you are hacked! From the publisher of the international best-seller, Hacking Exposed, here is a brilliant new offering written with a passion for security
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Automating UNIX and Linux Administration will focus on automating the tedious daily tasks of system administration. It will provide real-world examples and explore the existing tools that will help with this task. Although the book will provide brief overviews of tools and technologies that are covered, the author will assume the reader knows how to edit a configuration file or mount a file system. The book will focus on putting these tools to use in the real world, such as how to use a set of Perl scripts to manage your user accounts across 1000 machines. It will not show you how to write a more...

This is THE guide to UNIX network programming APIs. Whether you write Web servers, client/server applications, or any other network software, you need to understand networking APIS-especially sockets in greater detail than ever before. You need UNIX Network Programming, Volume 1, Third Edition. In this book, the Authors offer unprecedented, start-to-finish guidance on making the most of sockets, the deacto standard for UNIX network programming with APIs - as well as extensive coverage of the X/Open Transport Interface (XTI).

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"This book is great. Nick covers a wide range of materials--everything from how to architect the mail system and what disks to buy to how to configure your router. This book should be a basic reference for anyone who needs to get down into the guts of a sendmail-based system and make it shine."-Eric Allman, the creator of sendmail and Chief Technical Officer, Sendmail, Inc.

As email traffic continues to increase, system administrators must be able to guarantee that their email servers can deliver reliable performance today and bear larger loads tomorrow. sendmail Performance Tuning is a pr more...

The first section of Perl to Python Programming will show you the basic layout and approach of the two languages whilst the second section moves on to the specific differences of using Python data types and objects over Perl variables. The book then looks at the core technologies behind the Python language, including the exception system for handling errors, the class and object orientation system for creating new classes and instances and how to split your program into functions and modules for easier management. All of these basics are treated with respect to people's existing understanding more...