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Item Description: Fantastic Book by Dave Roth

Review Synopsis:

<IMG SRC=http://images.fatbrain.com/15/787/021/1578702151M.gif> 
Buy Me or
view my photo.

         Author: Dave Roth
List Price: $35.00
371 Pages
Published by MacMillan Technical Pub
Date Published: 11/2000
ISBN: 1578702151

Win32 Perl Scripting: The Administrator's Handbook

Quick Review:  How to avoid the Windows GUI in 9 chapters.

Example code to speed up the most boring of repetitive Win32 administrative tasks

 
Chapter Guide: 
(my description)
  1. Why Perl is a great tool to administer the Win32 environment
  2. Windows accounts, groups, domains
  3. NTFS, Shared Folders, Permissions, the Registry
  4. Using Perl to prevent\restore order to a crisis
  5. Event Logs and other ways of monitoring the system
  6. Using Perl in logon scripts
  7. Creating\Killing processes, fork(), impersonation
  8. Managing Win32 services, creating Perl services
  9. ADSI, WMI - including tools to help with IIS webserver
Who should read this book:  Well, anyone who has got this far in the review is probably a good candidate! Seriously though: anyone who has to administer or support a Win32 environment. It is the most useful book I have read relating to Windows because it involves Perl and really relieves the boredom from everyday Win32 tasks.

 
Rating: 5 Star!

 

Full Review:

Dave Roth's newest book is excellent! Also author of Win32 Perl Programming. He may be better known for contributing the following modules:

The Administrator's Handbook is an invaluable addition to my book collection. The author gives dozens of examples on how to make maximum use of Win32::* modules. Not only does this book help to automate many Windows tasks, but we are shown that using the right tool actually gives you finer control over Windows settings that the Windows GUI itself.

Dave Roth doesn't waste time, he gets to the heart of the matter describing each task and gives several documented examples. He shows at least 3 ways of manipulating the Windows NT\2000 user base!

My favorite chapters are the last 3 - Processes, Services and ADSI.

The following also stands out in my mind:

I really don't think this review does justice to the book, but you can read a sample chapter from the book's publisher. There is some seriously fantastic material here, so much that I really need to go through the whole thing again to work out all the possible uses for it all.

Take the gruntwork out of Win32, read this book!!!

  • Comment on Win32 Perl Scripting: The Administrator's Handbook
Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Win32 Perl Scripting (Japanese Edition)
by Hanamaki (Chaplain) on Sep 23, 2001 at 20:04 UTC
    This book was translated into Japanese and published by ASCII in August. On its Japanese Product Page you will find Chapter 1 "Perl to shisutemu kanrisha" as a free sample pdf chapter.

    Titel: Win32 Perl Adominisutorêta Handobukku: Perl ni yoru Windows shisutemu kanri no jidôka.
    ISBN: 4-7561-3885-3
    Price: 3600 Yen


    Hanamaki
[reply]
Re: Win32 Perl Scripting: The Administrator's Handbook
by ibanix (Hermit) on Dec 08, 2002 at 09:09 UTC
    This is an excellent book! However, I wish that the code in the book was available on CD or for download. I have not been able to find it anywhere.

    Update: Thanks to cjf-II who pointed out the code is available here

    $ echo '$0 & $0 &' > foo; chmod a+x foo; foo;
[reply]
[d/l]
      I wish the code was available too, Unfortunatelly, this book takes for granted a very thorough understanding of BOTH perl and OLE, etc. I found this to be very aggravating...
[reply]
Re: Win32 Perl Scripting: The Administrator's Handbook
by Plato (Friar) on Mar 11, 2005 at 12:13 UTC
[reply]
Re: Win32 Perl Scripting: The Administrator's Handbook
by girarde (Hermit) on Aug 28, 2007 at 20:08 UTC
    A WONDERFUL book. Things that made it harder for me to use include the assumption of intimacy with OLE noted above, the non-K&R indentation, extensive use of do(this) if(that); syntax, and a neglect of the LDAP: service provider in favor of WinNT: in the examples dealing with Active Directory despite LDAP being the provider that has all the W2K stuff.
[reply]
[d/l]
Re: Win32 Perl Scripting: The Administrator's Handbook
by matze77 (Friar) on Oct 20, 2010 at 09:55 UTC
[reply]