Writing isn’t about putting pen to paper or, in the digital age, typing in a word processor, writing is all about being able to understand the essence of a topic, being able to clearly and entertainingly communicate with the reader. It’s about enabling readers to learn. And I’ve been doing just that for over a decade in the technical and business areas, including writing and publishing over twenty different books.

Learning Unix for Mac OS X

The fifth edition of Learning Unix for Mac OS X from O’Reilly & Associates is a concise and invaluable introduction to just what you need to know to get started with the Unix inside Mac OS X Mountain Lion. With Mac OS X, you can continue to use your preferred computing platform, while exploring the powerful capabilities of the underlying Unix operating system. This book will teach you exactly what you need to know about how to use the Terminal application, become quite functional with the command line interface, learn how to use the cool fink utility to get thousands of free open source applications, the X11 windowing system, and explore the best of the Unix applications. And lots more.

Let Go to Grow

Co-authored with IBM executive Linda Sanford, this business title explores the dangers inherent in the increasing commoditization of market segments and how to manage that change. It’s partially based on the remarkable story of how IBM reinvented itself in a world of commodity computers and re-emerged as a market leader in the new services industry. Because it’s never been about the gadgets, it’s always been about helping people know how to use them smartly.

Growing Your Business with Google

My latest book, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Growing Your Business with Google, represents almost twenty years of online business development, and it contains lots of critical information for any entrepreneur, from how to track your competitors online to why you should consider a business blog (and when you shouldn’t do one). Additional topics include how Google works, how to work with the various Google programs (including detailed information on AdSense, AdWords, and related) and lots of discussion of search engine optimization and how to recognize bad SEO consultants who will kill your business. Business experts from Tom Peters to Guy Kawasaki, Chris Pirillo, and Debbie Weil agree, it’s a must read for any entrepreneur.

Wicked Cool Shell Scripts

Offering useful and entertaining shell scripts for Linux, Unix and Mac OS X systems, Wicked Cool Shell Scripts from NoStarch Press is the shell script programming reference work you’ve been seeking for years. Eschewing the usual 250 pages of scripting tutorial content, Wicked Cool Shell Scripts instead offers 101 smart shell scripts that help you get more out of your computing environment, whether it’s adding users in Mac OS X, analyzing an Apache weblog, or even scraping a few of your favorite Web sites for new information. This book is now on its fourth printing, and sales show no sign of slowing down.

Teach Yourself Unix in 24 Hours

In just 24 sessions of one hour or less, readers of the best-selling Teach Yourself Unix in 24 Hours will be up and running with UNIX, the operating system at the heart of the Internet. Using a straightforward, step-by-step approach, each lesson builds on the previous one, allowing you to learn the essentials of UNIX from the ground up. 24 Hours. Really. Now on its third best-selling edition. Rather than explicitly focus on one flavor of Unix, this book covers a number of variants, allowing readers to be productive on any system.

Earlier Titles

Other books I’ve written include Teach Yourself Unix in a Week, Creating Cool Web Sites, Global Software, and The Internet Business Guide. All of these are out of print now as time and technology wait for none of us, but I dare say they’re still worth a read if you can find a copy.

I’ve also contributed to numerous other books, including “Internet Secrets”, “The Internet Unleashed”, “Yahoo Unplugged”, “Web Programming Unleashed”, “The Internet Security Handbook”, “The Unix Papers”, “Your Internet Consultant” and “Unix Unleashed”.

Articles and Other Writing

In addition to books, I also write for a variety of different magazines including CPU Magazine, Macworld Magazine and have a monthly column in Linux Journal. Some of my most popular articles are archived online for your reading pleasure, along with transcripts from some interviews I’ve done with Business Week, CompuServe, and others.

Technical Editing

I’m an experienced technical editor, helping out publishers by checking the accuracy of technical material in both computer and non-computer books. Books that I’ve tech edited include: The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Outsourcing, Open Source Solutions for Small Businesses, Teach Yourself Red Hat Linux Fedora, Red Hat Linux UNLEASHED, Teach Yourself Red Hat Linux 9, Linux for Dummies, and Perl, CGI and JavaScript Complete. If you’re interested in having me help you with your book project as a technical editor, please contact me and we can talk.