Overview of a Linux System

God looked over everything he had made,
and saw that it was very good.
Genesis 1:31

This chapter gives an overview of a Linux system. First, the major services provided by the operating system are described. Then, the programs that implement these services are described with a considerable lack of detail. The purpose of this chapter is to give an understanding of the system as a whole, so that each part is described in detail elsewhere.

 
• Various parts of an operating system
• Important parts of the kernel
• Major services in a UNIX system
  • init
  • Logins from terminals
  • Syslog
  • Periodic command execution: cron and at
  • Graphical user interface
  • Networking
  • Network logins
  • Network file systems
  • Mail
  • Printing
• The filesystem layout