This chapter just introduces the basics for shell scripting. There are many more things you can do. The online manual pages for the bash or tcsh commands provide a wealth of reference information on these shells.

A number of Web sites provide tutorials on bash, including http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/unix/bash-tute.html and www.linuxorbit.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=Sections&file=index&req=viewarticle&artid=459. In addition, the Linux Documentation Project at www.tldp.org/guides.html provides a bash scripting guide, along with a number of bash- and shell-related how-to documents at www.tldp.org/HOWTO/HOWTO-INDEX/howtos.html.

Teach Yourself Linux, by Steve Oualline and Eric Foster-Johnson (John Wiley & Sons, 2000), introduces a number of Linux topics, including text editors and scripting, for those new to Linux. And Graphical Applications with Tcl and Tk (Hungry Minds, Inc., 1997) by Eric Foster-Johnson, covers another scripting language, Tcl/Tk.

Use your imagination. Any command that you run often or that is hard to type can be scripted. Furthermore, you can write complex scripts that automate some of the more tedious tasks you need to perform.