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W. Richard Stevens’ Unix Network Programming: Interprocess Communications is the second volume in the author’s Unix Network Programming series and deals with network programming in the Unix Operating System. Summary Of The Book Unix Network Programming: Interprocess Communications deals with the various aspects of interprocess communication (IPC) in Unix like synchronization, Remote Procedure Calls (RPC), shared memory, and message passing. The performance of any Unix system depends on the implementation of the IPC. The contents of the book are split up into five parts. The first part, the introduction, covers topics such as System V IPC and Posix IPC along with a brief introduction to networking processes and programming using the Unix software. Message Passing has been covered in the second part and involves topics like Posix Message Queues, Pipes and FIFOs, and System V Message Queues. The third part of Unix Network Programming: Interprocess Communications deals with Synchronization and mainly talks about topics like Record Locking, Read-Write Locks, Condition Variables, and Posix Semaphores. Shared Memory is the feature of the fourth part which discusses in detail the concepts of Posix Shared Memory and System V Shared Memory. The fifth and last part of the book is about Remote Procedure Calls and covers Sun RPC and Doors. Unix Network Programming: Interprocess Communications is sure to give a detailed understanding of the subject to the readers and is ideal for many computer science students who need to have in-depth knowledge of network programming. It is also used by many experienced programmers as a reference book. About Richard Stevens William Richard Stevens was well known for his computer science books, which are mostly regarding TCP/IP and UNIX. The author has written a host of books including Advanced Programming in the UNIX Environment, the TCP/IP Illustrated series, and the Unix Network Programming series. He was also involved in co-authoring multiple IETF Request for Comments documents. Stevens was born in 1951 in what is now Zambia. He graduated from the University of Michigan in Aerospace Engineering and completed his master’s from the University of Arizona in Systems Engineering. Stevens also worked as a part-time flight instructor and was enthusiastic about piloting. He was posthumously awarded in 2000 with the Usenix Lifetime Achievement Award.