06/28   A friend of mine who's a CS grad student over at UCLA had his
        research advisor / boss buy him a SPARC station for him to take
        home. Is this ... like, not out of the ordinary? BTW, any
        recommended Solaris, SPARC books for a newbie that you would
        suggest for him? Thanks!
        \_ Probably not bad to buy some general (presumably ORA) Unix-type
           books.  _Unix in a Nutshell_, _Essential System Administration_,
           etc.  It is difficult to go wrong when buying Unix books from
           O'Reilly.  Also, if your friend doesn't need any Solaris-specific
           software, you might think of installing SPARC Linux -- for which
           it is far easier to get free technical support in universities.
           Many grad students have very spiffy machines, for which we may envy
           them.
        \_ Unix System Administration Handbook by Nemeth, Seebass, Snyder ...