> Since I am a novice at working with UN*X:
> 
> I was wondering if anyone could suggest some good reference sources.
Man pages and source code are the best references.  Anything else  is
just too general.

> 
> Is there an alternative to the VI (barf) editor :)
Yes, EMACS.  But learn VI.  It is extremely EASY to use and VERY well
featured.  It just takes a little time to get used to.  VI is the
standard editor  on all Unix systems.  If you want to say you know
Unix, you'd better know how to use VI.

> I am a Systems Programmer by profession (IBM mainframes) so I pickup on
> things pretty quickly and I would like to eventually contribute to this
> effort.
Welcome the wonderful world of Open Systems.  An AIX book might be useful
to you - IBM went out of their way to make AIX more palatable to
mainframers.