Linux System Administration

At Course Completion

Guided by an expert instructor in a hands-on lab environment, participants will:

Install a Linux virtual machine and understand the terminal versus shell.
Navigate the Linux file system, manage directories, and use command-line tools.
Edit text files using both graphical editors (gedit, kate) and command-line editors (nano, vi).
Copy, move, rename, and delete files and directories.
Differentiate between Linux command types and effectively use command documentation.
Create and manage both soft and hard links.
Manage superuser access and handle root privileges with security best practices.
Add and manage users, groups, and file permissions to control access.
Utilize piping and I/O redirection for efficient data management.
Automate administrative tasks using cron and shell scripts.
Create system backups, manage disks, partitions, and file systems.
Install and configure basic networking, and set up a LAMP stack for web hosting.

Need different skills or topics? If your team requires different topics or tools, additional skills or custom approach, this course may be further adjusted to accommodate. We offer additional Unix, Linux, Scripting, administration, networking, programming, database and other related courses which may be blended with this course for a track that best suits your learning objectives.

Audience Profile

This course is ideal for IT professionals, system administrators, and anyone looking to gain a practical understanding of Linux system administration. It is designed for beginners, though familiarity with basic computer and command-line operations will be beneficial. No prior Linux experience is required.

Labs and exercises are designed to work across multiple distributions, including CentOS, Ubuntu, RHEL, Oracle, and others. You'll gain hands-on experience in areas such as user and group management, software installation, system backups, file system management, networking, and web server configuration, all applicable to a range of Linux environments.

Outline

Please note that this list of topics is based on our standard course offering, evolved from typical industry uses and trends. We will work with you to tune this course and level of coverage to target the skills you need most. Course agenda, topics and labs are subject to adjust during live delivery in response to student skill level, interests and participation.

1. System Administration Overview

System Administration Overview
Installing a Linux virtual machine
Terminal versus Shell
A few simple commands

2. The Linux File System

Navigating through the directory tree
Parent and current directories
Passing command arguments
The touch command
Making directories
Combining command options

3. Linux File Editors

Graphical editors - gedit and kate
The nano editor
Saving and exiting vi
Command mode
Heads or tails?

4. Copying, Moving, and Deleting Files

Copying one file
Copying multiple directories
Moving multiple files
Renaming files
Removing directories

5. Linux Command Types

The four categories of linux commands
What does the command do?
The info page
Helpful apropos command
The /usr/share/doc directory

6. Hard versus Soft Links

Displaying file inode number
Creating soft links
Creating hard links

7. Superusers and the Root Login

Accessing the root user
The dash difference
Setting the root password

8. Controlling the Population:

The /etc/passwd file
Adding users
Modifying user attributes
Defining the skeleton
Changing the defaults
Adding group members
Primary versus secondary groups
Changing file permissions

9. Piping and I/O Redirection

Linux pipes
Redirecting standard output
Redirecting standard error
Redirecting standard input

10. Analyzing and Manipulating Files

Viewing file size
Counting characters, words, and lines
Sorting files
Searching for patterns
The stream editor
Text processing with awk

11. Find/Locate Files

The locate command
Updating the file database
The find command

12. Managing and Identifying Software Packages

How to download packages
How to install packages
How to remove packages
How to show package information
Listing all packages
Patching your system

13. Controlling Processes:

What is a process?
Parent process versus child process
Foreground versus background processes
Sending signals to processes
Setting priorities for new processes
The /proc directory

14. The Power of Sudo

Examples of privileged commands
Granting access with sudo
Group privileges
Listing user privileges
visudo versus /etc/sudoers

15. Basic Networking

Testing network connectivity
The ip command
The nmcli command
Checking your IP address
Flying with traceroute
Breaking your DNS
Changing your hostname

16. Shell Scripting Overview

The PATH variable
Reading user input
Passing arguments to scripts
Using the if condition
Using the for loop
Using the while loop
Bash script functions

17. Controlling Processes: cron and crontab

Our first cron job
Run every five minutes
Automating system patching
Running a job once

18. System Backups

Creating an archive
Extracting archive files
Compressing with gzip
Compressing with bzip2
Compressing with xz
Measuring performance

19. Creating Aliases

Your first alias
One alias for multiple commands
Listing all aliases
Creating a permanent alias
Removing an alias

20. File and Disk Management Tools

Where are your devices?
Where is your hard disk?
Adding disks to your virtual machine
Creating new disk partitions
Creating new filesystems
Mounting filesystems
Unmounting filesystems
Corrupting and fixing filesystems
Creating logical volumes

21. LAMP Server Basics

Installing Apache and Updating the Firewall
Installing MySQL
Installing PHP
Creating a Virtual Host for your Website
Testing PHP Processing on your Web Server
Testing Database Connection from PHP

BONUS TOPICS / Time Permitting

22. The Samba File Sharing Facility

Installing Samba
Setting Samba's Global Options
Creating Users
Configuring the Samba Shares
Logging Into the Samba Server

23. Networked File Systems (NFS)

Downloading and Installing the Components
Creating the Share Directories on the Host
Configuring the NFS Exports on the Host Server
Adjusting the Firewall on the Host
Creating Mount Points and Mounting Directories on the Client
Testing NFS Access
Mounting the Remote NFS Directories at Boot
Unmounting an NFS Remote Share