Linux Advanced System Administration (LPI) Training Course

Course Outline

DAY 1

Linux Advanced System Administration (LPI) Training Course

Course Introduction

• Administration and Course Materials
• Course Structure and Agenda
• Delegate and Trainer Introductions

Session 1: ADVANCED NETWORK CONFIGURATION & TROUBLESHOOTING

• Configuring the network card (ip link, ip addr)
• Network scripts
• Configuring routing (ip route)
• Network troubleshooting and related tools (tcpdump, ping, mtr, traceroute, netstat, ss, arp, nmap, nc)
• Exercise

Session 2: APACHE, SQUID AND NGINX

• APACHE main configuration files
• APACHE server configuration (main Section entries)
• Starting APACHE
• APACHE access configuration
• Configuring secure APACHE (https)
• Configuring IP address-based virtual hosts
• Configuring name-based virtual hosts
• Configuring Apache for user-based content
• SQUID proxy server
• Configuring client browsers
• Starting SQUID
• The SQUID configuration file (squid.conf)
• SQUID security settings
• NGINX Proxy and Reverse Proxy
• Exercise

Session 3: NFS NETWORK SERVICES

• NFS operation and daemons (portmapper etc.)
• Setting up an NFS server (/etc/exports and exportfs)
• Investigating the portmapper
• Setting up an NFS client (mount)
• Mounting NFS filesystems at boot (/etc/fstab)
• Configuring AutoFS direct and indirect mounts
• Creating AutoFS units
• Exercise

Session 4: SAMBA

• The SAMBA configuration file (smb.conf)
• Testing the SAMBA configuration
• Configuring SAMBA users
• Mapping Windows and SAMBA users
• Starting SAMBA
• Managing Windows filesystems (smbmount, nmblookup)
• Accessing Windows shares
• Exercise

DAY 2

Linux Advanced System Administration (LPI) Training Course

Session 5: THE DOMAIN NAME SERVER

• DNS operation
• Types of DNS Servers
• Domain Name Space
• Setting up a DNS master and slave server
• Server configuration files (named.conf and databases)
• DNS resource record formats
• Configuring DNS logging
• Configuring DNS security
• Starting and managing the DNS Server (rcnamed, rndc)
• Testing the DNS Server (host, dig, nslookup)
• Configuring DNS Clients
• Exercise

Session 6: DHCP

• Configuring DHCP
• The dhcpd.conf configuration file
• DNS entries
• Client address entries
• Address leases
• DHCP client configuration
• Exercise

Session 7: FTP

• Configuring a VSFTPD server
• Configuring Pure-FTPd
• Configuring ProFTPd
• Active vs Passive mode
• Exercise

Session 8: CENTRALISED STORAGE WITH ISCSI

• Definition and benefits of iSCSI
• Configuring an iSCSI target
• Configuring an iSCSI initiator
• Configuring iSCSI via YaST
• Exercise

DAY 3

Linux Advanced System Administration (LPI) Training Course

Session 9: ADVANCED FILESYSTEM TOOLS

• Converting Ext filesystems to Btrfs
• Checking and repairing Btrfs filesystems
• Creating Btrfs subvolumes and snapshots
• Labelling XFS filesystems
• Configuring UUIDs
• Performing full and incremental backups of XFS filesystems
• Querying the backup repository
• Restoring XFS filesystems
• Exercise

Session 10: LOGICAL VOLUME MANAGEMENT (LVM)

• LVM Overview
• Configuring LVM (pvcreate, vgcreate, vgextend, lvcreate etc.)
• Displaying information about the LVM environment (pvdisplay, pvs, vgdisplay, vgs, lvdisplay, lvs)
• Creating striped logical volumes
• Resizing Logical Volumes (lvextend, resize2fs, resize_reiserfs, xfs_growfs)
• Logical Volume Snapshots (lvcreate, lvdisplay)
• The Device Mapper
• Configuring the lvm.conf file
• Exercise

Session 11: RAID

• RAID overview
• Raw devices and partitions
• Creating a RAID device (fdisk, mdadm)
• Managing a RAID device (mdadm, /proc/mdstat)
• Creating and mount a file system on a RAID device
• Hot swapping failed drives
• Exercise

Session 12: DISK MONITORING WITH SMARTD

• Main features of monitoring disk devices with smartd
• Configuring smartd
• /etc/sysconfig/smartmontools
• /etc/smartd.conf
• Managing smartd with smartctl
• Exercise

DAY 4

Linux Advanced System Administration (LPI) Training Course

Session 13: LDAP

• Structure of an LDAP Tree
• Configuring the LDAP server (slapd.conf)
• Testing the LDAP server (ldapsearch)
• Adding information into LDAP (lpdapadd)
• Configuring the LDAP Clients (nsswitch.conf, ldap.conf)
• Testing the Client connection to the Server (getent)
• Exercise

Session 14: COMPILING SOFTWARE FROM SOURCE

• Installing programs from source (tar, tarball)
• Compiling Open Source Software (configure, make)
• Installing the compiled software (make install)
• Managing shared libraries (ldd)
• Compiling from SRC (source) RPM packages (rpmbuild, rpm)
• Exercise

Session 15: SYSTEM MONITORING & PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT

• System performance monitoring
• Collecting system performance information (sar)
• Monitoring memory usage (free)
• Measuring virtual memory (vmstat)
• Measuring I/O performance (iostat)
• Performance Guidelines
• Installing and verifying Nagios
• Exercise

Session 16: THE LINUX KERNEL

• Kernel naming conventions
• Monolithic and Modular kernel design
• Listing modules (lsmod, modinfo)
• Kernel module configuration
• Kernel tuning (/proc sysctl.conf, sysctl)
• Exercise

DAY 5

Linux Advanced System Administration (LPI) Training Course

Session 17: FIREWALL CONFIGURATION

• Basic packets and routing
• Netfilter (iptables)
• Packet filtering (iptables, chains, rule targets, connection tracking)
• Saving and restoring firewall settings
• Network address translation (NAT)
• Exercise

Session 18: PLUGGABLE AUTHENTICATION MODULES (PAM)

• The main PAM configuration files (/etc/pam.d directory)
• Configuration file formats
• Controlling user access using the configuration files
• Configuring pam_listfile
• Controlling time-based access with PAM
• Controlling limits with PAM
• Exercise

Session 19: APPARMOR

• Enabling and disabling AppArmor
• AppArmor monitoring tools
• Building and modifying AppArmor profiles
• Logging AppArmor
• AppArmor Options
• Exercise

Session 20: SELINUX

• Installation and configuration of SELinux
• Installation of an SELinux policy
• Modifying an SElinux policy
• Modifying services within SELinux
• SELinux contexts
• Exercise

Session 21: HARDWARE CONFIGURATION

• The Hotplug system
• Devices and Interfaces
• The sysfs filesystem and persistent names
• Device initialisation and interface configuration
• Hotplug and Coldplug
• The Udev system
• Exercise

Addendum: Reference Materials (provided within the course handbook for additional reading)

APPENDIX A - CONFIGURING APACHE FOR PHP AND TOMCAT

• Configuring Apache Web Server to support PHP and Tomcat

APPENDIX B - BASIC OPENVPN

• Accessing a private network with OpenVPN

APPENDIX C - RAIDTOOLS

• Old style raidtools package

APPENDIX D - CUSTOM KERNEL CONFIGURATION

• Modifying the kernel configuration
• Installing kernel sources
• Configuring the kernel

APPENDIX E - DRACUT

• Managing the Linux boot process with dracut

APPENDIX F - UEFI

• A description of UEFI
• The UEFI partition
• Secure Boot
• UEFI operation
• The UEFI Shell

APPENDIX G - ELECTRONIC MAIL AND POSTFIX

• Basic mail server configuration with postfix