Punjab University Gujranwala Campus
Course Outline for Certification Course
Title: Linux Administration
Objective:
This course is intended for users who want to learn more about the inner workings of Linux and how the various
pieces of the Operating System fit together. This course will guide you step-by-step in creating your own custom
build Linux system from scratch, using nothing but the sources of software that are needed.
Another purpose of this course is to give an overview of the networking capabilities of the Linux operating
system. New Linux users, particularly those coming from a Windows environment, are often unaware of the
networking possibilities of Linux. This course aims to show a general picture of such possibilities with a brief
description of each one and pointers for further information.
The information has been gathered from many sources: HOWTOs, faqs, projects' web pages and my own hands-
on experience.
Those are just a few out of many reasons why people want to build their own Linux system. If you're one of
those, this course is meant for you.
Lecture Topics
1 History of Linux, Comparison between Linux & Windows, System requirements, Mount Points,
2 Linux Installation
File System Structure: DOS to Linux Cheat Sheet, Linux File Systems, What are Inodes, Data
Storage Layout in ext2.
3 File Systems Hierarchy Standards: File system Structure,
The Directory Tree Structure
Basic Commands:
Logging In, Logging Out, Shutting Down, Changing your Password, Listing Files (ls), Pico, more, less
4
System manual pages, System info pages, Directories [cd], Manipulating directories [mkdir], Directories
[pwd], Directories [rm], Directories [rmdir],
Basic Commands:
Relative vs. absolute pathnames, Directories [cp], Basics of Wildcards, clear, Using cat command to
5 create files, Using Redirection, Joining Files and Redirecting Output, Appending Standard Output,
Redirecting Standard Input, touch command,
Basic Commands:
Determining file type, Viewing the access statistics of a file or directory, which command, cmp, grep,
6 head, tail, locate, Searching for files using find command
Permissions: Permissions, File Permission Types, Directory Permission Types, Changing
Permissions (chmod), Level Options, Symbols used between Levels & Permissions, Adding rights to a
7 file, Removing rights from a file, Changing Permissions with Numbers
Default Discretionary Access Control (UMASK)
Changing user OR group ownership chown & chgrp commands
Managing File Links: Managing Links, Hard links, Removing a link, Symbolic links.
Linux Devices: Device Basics, Hard and Floppy Drives, Serial Devices, CD and Tape Drives, Device
Commands, Adding A Device
8 Linux Partitioning using Fdisk
Introducing Linux fdisk, Starting fdisk, Displaying Table, Toggling Display Units, Creating Partitions,
Listing Partition Types, Changing Partition ID, Toggling Boot Flag, Deleting Partitions, Verifying Table,
Quitting Without Saving, Writing Changes to Disk
9 User AGroups,
dministration: User
Privileges of aAccounts,
root user ,Standard Users, System Accounts, Default Users, Default
Key Configuration File
/etc/passwd File, Why use Shadow Password ?, /etc/shadow File, Adding Users, /etc/login.defs
Managing Users with Command Line Tools
Creating a new user account, Default Settings, Overriding System Default, Private Group, Assigning
user an additional group, To Find Out which groups user belong to,
User Administration
Creating a new group, Modifying an existing user account, Changing a password, Changing the shell,
10 Chang1ng the home directory, Changing a default group, Changing an account expiration date,
Changing finger information, Modifying an existing group, Deleting a user account, Disabling a user
account, Creating default user settings
System Startup & Shutdown.
11 System Startup and Initialization, kernel Boot Messages
Chkconfig Utility
12 Process Management
RPM Management
What Is Package Management?
Red Hat Package Manager (RPM)
The tasks you can perform with RPM
What Is a Package?
Binary Package
Source Package
Syntax of RPM
13
Architecture for the Package
noarch string
Some common Architecture strings
Where To find Packages
Working with rpm
How to examine the information about a package?
To see a listing of the files in the package
Querying Packages with RPM
RPM Management
Installing Packages with RPM
Steps RPM goes through during installation.
Install options used with RPM
14 Uninstalling Packages with RPM
Updating Packages with RPM
Verifying Packages with RPM
Verification Failure Codes
Backup
Archiving and compressing files
Using tar.
gzip
15
gunzip
Putting them together
Unpack this Archive
Scheduling Jobs Using cron
Linux Networking
Introduction to UNIX Networking
Setting Up a Network
16 Set Up Network Interface
Network Configuration in RH
Common Network Conf. Files
The xinetd Internet Service Daemon
Server Configuration
Set up FTP Service
17
Set up Telnet Service
Setup SSh Server
18 Samba as a PDC
19 Samba as a PDC
20 Samba as a member server of an existing domain
21 The Quota Service
22 Squid (Proxy Server)
23 Set Up Mail Service (Sendmail)
24 Set Up NFS Server
