01-chapter 1_Introduction
01-chapter 1_Introduction
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Learning Objectives:At the end of the topic,
the students will be able to:
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What will the course cover?
● Understand the role & responsibilities of a system administrator
● Configure the Linux operating system
● Describe the system boot process
● Setup and manage user accounts and groups
● Manage the resources and security of a computer running Linux
● Make effective use of Unix utilities and scripting languages
(bash, Perl)
● Configure and manage simple network services on a Linux
system
● Develop an appreciation of the documentation available as part
of an installed Unix/Linux system
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What does a sysadmin do?
● User account management
● Hardware management
● Perform filesystem backups, restores
● Install and configure new software and services
● Keep systems and services operating
– Monitor system and network
– Troubleshoot problems
● Maintain documentation
● Audit security
● Help users, performance tuning, and more!
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1. Overview
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2. System Administration
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System Administrator
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Duties of a system administrator
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Duties of a system administrator
(continue)
1. Install patches
2. Review system logs
3. Report malicious or suspicious activity on systems to ISO immediately
4. Report sensitive information stored on systems to ISO
5. Maintain user access administration
6. Disaster recovery planning
7. Physical security
8. Disable unnecessary services on servers
9. Generate/Retain system backups
10. Identify secondary system administrator(s)
11. Comply with password requirements
12. Access control
13. Environmental protection (i.e.,protection from possible exposure to water damage,excessive
heat, etc.)
14. Security training will be required every three (3) years
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3. Network Administration
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3. Network Administration
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5.What is a Network Operating System?
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Windows Server
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Windows Server
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User Account Management
● User Ids
● Mail
● Home directories (quotas,
drive capacities)
● Default startup files (paths)
● Permissions, group memberships,
accounting and restrictions
● Communicating policies and procedures
● Disabling / removing user accounts
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Hardware Management
– Capacity planning
– Inventory
– Hardware evaluation and purchase
– Adding and removing hardware
● Configuration
● Cabling, wiring, DIP switches, etc.
– Device driver installation
– System configuration and settings
– User notification and documentation
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Data Backups
– Perhaps most important aspect!
– Disk and backup media capacity planning
– Performance, network and system impact
– Disaster recovery
● Onsite/Offsite
● Periodic testing
● Multiple copies
– User communication
● Schedules, restore guarantees
and procedures, loss tolerance
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Software Installation/Maintenance
● Evaluation of software
● Downloading and building (compiling and
tweaking)
● Installation
● Maintenance of
multiple versions
● Security
● Patches and updates
● User notification, documentation
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System Monitoring
– Hardware and services functioning and operational
– Capacity
● Disk, RAM, CPU, network
– Security
● Passwords
● Break-ins
– System logs
● Examination
● Periodic rotation and truncation
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Troubleshooting
● Problem discovery, diagnosis, and resolution
– Root cause analysis
– Often quite difficult!
● Often requires
– Broad and thorough
system knowledge
– Outside experts
– Luck
● Expediency
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Local Documentation
● Administrative policies and procedures
– Backup media locations
– Hardware
● Location
● Description, configuration, connections
– Software
● Install media (or download location)
● Installation, build, and configuration details
● Patches installed
● Acceptable use policies
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Security Concerns
● System logging and audit facilities
– Evaluation and implementation
– Monitoring and analysis
– Traps, auditing and monitoring programs
● Unexpected or unauthorized use detection
● Monitoring of security advisories
– Security holes and weaknesses
– Live exploits
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User Assistance
– Time intensive!
– Techniques
● Help desks
● Trouble-ticket systems
– Software availability and usage
– Software configuration settings
– Hardware usage, maintenance, and troubleshooting
– Writing FAQs
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Administration Challenges
– Need
● Broad knowledge of hardware and software
● To balance conflicting requirements
– Short-term vs. long-term needs
– End-user vs. organizational requirements
– Service provider vs. police model
● To work well and efficiently under pressure
● 24x7 availability
● Flexibility, tolerance, and patience
● Good communication skills
– People think of sysadmins only when things don't work!
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Why (Red Hat/CentOS) Linux?
– Need to use some OS to make ideas concrete
– Really only two choices:
● Windows (I'm not qualified)
● UNIX (and UNIX-like OSes such as Linux)
– Both are useful and common in the real world
– Linux is popular, free, and usable on personal
machines, but also handles large-scale services
– Red Hat/CentOS is relatively polished, popular
● I've been using it since ~1996
● There are, of course, many alternatives
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What is Linux?
much is courtesy of www.kernel.org
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Brief history of UNIX
● Originated as a research project in 1969 at AT&T Bell Labs
– Made available to universities (free) in 1976
● Berkeley UNIX started in 1977 when UCB licensed code from
AT&T.
● Berkeley Software Distribution started in 1977 with 1BSD, and
ended in 1993 with 4.4BSD
● Licensing costs from AT&T increased, so Berkeley attempted to
remove AT&T code, but ran out of funds before completion.
● Final release of AT&T-free code called 4.4BSD-Lite.
– Most current BSD distributions (FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD) are
derived from 4.4BSD-Lite.
● Most commercial versions of UNIX (Solaris, HP-UX) are derived
from the AT&T code
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Brief history of Linux
● Created as a personal project (and still
controlled) by Linus Torvalds, a Finnish
graduate student, in 1991
● Conceived as an offshoot of Minix (a model OS)
– Not derived from AT&T or BSD UNIX
● Red Hat (one of many Linux vendors) founded
in 1993
● Kernel v1.0 released 1994
● Most recent (Jan 2012) kernel release is 3.2.1
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Where to get answers
● Linux/UNIX documentation can be found in
many places
– Manual pages (man pages, using man command)
– Texinfo documents (read with info command)
– HOWTOs – focused descriptions of a topic
– Distribution-specific documentation
– Your favorite Web search engine
● Will typically find online versions of the above
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Where to get answers
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man pages
– Usually my first resource
– Provide OS installation-specific
information
– Man pages document (almost)
every command, driver, file
format, and library routine
– “man -k topic” will list all man
pages that use topic
– Parameters are not the same
for every UNIX, e.g.:
● Linux: man 4 tty
● Solaris: man -s4 tty
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man page organization
● Man pages are divided into sections (somewhat Linux specific)
– 1: User-level commands and applications
– 2: System calls and kernel error codes
– 3: Library calls
– 4: Device drivers
– 5: Standard file formats
– 6: Games and demonstrations
– 7: Miscellaneous files and documents
– 8: System administration commands
– 9: Obscure kernel specs and interfaces
● Some sections are subdivided
– 3M contains pages for math library
– Section “n” often contains subcommands (such as bash built-in cmds)
● Sections 6 and 9 are typically empty
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Where do we go from here?
– In this course, I'll assign homework projects that
require root access on a RHEL/CentOS 5 system.
– In our first lab, you will be provided with a hard drive
that can be used in the Sandbox lab (PL112) with the
OS, and root privileges so that you will administer it.
– In addition, you can (and should) use
● the department Suns for most things
● A CentOS 5 system (on the CSE network) called
edgar.cse.lehigh.edu to explore a minimal working system
– See course web page for syllabus and schedule for
topics and readings.
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