AIX Training : AIX System Administration

AIX System Administration

AIX Training Overview

This course combines lectures and hands-on labs to teach the participant how to manage the AIX operating system. It includes information on basic system administration, as well as including topics that are AIX-specific that would be of interest to administrators coming from other platforms. The course may be customized to include topics associated with AIX on the SP platforms

AIX Training Audience

New AIX system administrators or administrators migrating from other UNIX systems to AIX

AIX Training Prerequisites

A familiarity with using the UNIX operating system, including using vi, navigating file systems and using basic commands.

AIX Training Course duration

5 Days

AIX Training Topics

Introduction to System Administration

System Management Tool (smit)

Managing Devices

System Startup/Shutdown

File System Concepts

The Journaled File System

Backup and Restore

Logical Volume Manager

Managing Users and Groups

AIX Queuing System

Basic Problem Determination

AIX Training Course outline

System Administration Concepts

Lecture objectives
Who is the system administrator?
What does the system administrator do?
What a system administrator must know
Using the root login id
Aix configuration files
System security
Lecture summary

The System Management Interface Tool

Lecture objectives
Unix system management -- the old way
Aix system management
The philosophy -- "smit happens"
High level commands
Smit tasks
Smit screens
Smit screen symbols
Smit function keys
The log and script files
The smit graphical user interface
Executing smit
Lecture summary

Managing AIX User Accounts and Groups

Objectives
Lecture objectives
Attributes of a user accounts
Managing aix groups
Passwords

Managing AIX User Accounts and Groups (Cont'd)

Aix user and group management files
The /etc/passwd file
The /etc/security/passwd file
The /etc/group file
The /etc/security/group file
Group administrators
The /etc/security/user file
The /etc/security/limits file
The /etc/security/login.cfg file
User management tasks
Adding a new user
The /usr/lib/security/user.default file
Removing a user
Adding a group
Setting port attributes
User services
Lecture summary

AIX Device Management

Lecture objectives
Aix devices
Aix device management strategy
Device management tasks
The configuration manager (/etc/cfgmgr)
The object data manager
Methods and device states
A word about scsi devices
Device management through smit
Adding devices
Removing a device
Changing a device
Device management commands
Lecture summary

The AIX Queueing System

Lecture objectives
Queueing system concepts
Queue configurations
Components of the aix queueing system
The qdaemon program
The /etc/qconfig file
Backend programs
Adding a printer and queue
Managing queues
Queueing system files
Correcting a configuration problem
Using the queueing system
Specifying the destination queue and printer
Creating a batch queue
Configuring a print server
Configuring a print client
Working with virtual printers
Lecture summary
Additional information

File System Basics

Lecture objectives
File types
Ordinary files
Inodes
Directories
Pathnames -- the big picture
The global file system
Physical file systems
Virtual file systems
Aix file system device names
Mounting file systems
Seeing what's mounted
The /etc/filesystems file
Unmounting file systems
Mounting over a non-empty directory
The fuser command
Listing file systems
File system groups
Monitoring file system space -- the df command
Files that grow
Other file system commands
Hard links
Tracing hard links
Symbolic links
Additional information
Lecture summary

The Journaled File System

Lecture objectives
Features of the journaled file system
The structure of the jfs
Data block access schemes
Jfs control files
The jfs log
Creating a journaled file system
Extending a journaled file system
Removing a journaled file system
Jfs data block fragmentation
Setting the number of inodes
File system defragmentation -- the defragfs command
Additional information
Lecture summary

The Logical Volume Manager

Lecture objectives
The aix disk i/o strategy
Features of the logical volume manager
Physical volumes
Volume groups
Physical partitions
Logical volumes
Logical partitions
An introduction to mirroring
The volume group descriptor area
The rootvg
Adding a physical volume to the system
Creating a volume group
Varying on a volume group
Varying off a volume group
Logical volume strategies
Creating a logical volume
Additional information
Lecture summary

AIX Backup and Restore

Lecture objectives
Reasons for doing backups
Types of backups
Tools for backups and restores
Archive files and tape drive attributes
Tape device names
Creating and using a stacked tape
Restoring from a stacked tape
Backing up the root volume group
Restoring from a system image backup
The backup command
Backing up filesystems
Backing up filesystems, cont.
Filesystem backup strategy
Restoring a filesystem
Backing up individual files
Additional information
Lecture summary

AIX Backup and Restore

Lecture objectives
The aix boot process
The configuration manager
Run levels
The /etc/inittab file
Start-up shell scripts
The /sbin/rc.boot file
Changing run levels
The init command
Halting the system
The shutdown command
Lecture summary

Basic AIX Problem Determination

Lecture objectives
Aix problem determination
The operator panel
The aix boot process
Potential boot problems
The problem solving guide
Booting the system in service mode
Hardware diagnostics
The error log
Error reports
Cleaning the error log
System dumps
Lecture summary