Advanced Unix Systems Administration

Advanced Unix Systems Administration
(Networking Configuration ,Security Considerations ,Performance Monitoring and Tuning)

HP-UX Training Overview

This course will teach the commands and methods needed to setup and manage advanced features in a Unix system. The course will also use a problem solving approach in the lab exercises to teach system managers the proper application of advanced features.

Systems: HP-UX

HP-UX Training Prerequisites

It is assumed that the student has experience with interactive Unix systems with user-level commands, basic shell or Perl scripting techniques, and essential systems administrator functions.

HP-UX Training Course duration

This course requires five (5) days, approximately 70 % lecture, and 30 % lab time.

HP-UX Training Course Objectives

On completion of this course, a system manager should be able to implement networking features for the system and it's users; define name service capabilities; and use advanced options and setups for the shell command interpreters.

HP-UX Training Course outline

Review of System Concepts for Systems Administrators

Process concepts
Shell command usage and review

Advanced Network Features

Review of network basic setup
Subnet addressing
Using arp (address resolution protocol)
Network statistics
Controlling the inetd process
Miscellaneous network commands/tools
DHCP setup - client and server

File Transfer Capabilities

The ftp utility
- setup
- file capabilities
- trivial ftp and anonymous ftp setups

Advanced Network File System (NFS) Features

Review of basic NFS setup
Advanced capabilities of server setup
Advanced capabilities in client setup
Using the automount feature

Using and Configuring Samba

Reasons for using samba features
Selecting aserver host
Defining client hosts

Name Services

Capabilities of DNS
BIND configurations
Configuring the resolver
Configuring the named process
Cache initialization
Using nslookup to obtain information

Configuring Remote Printers

Printer setup databases (and control)
Remote printer usage

Tape Device Access Through TCP/IP

Using data dump (dd)
Combining tar with dd
Remote file system dumping

Maintaining System Integrity

Specifying auditing events
Improving shell performance
Using the error report facility

Security Concepts for System Administrators

Overview of issues related to Unix security
System administrator functions related to security

System Security Features Updating

Security levels in a Unix system
Rebuilding the Unix kernel with auditing

Managing of System Users

Using the root account securely
Password issues
- changing
- encryption
- ging and expirations
- shadow files
Groups

File System Security

File permissions review
Special permissions: SUID,SGID,Sticky Bits
Device files
Using chown and chgrp
Backups

Using Unix Log Files

Users
- lastlog,utmp,wtmp,pacct,syslog
System
- shutdownlog
- sulog/messages

Network Security

Proper maintenance of the /etc/hosts file
Using the "r" commands
The restricted shell
NFS security implications

Performance Basics

Factors affecting system performance
Performance metrics
Virtual system caching
Effects of Computer Architecture

Memory Management

Memory usage by the kernel
Process creation
Buffer Cache (and allocation control)
Shared Memory / Page Caching
Paging and Swapping
Monitoring Tools

CPU Management

Software priorities concepts
Impact of the nice parameter
Priority boosting
Differences in hardware implementations
Monitoring tools

I/O Management

Breakdown of Disk I/O
Measuring Disk I/O
File system structure concepts
File system caching
Name Lookup Caching
Monitoring tools

Network Management

TCP/IP Layers
Socket controls
Controlling network services
Setting network buffer values
Monitoring tools

NFS Performance

RPC Performance Considerations
Impact of NFS Blocking and Caching Sizes
Optimizing NFS Servers and Clients
Monitoring tools

X-window basics and implementation

Client-server communications
Optimizing a system with X
Reducing xterm memory usage
Monitoring tools

Modification of Performance Parameters

SUN Solaris
HP-UX
IBM AIX

Summaries

Memory management
CPU management
I/O management
Network management
User program management