Very Computer

Guys:

Interested in Linux admin, wanted to self learn, please let me know
what are important things I have to learn for Admin point of view. By
looking at On-line postings, I came to know these are important,
besides these what else are important to learn:

1) Samba installation and setup
2) Web server setup
3) Usr account creation

Besides those three, is there any things are important, also which
Distribution is better for Server side as well as Client side
(especially for small businesses point if view).

Thanks for your time.
GS.

["Followup-To:" header set to comp.os.linux.misc.]

Quote:

> Interested in Linux admin, wanted to self learn, please let me know
> what are important things I have to learn for Admin point of view. By
> looking at On-line postings, I came to know these are important,
> besides these what else are important to learn:

What's most important to ''learn'' (I don't know if it can be learned)
is how to think critically and how to read documentation.  There is a
bit of an art to both.  With these two skills, you can do pretty much
anything in the sysadmin world (not just linux, either).

Quote:> which
> Distribution is better for Server side as well as Client side
> (especially for small businesses point if view).

If 30 people post their answer to the above question, you'll likely get
35 different answers.  To the experienced admin they're all more similar
than they are different.

--keith

--

(try just my userid to email me)
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Quote:> Guys:

> Interested in Linux admin, wanted to self learn, please let me know
> what are important things I have to learn for Admin point of view. By
> looking at On-line postings, I came to know these are important,
> besides these what else are important to learn:

0) Operating System installation, setup and, or fine-tuning
0.1) Network/Firewall planing and setup
0.2) DHCP Server software selection, installation and setup
0.3) DNS Server software selection, installation and setup
0.4) Mail Server software selection, installation and setup
0.5) POP/IMAP Server software selection, installation and setup
0.6) SSH Server software selection, installation and setup
0.7) NFS Server software selection, installation and setup
0.8) Terminal Server (for remote booting) software selection,
      installation and setup
0.9) NTP Server software selection, installation and setup
0.10) LDAP Server software selection, installation and setup
0.11) CVS Server software selection, installation and setup
0.12) Backup Server software selection, installation and setup
0.13) Chat/Messenger Server software selection, installation and setup
0.14) X Server software selection, installation and setup
0.15) Desktop (VNC/NX) Server software selection, installation and setup

Quote:> 1) Samba installation and setup
> 2) Web server setup

2.0) FTP Server software selection, installation and setup
2.1) SQL Server software selection, installation and setup

Quote:> 3) Usr account creation

Isn't it a part of step 0 (above).

Quote:> Besides those three, is there any things are important, also which
> Distribution is better for Server side as well as Client side
> (especially for small businesses point if view).

Hey! that's a religious question, otherwise. The best could be same for
which you are most comfortable; OTH, FYI, broadly speaking all the Linux
distros can only be classified either as commercial or as community
supported. For a production system I for one shall go in for decent and
stable commercial distro with 24/7 customer support.

--
Dr Balwinder Singh Dheeman            Registered Linux User: #229709
CLLO (Chief Linux Learning Officer)   Machines: #168573, 170593, 259192

More: http://anu.homelinux.net/~bsd/  Visit: http://counter.li.org/

Quote:

> 0) Operating System installation, setup and, or fine-tuning
> 0.1) Network/Firewall planing and setup
> 0.2) DHCP Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.3) DNS Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.4) Mail Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.5) POP/IMAP Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.6) SSH Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.7) NFS Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.8) Terminal Server (for remote booting) software selection,
>       installation and setup
> 0.9) NTP Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.10) LDAP Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.11) CVS Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.12) Backup Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.13) Chat/Messenger Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.14) X Server software selection, installation and setup
> 0.15) Desktop (VNC/NX) Server software selection, installation and setup

>> 1) Samba installation and setup
>> 2) Web server setup

> 2.0) FTP Server software selection, installation and setup
> 2.1) SQL Server software selection, installation and setup

Add to this very good list of topics possibly before any of the others:

-1) Security:
    -1.5 Hardening the system
    -1.6 (Stealing from above) Firewall planning/setup
    -1.7 ssh selection, installation, setup
    -1.8 change control procedures, monitoring, etc

HTH;

Doug

Agreed, we both missed, in important:

0.x) Print Server (CUPS/lpRNG) software selection, installation and
      setup

And ... a much needed now a days, an iPBX Server (Asterisk/YATE)
software selection, installation and setup, which may further require
text-to-speech (festival/epos/recite) software.

Regards,
--
Dr Balwinder Singh Dheeman            Registered Linux User: #229709
CLLO (Chief Linux Learning Officer)   Machines: #168573, 170593, 259192

More: http://anu.homelinux.net/~bsd/  Visit: http://counter.li.org/

Grab a good book, and work through it.  O'Reilly's "Running Linux", for
example. ISBN: 0-596-00272-6

You might also want to pick up a "cheat sheet" book, like O'Reilly's
"Linux in a Nutshell"  ... I'll let you look up that one, if you're
interested.

That's how I got started, anyway.  Well, that, and the somewhat
frequent pestering of the friend who got me involved with Linux.
(Haven't seen him IRL in a while, come to think of it.)

It's all important.

What is administration, anyway?  It's making the machine do whatever it
is its owners need it to do.  You may not need to know the details of
applications (though that may not be the case always) but you certainly
have to know how the apps being used affect the OS and the hardware and
vice-versa.  An administrator may not be a "performance expert" or a
"storage expert" or an "* expert", but you do need familiarity with all
those things.  And because Windows boxen will undoubtedly be in the mix,
you need at least some knowledge of that crapola also (pardon my
prejudice - does it show?).

An administrator, then, is a generalist.  Unless you know ahead of time
that you will be working for XYZ and their environment consists of a, b
and d, you can't afford to spend too much time learning too many
details.  I don't mean to imply that superficiality is your goal, but
you have to balance depth against breadth and realize that
administrators usually need breadth more than depth.  It's a tough act
sometimes - I know I constantly find myself learning more than I really
wanted to know about Y and wishing I had the time to really dig into Z.

One thing you might find useful is my Linux Skills Tests at
http://aplawrence.com/Tests/Linux .  I originally developed these for
testing tech job applicants - I'd sit down with the person and have them
verbally answer a few dozen questions like this.. it gave me a real good
idea of how broad their skills were (tech folk need perhaps even broader
skills than admins).. anyway, it might help show you where your weak
areas are.  Some of the questions are very basic, some aren't, but if
you find yourself really thrown by a lot of them, you need a lot of
work.  Most of the people who answer questions here would likely waltz
through them and quit out of boredom rather soon - if that's your
experience, you are probably well prepared to be an admin.  And if not..
well, learning just takes time and effort, right?

--
Tony Lawrence
Unix/Linux/Mac OS X  resources: http://aplawrence.com

Mike and other guys:

Thanks for your time for giving valuable info. I ordered those books,
Please let me know if there is any other books for Linux Admin, I heard
from a friend that there are some books are available on INternet also,
can I use those book?.

One more question is, I need to download Fedora (client) and latest RH
version (server side), will those two versions serve my purpose for
Server and Client purpose, I wanted to download Debian and Suse also,
please give me your valuable idea.

Thanks and appreciated for your time.
GS.

Get yourself "cheat sheets" or "quick references" for the various
packages. A good understanding of scripting languages will also take you
a long way, if you're to automate things - study up Bash syntax, as well
as something like perl.

ciao

Can somebody suggest me, which version I have to use for Server and
which version for client  in freely available distributions. Thanks in
advance.

GS

Dr. Balwinder,

Appreciated for your response, You mentioned many severs installation
and setup, If I take any one of the Distribution for example RH, all
those servers are part of the package, Or do I have to separately
download and install it. I believe all those are part of the package. I
tried to install the RH, it gave me soma options like 1) Server 2)
Desktop 3) Workstation 4) customized, if I select Server for Server, it
should install all the server packages, similarly for client machines,
If I select client, then it should install the necessary client
packages, mainly I have to setup based on whether it is for client or
server, I am reading Linux is very popular on Servers side only, but on
client side still many corporate offices are using Windows desktops I
believe. Please correct me if I am wrong here.

Thanks again,GS.

Well, you are right, but there is some movement back to terminals on the
desktop - not old green screen terminals, but GUI based RDP, X or
whatever.  If you have no idea what I'm talking about, see
http://www.veryComputer.com/

The advantages to business are return of more control to the MIS
department, easier deployment of upgrades, less concern about viruses,
spyware, etc (or at least less kittens to chase).  These terminals can
also be less expensive, more reliable, and easier to "repair" (just
replace it).  Many of these, particularly at the low end of the market,
run Linux as the underlying OS.

So, yes, right now Windows desktops are the most common circumstance,
but MIS departments expend tremendous energy and money because of that,
so the tide may be shifting.  The ability to do this has been available
for quite a few years (I was doing Citrix stuff longer ago than I care
to remember, and X terminals before that), but it's much more palatable
then it was a decade ago.  That's partially because the technology has
gotten better, particularly for remote office use, partially because
Windows apps now play much better in a multiuser environment than they
did previously, but I think mostly it is driven by the frustration with
viri, spyware and the many inscrutable and time consuming glitches that
plague Windows desktops.

The beautiful thing about it from a Redmond hater's point of view is
that the client/server model makes it much easier for an app vendor to
return to or switch to Unix/Linux and much more likely that they will
contemplate doing so.  We may yet see the day when people say "Gawd..
remember when we had all that awful Microsoft *in here?"

--
Tony Lawrence
Unix/Linux/Mac OS X  resources: http://www.veryComputer.com/

Most distributions can be configured to perform either task.  Any of
the major ones can, and most of the minor ones.

"Running Linux" will have you working with a specific distribution,
though I'm not sure which.  Start with that one; Most of the skills
should carry over to any distribution you choose.  That's the beauty of
Linux.  Not only is the software largely interchangable, the skills
carry, too.