LPI - Exam 102: Detailed Objectives

This is a required exam for LPI certification Level 1. It covers basic skills for the Linux Professional that are common to major distributions of Linux..

IMPORTANT INFORMATION: These are the current 102 objectives, which are valid effective 2009-04-01.

Each objective is assigned a weighting value. The weights range roughly from 1 to 10 and indicate the relative importance of each objective. Objectives with higher weights will be covered in the exam with more questions.

Objectives: Exam 102

Topic 105: Shells, Scripting and Data Management

105.1 Customize and use the shell environment

Weight	4
Description	Candidates should be able to customize shell environments to meet users' needs. Candidates should be able to modify global and user profiles.

Key Knowledge Areas

Set environment variables (e.g. PATH) at login or when spawning a new shell.

Write BASH functions for frequently used sequences of commands.

Maintain skeleton directories for new user accounts.

Set command search path with the proper directory.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/profile

env

export

set

unset

~/.bash_profile

~/.bash_login

~/.profile

~/.bashrc

~/.bash_logout

function

alias

lists

105.2 Customize or write simple scripts

Weight	4
Description	Candidates should be able to customize existing scripts, or write simple new BASH scripts.

Key Knowledge Areas

Use standard sh syntax (loops, tests).

Use command substitution.

Test return values for success or failure or other information provided by a command.

Perform conditional mailing to the superuser.

Correctly select the script interpreter through the shebang (#!) line.

Manage the location, ownership, execution and suid-rights of scripts.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

for

while

test

if

read

seq

105.3 SQL data management

Weight	2
Description	Candidates should be able to query databases and manipulate data using basic SQL commands. This objective includes performing queries involving joining of 2 tables and/or subselects.

Key Knowledge Areas

Use of basic SQL commands.

Perform basic data manipulation.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

insert

update

select

delete

from

where

group by

order by

join

Topic 106: User Interfaces and Desktops

106.1 Install and configure X11

Weight	2
Description	Candidates should be able to install and configure X11.

Key Knowledge Areas

Verify that the video card and monitor are supported by an X server.

Awareness of the X font server.

Basic understanding and knowledge of the X Window configuration file.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/X11/xorg.conf

xhost

DISPLAY

xwininfo

xdpyinfo

X

106.2 Setup a display manager

Weight	2
Description	Candidates should be able setup and customize a display manager. This objective covers the display managers XDM (X Display Manger), GDM (Gnome Display Manager) and KDM (KDE Display Manager).

Key Knowledge Areas

Turn the display manager on or off.

Change the display manager greeting.

Change default color depth for the display manager.

Configure display managers for use by X-stations.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/inittab

xdm configuration files

kdm configuration files

gdm configuration files

106.3 Accessibility

Weight	1
Description	Demonstrate knowledge and awareness of accessibility technologies.

Key Knowledge Areas

Keyboard Accessibility Settings (AccessX?)

Visual Settings and Themes

Assistive Technology (ATs)

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

Sticky/Repeat Keys

Slow/Bounce/Toggle Keys

Mouse Keys

High Contrast/Large Print Desktop Themes

Screen Reader

Braille Display

Screen Magnifier

On-Screen Keyboard

Gestures (used at login, for example gdm)

Orca

GOK

emacspeak

Topic 107: Administrative Tasks

107.1 Manage user and group accounts and related system files

Weight	5
Description	Candidates should be able to add, remove, suspend and change user accounts.

Key Knowledge Areas

Add, modify and remove users and groups.

Manage user/group info in password/group databases.

Create and manage special purpose and limited accounts.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/passwd

/etc/shadow

/etc/group

/etc/skel

chage

groupadd

groupdel

groupmod

passwd

useradd

userdel

usermod

107.2 Automate system administration tasks by scheduling jobs

Weight	4
Description	Candidates should be able to use cron or anacron to run jobs at regular intervals and to use at to run jobs at a specific time.

Key Knowledge Areas

Manage cron and at jobs.

Configure user access to cron and at services.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/cron.{d,daily,hourly,monthly,weekly}

/etc/at.deny

/etc/at.allow

/etc/crontab

/etc/cron.allow

/etc/cron.deny

/var/spool/cron/*

crontab

at

atq

atrm

107.3 Localisation and internationalisation

Weight	3
Description	Candidates should be able to localize a system in a different language than English. As well, an understanding of why LANG=C is useful when scripting.

Key Knowledge Areas

Locale settings.

Timezone settings.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/timezone

/etc/localtime

/usr/share/zoneinfo

Environment variables:

LC_*

LC_ALL

LANG

/usr/bin/locale

tzselect

tzconfig

date

iconv

UTF-8

ISO-8859

ASCII

Unicode

Topic 108: Essential System Services

108.1 Maintain system time

Weight	3
Description	Candidates should be able to properly maintain the system time and synchronize the clock via NTP.

Key Knowledge Areas

Set the system date and time.

Set the hardware clock to the correct time in UTC.

Configure the correct timezone.

Basic NTP configuration.

Knowledge of using the pool.ntp.org service

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/usr/share/zoneinfo

/etc/timezone

/etc/localtime

/etc/ntp.conf

date

hwclock

ntpd

ntpdate

pool.ntp.org

108.2 System logging

Weight	2
Description	Candidates should be able to configure the syslog daemon. This objective also includes configuring the logging daemon to send log output to a central log server or accept log output as a central log server.

Key Knowledge Areas

syslog configuration files

syslog

standard facilities, priorities and actions

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

syslog.conf

syslogd

klogd

logger

108.3 Mail Tranfer Agent (MTA) basics

Weight	3
Description	Candidates should be aware of the commonly available MTA programs and be able to perform basic forward and alias configuration on a client host. Other configuration files are not covered.

Key Knowledge Areas

Create e-mail aliases.

Configure e-mail forwarding.

Knowledge of commonly available MTA programs (postfix, sendmail, qmail, exim) (no configuration)

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

~/.forward

sendmail emulation layer commands

newaliases

mail

mailq

postfix

sendmail

exim

qmail

108.4 Manage printers and printing

Weight	2
Description	Candidates should be able to manage print queues and user print jobs using CUPS and the LPD compatibility interface.

Key Knowledge Areas

Basic CUPS configuration (for local and remote printers).

Manage user print queues.

Troubleshoot general printing problems.

Add and remove jobs from configured printer queues.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

CUPS configuration files, tools and utilities

/etc/cups

lpd legacy interface (lpr, lprm, lpq)

Topic 109: Networking Fundamentals

109.1 Fundamentals of internet protocols

Weight	4
Description	Candidates should demonstrate a proper understanding of TCP/IP network fundamentals.

Key Knowledge Areas

Demonstrate an understanding network masks.

Knowledge of the differences between private and public "dotted quad" IP-Addresses.

Setting a default route.

Knowledge about common TCP and UDP ports (20, 21, 22, 23, 25, 53, 80, 110, 119, 139, 143, 161, 443, 465, 993, 995).

Knowledge about the differences and major features of UDP, TCP and ICMP.

Knowledge of the major differences between IPv4 and IPV6.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/services

ftp

telnet

host

ping

dig

traceroute

tracepath

109.2 Basic network configuration

Weight	4
Description	Candidates should be able to view, change and verify configuration settings on client hosts.

Key Knowledge Areas

Manually and automatically configure network interfaces

Basic TCP/IP host configuration.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/hostname

/etc/hosts

/etc/resolv.conf

/etc/nsswitch.conf

ifconfig

ifup

ifdown

route

ping

109.3 Basic network troubleshooting

Weight	4
Description	Candidates should be able to troubleshoot networking issues on client hosts.

Key Knowledge Areas

Manually and automatically configure network interfaces and routing tables to include adding, starting, stopping, restarting, deleting or reconfiguring network interfaces.

Change, view, or configure the routing table and correct an improperly set default route manually.

Debug problems associated with the network configuration.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

ifconfig

ifup

ifdown

route

host

hostname

dig

netstat

ping

traceroute

109.4 Configure client side DNS

Weight	2
Description	Candidates should be able to configure DNS on a client host.

Key Knowledge Areas

Demonstrate the use of DNS on the local system.

Modify the order in which name resolution is done.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/hosts

/etc/resolv.conf

/etc/nsswitch.conf

Topic 110: Security

110.1 Perform security administration tasks

Weight	3
Description	Candidates should know how to review system configuration to ensure host security in accordance with local security policies.

Key Knowledge Areas

Audit a system to find files with the suid/sgid bit set.

Set or change user passwords and password aging information.

Being able to use nmap and netstat to discover open ports on a system.

Set up limits on user logins, processes and memory usage.

Basic sudo configuration and usage.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

find

passwd

lsof

nmap

chage

netstat

sudo

/etc/sudoers

su

usermod

ulimit

110.2 Setup host security

Weight	3
Description	Candidates should know how to set up a basic level of host security.

Key Knowledge Areas

Awareness of shadow passwords and how they work.

Turn off network services not in use.

Understand the role of TCP wrappers.

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

/etc/nologin

/etc/passwd

/etc/shadow

/etc/xinetd.d/*

/etc/xinetd.conf

/etc/inetd.d/*

/etc/inetd.conf

/etc/inittab

/etc/init.d/*

/etc/hosts.allow

/etc/hosts.deny

110.3 Securing data with encryption

Weight	3
Description	The candidate should be able to use puplic key techniques to secure data and communication.

Key Knowledge Areas

Perform basic OpenSSH 2 client configuration and usage.

Understand the role of OpenSSH? 2 server host keys

Perform basic GnuPG configuration and usage.

Understand SSH port tunnels (including X11 tunnels).

The following is a partial list of the used files, terms and utilities:

ssh

ssh-keygen

ssh-agent

ssh-add

~/.ssh/id_rsa and id_rsa.pub

~/.ssh/id_dsa and id_dsa.pub

/etc/ssh/ssh_host_rsa_key and ssh_host_rsa_key.pub

/etc/ssh/ssh_host_dsa_key and ssh_host_dsa_key.pub

~/.ssh/authorized_keys

/etc/ssh_known_hosts

gpg

~/.gnupg/*