Book excerpt: Develop the skills you need in the real world Hit the ground running with the street-smart training you'll find in this practical book. Using a "year in the life" approach, it gives you an inside look at Linux administration, with key information organized around the actual day-to-day tasks, scenarios, and challenges you'll face in the field. This valuable training tool is loaded with hands-on, step-by-step exercises covering all phases of Linux administration, including: * Working on the command line * Configuring hardware and the kernel * Managing software and processes * Documenting the system * Working with partitions and file systems * Configuring network features * Managing security An invaluable study tool This no-nonsense book also maps to the common tasks and exam objectives for the Linux Professional Institute (LPI) LPIC-1 certification exam and CompTIA's Linux+ certification exam. So whether you're preparing for certification or seeking practical skills to break into the field, you'll find the instruction you need, such as: * Using the command shell history * Redirecting input and output * Resolving hardware conflicts * Reconfiguring the login screen * Managing RPM and Debian packages * Protecting your system from runaway processes * Monitoring your system for degraded performance and security problems * Using journaling filesystems * Configuring common server software The Street Smarts Series is designed to help current or aspiring IT professionals put their certification to work for them. Full of practical, real world scenarios, each book features actual tasks from the field and then offers step-by-step exercises that teach the skills necessary to complete those tasks. And because the exercises are based upon exam objectives from leading technology certifications, each Street Smarts book can be used as a lab manual for certification prep.