RHCSA/RHCE®
Red Hat® Linux® Certification
Study Guide, Seventh Edition
(Exams EX200 & EX300)
Michael Jang 
Alessandro Orsaria
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use of this publication and DVD-ROM will ensure passing any exam.
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RHCSA/RHCE® Red Hat® Linux® Certification Study Guide, Seventh Edition (Exams EX200 & EX300)
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For the young widows and widowers: 
may they find the courage to face their fears, 
to navigate their way through the pain, 
and to find hope for a brighter future. 
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Michael Jang (RHCE, LPIC-2, UCP, LCP, Linux+, MCP) is currently a Senior Technical 
Writer for ForgeRock. His experience with computers goes back to the days of jumbled 
punch cards. He has written other books on Linux certification, including LPIC-1 in 
Depth, Mike Meyers’ Linux+ Certification Passport, and Sair GNU/Linux Installation and 
Configuration Exam Cram. His other Linux books include Linux Annoyances for Geeks, 
Linux Patch Management, and Mastering Fedora Core Linux 5. He has also written or 
contributed to books on Microsoft operating systems, including MCSE Guide to Microsoft 
Windows 98 and Mastering Windows XP Professional, Second Edition.
Alessandro Orsaria (RHCE, RHCA, CCIE x 2) is an IT professional with more than 15 
years’ experience in the industry. He has authored articles for technical Linux magazines 
and is currently employed by a global equity hedge fund as an IT Infrastructure Architect. 
Alessandro is Red Hat RHCE and RHCA certified and has achieved two Cisco CCIE 
certifications in Routing & Switching and Datacenter. He holds an MBA from Imperial 
College of London and a degree in physics.
About the Technical Editor
Alex Davies works for a proprietary trading firm, where he is responsible for Linux systems 
and manages a team of Linux engineers across Chicago, New York, London, and Singapore. 
Alex is the author of MySQL Clustering and MySQL High Availability Cookbook. Earlier 
in his career he was both RHCE and RHCA certified and received the RHCE of the Year 
award in 2009 from Red Hat. Alex also holds a degree in economics from the University of 
Durham.
CONTENTS AT A GLANCE
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Prepare for Red Hat Hands-on Certifications 
Virtual Machines and Automated Installations 
Fundamental Command-Line Skills 
RHCSA-Level Security Options 
The Boot Process 
Linux Filesystem Administration 
Package Management 
User Administration 
RHCSA-Level System Administration Tasks 
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10  A Security Primer 
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System Services and SELinux 
12  RHCE Administrative Tasks 
13  Network Services: DNS, SMTP, iSCSI, and NTP 
14  The Apache Web Server 
15  The Samba File Server 
16  NFS Secured with Kerberos 
17  The MariaDB Server 
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Prepare a System for the Sample Exams 
Sample Exam 1: RHCSA 
Sample Exam 2: RHCSA 
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Sample Exam 3: RHCE Sample Exam 1 
Sample Exam 4: RHCE Sample Exam 2 
About the DVD 
Glossary 
Index 
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CONTENTS
1 
Acknowledgments 
Preface 
Introduction 
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Hardware Compatibility 
Architectures 
RAM Requirements 
Hard Drive Options 
Networking 
Virtual Machine Options 
Prepare for Red Hat Hands-on Certifications  ................. 
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The RHCSA and RHCE Exams 
The Exam Experience 
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The RHCSA Exam 
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The RHCE Exam 
If You’re Studying “Just” for the RHCSA Exam 
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Evolving Requirements 
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Basic Hardware Requirements 
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You Won’t Start from Scratch 
The Advantages of Network Installation 
Red Hat and Virtual Machines 
Virtual and Physical Systems 
A Pre-installed Environment for Practice Labs 
System Roles 
Installation Options 
Boot Media 
CD/DVD or Boot USB Starts Installation 
Basic Installation Steps 
Installation Requirements 
Get Red Hat Enterprise Linux 
Purchase a Subscription 
Get an Evaluation Copy 
Third-party Rebuilds 
Check the Download 
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System Setup Options 
Configure Default File Sharing Services 
Initial Setup and Firstboot 
Default Security Settings 
Special Setup Options for Virtual Machines 
The Installation Perspective on Partitions 
Partition Creation Exercise 
Exercise 1-1:  Partitioning During Installation 
Wow, Look at All That Software! 
Baseline Packages 
Package Groups 
During the Installation 
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Mount and Copy the Installation DVD 
Set Up a Default Configuration Apache Server 
Exercise 1-2:  Configure Apache as an Installation Server 
Share Copied Files via FTP Server 
Certification Summary 
Lab Questions 
Self Test Answers 
Lab Answers 
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  ✓  Two-Minute Drill 
 Q&A  Self Test 
Configure KVM for Red Hat 
Why Virtual Machines 
If You Have to Install KVM 
The Right KVM Modules 
Configure the Virtual Machine Manager 
Configuration by Hypervisor 
Virtual Networks on a Hypervisor 
Exercise 2-1:  Create a Second Virtual Network 
2  Virtual Machines and Automated Installations  ..............  55
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Configure a Virtual Machine on KVM 
Exercise 2-2:  Add Virtual Hard Drives 
KVM Configuration Files 
Control Virtual Machines from the Command Line 
Kickstart Concepts 
Set Up Local Access to Kickstart 
Set Up Network Access to Kickstart 
Configure a Virtual Machine on KVM 
Automated Installation Options