RHCE Objectives: Sed and Awk

Hi all,

I read in one the stickies about how the hardest thing in studying the RHCE objectives is knowing how much depth to go into on any one topic. I've run into this issue at the very beginning of my studies in regards to sed and awk. I'm not sure how in depth to study on this objective. I have an entire book dedicated to it (O'Reilly's "Sed&Awk") but I don't want to spend too much time becoming a sed and awk guru if the exam will only expect basic operations.

So, of those who have taken the RHCE, what level of depth would you recommend for this objective? Can you give some examples (not from the exam of course) of the kinds of situations or operations that one should know how to do for the exam?

I find the examples in the Sed&Awk book to be somewhat abstract. I'd like to know in what kinds of situations a Sysadmin would use sed and awk in configuring or troubleshooting Linux.

Thanks for your insight.

J.

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Comments

Forsaken_GA

Bl8ckr0uter wrote: »

I think it would be better if you could have someone else break the stuff for you. I think when I get further into my linux studies I am going to grab some commands that break stuff and give the keyboard to my wife and tell her to pick some.

That certainly works too, and is actually a good way to learn something you might not know if the breaker is somewhat familiar with the technology you're working with.

But you should still break it yourself. Or rather, you should ask yourself what would happen if you did such and such, record your expectations, then actually go do it, and if your observations differ from your expectations, figure out why.

The scientific method is quite applicable to IT

Chris:/*

Forsaken_GA wrote: »

Debian and Ubuntu are fine for learning Linux as well, you just have to do a little extra work to find a few things, and your package management is different. I always hate it when I have to go work on a RH box and it's like 'oh yeah the network config files are in a different place', but in general, if you can work with one form, you can stumble your way through another.

I do agree that immersion is the best way to learn it. only touching linux when you're studying, and then going back to doing whatever on your windows box is not a good way to make things stick

With respect to Forsaken_GA learning Linux Debian and Ubuntu are fine but for preparing for the RHCE they are not going to help. As Forsaken_GA said file locations are different init structure is slightly different and for the problems RH injects in the test box you really need to be quick to pass the test. You absolutely do have to understand the way RHEL works. Update and package management are different as well. All Linux flavors have similarities but when having a lot to do in a short amount of time I recommend practicing what you are going to play.

NightShade03

I agree with what everyone has been saying as well about troubleshooting and that you really do need to practice it in order to be able to effectively handle that part of the exam. In the book I'm writing I've been putting together tons of scripts that hopefully people can use to break their machine in random ways....hoping this will give people the opportunity to learn troubleshooting without always needing someone else around.

The scripts will be free, but go well alongside the book if you are interested. They probably won't fully be done for another month though....not sure how far along in the study process you will be (plus some of you have already passed the exam).

MentholMoose

For learning to troubleshoot Linux, while it's good to practice on something broken, it's also helpful to get something new to work. Often applications come with functional default configurations, so write your own from scratch, and try getting advanced features to work. Change ports, enable security and access controls, implement SSL, and so on.

You will make mistakes and have to fix them, and some things are just difficult to get working. For example, instead of setting up a basic Apache server and quitting when you can view the default Apache page, build a full-on LAMP server and get some free web apps (forums, blogs, image galleries, etc.) to work. Find a web app you're interested in and instead of using MySQL, use another supported database. Enabling some of the advanced features and plug-ins on those apps will be a good learning experience since many will have various requirements and dependencies of your server.

When learning Samba, don't just setup a basic file share. That's way too easy and you can just use the default configuration and uncomment the example share entries. Instead, try getting winbind to work, though don't try that too soon or you might just give up on Linux.

dijital1

A big point to keep in mind is that the RHCE exam is 100% practical. So your expected skill level with sed and awk would be applied towards accomplishing the exam objectives more quickly.

A good way to prepare would be to learn how to use sed, awk, tr, cut, etc, for replacing and formatting data as needed. Learn to use the tools as they apply towards system administration. Don't spend time memorizing man pages.

The RHCE exam is about repairing a broken RHEL system and then configuring it per the the supplied document's requirements. I believe they've removed/shortened the installation portion since when I took it so there's plenty of time now for accomplishing the exam objectives.

Know the material, understand the requested objectives, and then take your time so that you don't make mistakes that you later have to go back to correct.

Chris:/*

Yes the install portion has been removed. From my instructors statement he said their statistics showed that people who passed the exam flew through the install but not in reverse as such Red Hat decided to remove that portion.

@dijital1 nice certification list! Most are on my list to accomplish eventually.