RHCSA Objectives

Here is the list of things you should be able to do to pass the RHCSA Exam (CertDepot Site):

Understand and use essential tools

• Access a shell prompt and issue commands with correct syntax
• Use input-output redirection (>, >>, |, 2>, etc.)
• Use grep and regular expressions to analyze text
• Access remote systems using ssh
• Log in and switch users in multiuser targets
• Archive, compress, unpack, and uncompress files using tar, star, gzip, and bzip2
• Create and edit text files
• Create, delete, copy, and move files and directories
• Create hard and soft links
• List, set, and change standard ugo/rwx permissions
• Locate, read, and use system documentation including man, info, and files in /usr/share/doc

Note: Red Hat may use applications during the exam that are not included in Red Hat Enterprise Linux for the purpose of evaluating candidate’s abilities to meet this objective.

Operate running systems

• Boot, reboot, and shut down a system normally
• Boot systems into different targets manually – This part is the systemctl command to a target runlevel, IE systemctl command runlevel3.target.
• Interrupt the boot process in order to gain access to a system – Simple escape at the bootloader and enter a ‘1’ at the end of the kernal to get into runlevel 1
• Identify CPU/memory intensive processes, adjust process priority with renice, and kill processes
• Locate and interpret system log files and journals – journalctl command
• Access a virtual machine’s console
• Start and stop virtual machines
• Start, stop, and check the status of network services – systemctl commands
• Securely transfer files between systems
  • scp or sftp

Configure local storage

List, create, delete partitions on MBR and GPT disks
Create and remove physical volumes, assign physical volumes to volume groups, and create and delete logical volumes
Configure systems to mount file systems at boot by Universally Unique ID (UUID) or label
Add new partitions and logical volumes, and swap to a system non-destructively

Create and configure file systems

Create, mount, unmount, and use vfat, ext4, and xfs file systems
Mount and unmount CIFS and NFS network file systems
Extend existing logical volumes
Create and configure set-GID directories for collaboration
Create and manage Access Control Lists (ACLs) – This requires the acl option to a filesystem, then setaccl/getaccl
Diagnose and correct file permission problems – ls -Z to get acl info

Deploy, configure, and maintain systems

Configure networking and hostname resolution statically or dynamically
Schedule tasks using at and cron
Start and stop services and configure services to start automatically at boot
Configure systems to boot into a specific target automatically – systemctl set-default runlevel
Install Red Hat Enterprise Linux automatically using Kickstart
Configure a physical machine to host virtual guests
Install Red Hat Enterprise Linux systems as virtual guests
Configure systems to launch virtual machines at boot
Configure network services to start automatically at boot
Configure a system to use time services
Install and update software packages from Red Hat Network, a remote repository, or from the local file system
Update the kernel package appropriately to ensure a bootable system
Modify the system bootloader

Manage users and groups

Create, delete, and modify local user accounts
Change passwords and adjust password aging for local user accounts
Create, delete, and modify local groups and group memberships
Configure a system to use an existing authentication service for user and group information (Kerberos)

Manage security

Configure firewall settings using firewall-config, firewall-cmd, or iptables
Configure key-based authentication for SSH
Set enforcing and permissive modes for SELinux
List and identify SELinux file and process context
Restore default file contexts
Use boolean settings to modify system SELinux settings
Diagnose and address routine SELinux policy violations