System administrators are responsible
for the most crucial and wide sort of duties. They are critical to the successful
and reliable operations of an organization as well as its data center and network
operations center. A System admin should have proficiency with the system's
core platform like Windows, Linux, etc.and alsomust aware of various areas
including data restoration, IT security, networking, backup,middleware
basics,database operations, load balancing, and others more.The System administrator
has a superficially endless list of everyday jobs, some of them are more
critical than the other jobs.
Linux system administrators playing
their role very effectively and efficiently like other system administrators
are doing in the business industry. Linux Administrator is an official specialist
who specializes in developing and maintaining Linux infrastructure technology.They
are backend Information technology professionals who configure, install, and
maintain Linux operating systems in the number of reputable firms. This partcontains
operations for server-side and troubleshooting in systems that maintaincritical
business and development activities. Linux administrators also configure and organize
user access and monitor system solidity and security through deployment.
The
role of a Linux system administrator
The role of a Linux system administrator
can be different based on the type of their business and industry, but the
universal tasks of this role are relatively common. With the successful
completion of Linux
administration certification a Linux system administrator gear up for the
future and gain valuable job offers in the market. We can analyze the role of a
Linux system administrator that includes;
Perform
System Maintenance
Linux administrators also execute the
ongoing system maintenance and answerthe server related issues as they appear.
This characteristic of the role involves the Linux administrator to analysis
error logs, reported errors and try to find their solutions. They are
continuously checking for the processes that are spending more resources than
expected and take necessary action for the resolution. They are also regularly
monitoring and checking the CPU utilization of the critical process, checking memory
utilization and clear the cache when required, handling the average load and
tune the server for better and effective performance and also utilizing Disk/SAN/NAS
by checking the reports of external storage and if found any issue then
coordinate with the relevant team for the correction.Linux administrators frequently
and effectively need to work with the system’s source code to make compulsory
changes and to make sure reliable performance and then deploy all over the
system.
Install
and Configure Linux Systems
Linux system administrator’s key
function is to install and set up servers as per the proper Linux system
process. And also proactively and consistently maintain and develop all Linux
infrastructure equipment to maintain 24x7x365 services. They improve the server’sperformance
and work with different users to make sure that the system works actively, reliably
and quickly, and also answer the questions correctly related to the setup and
installation. In this process, Linux administrators also develop the architecture
of the system that includes back-end databases and scripts for precise
applications.
Create
System Backups
Linux system administrators
are also responsible to conduct backups for all the systemsaccording to the company
or industry criteria and standards. Linux administrator Communicate with the
backup performers and provide them the info and the client priorities for
backup and also they help to restore all processes and make available required
training to all workers.They have torecommend completesystem backups as
required weekly (Saturday and Sunday), daily (Monday to Friday), and disaster
recovery drill once a month or more frequently contingentto the system space
and industryor business requirements. This act improves system recovery when a
crash or other outage and supports records integrity by certifying that there
is never a giant loss of vital data.
Evaluation
of system documents
System administrators must have a proper
and accurate record of assets including hardware and software with their types,
counts, and licenses. Hardware inventory consist of physical and practical
servers like OS, RAM, CPU, HDD, external storage, open ports, IP address and
engineering appliances while software inventory like configured applications (IBM
WebSphere Application Server, Red Hat JBoss,Oracle WebLogic, Apache Tomcat,
etc. their role is also maintaining the details and the count of all licenses
of physical and virtual systems
Server
hardening
Linux System administrators doing some
works like they set a BIOS secret code to prevent users from changing BIOS
settings and Set a GRUB password forthe GRUB bootloader, Disallowingthe root
access that decreases the probability of interruptions and apply TCP wrappers
which is the weapon to guard a server from hackers. They create a law for the
SSH daemon to permit only trusted hosts to join the server, and reject all
others and also manages rules for other areas like FTP, SSH File Transfer
Protocol, etc. Linux administrator also configuresfirewall and iptables rules
for entering traffic to the server. Include the specific port, destination IP,and
source IPand allow/ reject/deny ICMP requests for the public zone as well asthe
private zone.They install antivirus software for the protection of the servers and
bring up-to-date virus definitions for effective defense. They are checking
secure and audit logsregularly and rotate the logs to keep the logs for a limited
time andadequate disk space for perfect operation.
Monitoring
tools, Automation and System Logs
Some other tasks of a system
administrator are like backup triggers,resource utilization, server health
checkups, and transfer logs and files. To handle these tasks the system
administrator should write scripts and also use external tools and configure them
to perform automatically when required. They also configure and install live
monitoring tools to monitor the IT system and provides warnings for the
problems that are happening in the company’s system. They maintain Syslog
servers to acquire records of the system and application log for the issues.
They can check real time logs as well as previous logs to identify and resolve
issues
The aforementioned roles require wide
familiarity with Linux systems and servers and may include a high level of risk
calculation and user support. As Linux is an open-source working system,
administrators also communicate and collaborate with other designers to develop
and implement system developments.
