Overview
This guide provides information candidates may use in preparing to take the Red Hat Certified System Administrator (RHCSA) exam on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6. Candidates taking the Red Hat Certified Technician (RHCT) exam on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 should consult the past RHCT/RHCE Exam objectives linked above. Red Hat is not responsible for the content or accuracy of other guides, books, online resources, or any other information provided by organizations or individuals other than Red Hat Training and Certification. Red Hat reserves the right to change this guide when appropriate. Candidates who have enrolled in forthcoming classes or exams are advised to check this guide periodically for changes.Prospective employers of RHCEs should verify any and all claims by people claiming to hold this certification by requesting their certificate number and verifying it here.
Performance-based Exams
The RHCSA exam is a performance-based evaluation of Red Hat Enterprise Linux system administration skills and knowledge. Candidates perform a number of routine system administration tasks and are evaluated on whether they have met specific objective criteria. Performance-based testing means that candidates must perform tasks similar to what they must perform on the job.Authorized Training Partners
Only Red Hat and Red Hat Certified Training Partners administer the RHCSA exam. Prospective candidates should exercise due diligence when purchasing a seat in an RHCSA exam from a provider other than Red Hat itself. They should verify that the provider is, in fact, an authorized training partner or reseller in good standing. Please notify greymarket@redhat.com about organizations that purport to offer the RHCSA exam but are not Red Hat Certified Training Partners.Scores and Reporting
Official scores for the RHCSA exams come exclusively from Red Hat Certification Central. Red Hat does not authorize examiners, training partners or other departments or individuals within Red Hat to report results to candidates. Scores on the exam are reported within three (3) US business days.Red Hat does not report performance on individual items, nor will it provide additional information upon request. This policy helps ensure impartiality and fairness for all candidates worldwide. Scores are used to establish whether certification should be issued and are reported for the benefit of candidates. Red Hat makes no representations regarding the use of scores for any other purpose, such as ranking or comparing candidates.
Format of the RHCSA Exam
The RHCSA exam is a hands-on, practical exam that lasts 2.5 hours. Internet access is not provided during the exam. Outside materials are not permitted. Documentation that ships with Red Hat Enterprise Linux is available during the exam. Red Hat reserves the right to make changes to format, including timing and the policies above. Such changes will be made public in advance through revisions to this document.Preparation for the RHCSA Exam
Red Hat encourages all candidates for RHCSA to consider taking one or more of its official training courses to help prepare. Attendance in these classes is not required, and one can choose to take just an exam. Many successful candidates who have come to class already possessing substantial skills and knowledge report that the class made a positive difference for them.To help you determine the best courses to take, Red Hat provides online skills assessment.
While attending Red Hat's classes can be an important part of one's preparation, attending class does not guarantee success on the exam. Previous experience, practice, and native aptitude are also important determinants of success.
Many books and other resources on system administration for Red Hat's products are available. Red Hat does not endorse any as preparation guides for any exams. Nevertheless, candidates may find additional reading deepens understanding and can prove helpful.
Exam Objectives
Red Hat reserves the right to add, modify and remove objectives. Such changes will be made public in advance through revisions to this document.RHCSA exam candidates should be able to accomplish the tasks below without assistance. These have been grouped into several categories.
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 and VNC
- Log in and switch users in multi-user runlevels
- 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 runlevels manually
- Use single-user mode to gain access to a system
- Identify CPU/memory intensive processes, adjust process priority with renice, and kill processes
- Locate and interpret system log files
- Access a virtual machine's console
- Start and stop virtual machines
- Start, stop and check the status of network services
Configure Local Storage
- List, create, delete and set partition type for primary, extended, and logical partitions
- Create and remove physical volumes, assign physical volumes to volume groups, create and delete logical volumes
- Create and configure LUKS-encrypted partitions and logical volumes to prompt for password and mount a decrypted file system at boot
- Configure systems to mount file systems at boot by Universally Unique ID (UUID) or label
- Add new partitions, logical volumes and swap to a system non-destructively
Create and Configure File Systems
- Create, mount, unmount and use ext2, ext3 and ext4 file systems
- Mount, unmount and use LUKS-encrypted file systems
- Mount and unmount CIFS and NFS network file systems
- Configure systems to mount ext4, LUKS-encrypted and network file systems automatically
- Extend existing unencrypted ext4-formatted logical volumes
- Create and configure set-GID directories for collaboration
- Create and manage Access Control Lists (ACLs)
- Diagnose and correct file permission problems
Deploy, Configure and Maintain Systems
- Configure networking and hostname resolution statically or dynamically
- Schedule tasks using cron
- Configure systems to boot into a specific runlevel automatically
- 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 run a default configuration HTTP server
- Configure a system to run a default configuration FTP server
- Install and update software packages from Red Hat Network, a remote repository, or from the local filesystem
- 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 LDAP directory service for user and group information
Manage Security
- Configure firewall settings using system-config-firewall or iptables
- 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