My Linux Course

[RockLobster]

Well I attended the first day of my Linux course today when I say Linux it's actually a mixture of Linux and Moodle. Quite enjoyed myself as traditionally I'm a Microsoft guy, well I'm a Microsoft developer. I have dabbled a bit with Linux before but I didn't know the fundamentals for e.g. the file permissions what does 755 actually represent etc. I learnt how to setup it on a bog standard PC but setting it up on a server I guess it a different kettle of fish when you have things like multiple drives with RAID configuration, tape drives, etc. A friend in work needs an Afresco (open source document management system) server but one of techies said to him it is better off on Windows because of security. Out of the box is Linux more secure than Windows? Is it really that difficult to secure a Linux server?

Anyway here are the course contents: -

Day One

• Understanding Linux and it's licensing
• Picking a suitable Linux distribution and obtaining it
• Making a Bootable Installation disk
• Installation of Linux onto a Standard PC
• Getting it to work on the Internet
• Using the command line interface and graphical user interface
• Keeping Linux up to date
• Installing new software
• Making your own webserver.

Second Two Days

Planning
Hardware requirements, Disk setup, Server placement, Prerequisites to Moodle (Operating system,
Web server, Database server, PHP, User integration)
Installation
Introduction, Operating system, Web server, Database server, PHP, Moodle
Moodle configuration
Under the bonnet, Moodle admin pages, Cron maintenance script and cron jobs, Variables, Themes,
Language files, Blocks, Modules, Filters, Backups, Course creation, User creation. User
authentication, Roles & permission, Enrolments, RSS feeds, Log files & reports
Administration & maintenance
Operating system administration, Apache, MySQL, PHP and Moodle administration, Backups, Upgrading

 

[bigredshark]

Linux is (generally speaking) a lot more secure than windows when properly configured. Thats the big issue, boxes configured by people who don't really know what they're doing (thats true of any operating system of course).

Principles are the same regardless of whether it's server or desktop really, linux handles partitioning well these days and it's fairly painless.

If you're going to do a course though, I'd do something industry standard (I'd say RHCT or RHCE but others may have different suggestions).

 

[amkan13]

Linux is (generally speaking) a lot more secure than windows when properly configured. Thats the big issue, boxes configured by people who don't really know what they're doing (thats true of any operating system of course).

Principles are the same regardless of whether it's server or desktop really, linux handles partitioning well these days and it's fairly painless.

If you're going to do a course though, I'd do something industry standard (I'd say RHCT or RHCE but others may have different suggestions).

and theres the stability too.

out of the box linux is always going to be more secure in terms of probability than say a windows box ie if you have a windows box and a linux box connected to the internet, the windows box will be more likely to be hacked first because it is more specifically targetted.

id be more inclined to do a course aimed at servers though, if you can do a lot of commandline/terminal stuff, doing desktop stuff with it will be a breeze, and you'll be taught how to secure a server properly, making desktop security easier too.