LPI 101 Linux Training Course Notes: Leading Edge Business Solutions

LPI 101
Linux Training Course Notes
Leading Edge Business Solutions

This manual was written for Leading Edge Business Solutions,
http://www.ledge.co.za/ and forms part of their Linux training programme.
101rel2.sxg, 26 September 2003
LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za
LPIC topics
LPIC topic 1.101.1 Configure Fundamental BIOS Settings [1]....................................................19
LPIC topic 1.101.3 Configure modem and sound cards [1]..........................................................28
LPIC topic 1.101.4 Setup SCSI Devices [1].................................................................................33
LPIC topic 1.101.5 Setup different PC expansion cards [3].........................................................38
LPIC topic 1.101.6 Configure Communication Devices [1].........................................................46
LPIC topic 1.101.7 USB hardware [1]..........................................................................................50
LPIC topic 1.102.1 Design hard disk layout [5]............................................................................54
LPIC topic 1.102.2 Install a boot manager [1]..............................................................................59
LPIC topic 1.102.3 Make and install programs from source [5]...................................................65
LPIC topic 1.102.4 Manage shared libraries [3]...........................................................................70
LPIC topic 1.102.5 Use Debian package management [8]............................................................73
LPIC topic 1.102.6 Use Red Hat Package Manager (RPM) [8]....................................................76
LPIC topic 1.103.1 Work on the command line [5]......................................................................81
LPIC topic 1.103.2 Process text streams using filters [6].............................................................89
LPIC topic 1.103.3 Perform basic file management [3]..............................................................102
LPIC topic 1.103.4 Use streams, pipes, and redirects [5]...........................................................110
LPIC topic 1.103.5 Create, monitor, and kill processes [5]........................................................118
LPIC topic 1.103.6 Modify process execution priorities [3].......................................................126
LPIC topic 1.103.7 Regular expressions [3]...............................................................................130
LPIC topic 1.103.8 Perform basic file editing operations using vi [1]........................................135
LPIC topic 1.104.1 Create partitions and filesystems [3]...........................................................139
LPIC topic 1.104.2 Maintain the integrity of filesystems [3]......................................................143
LPIC topic 1.104.3 Control mounting and unmounting filesystems [3].....................................150
LPIC topic 1.104.4 Managing disk quota [3]..............................................................................154
LPIC topic 1.104.5 Use file permissions to control access to files [5].......................................159
LPIC topic 1.104.6 Manage file ownership [1]...........................................................................166
LPIC topic 1.104.7 Create and change hard and symbolic links [1]...........................................169
LPIC topic 1.104.8 Find system files and place files in the correct location [5]........................173
LPIC topic 1.110.1 Install & Configure XFree86 [5]..................................................................179
LPIC topic 1.110.2 Setup a display manager [3].........................................................................188
LPIC topic 1.110.4 Install & Customize a Window Manager Environment [5].........................193
Table of Contents
1 Foreword..........................................................................................................................................10
2 Legal notices....................................................................................................................................14
2.1 About these notes.....................................................................................................................14
2.2 Copyright notice .....................................................................................................................14
2.3 GNU Free Documentation License..........................................................................................14
3 BIOS Settings..................................................................................................................................19
LPIC topic 1.101.1 Configure Fundamental BIOS Settings [1]
3.1 BIOS architecture....................................................................................................................19
3.2 Changing BIOS configuration.................................................................................................20
3.3 IDE disks..................................................................................................................................20

3.3.1 Disk geometry and addressing
3.3.2 Logical Block Addressing (LBA)
3.3.3 Data transfer
3.4 Integrated peripherals..............................................................................................................23
3.5 IRQ, DMA, I/O addresses........................................................................................................23
3.6 Error handling..........................................................................................................................24
3.7 Power management*................................................................................................................24
3.8 Linux view of the BIOS...........................................................................................................24
3.8.1 /proc/{ioports,interrupts,dma,pci}
3.8.2 lspci
3.8.3 boot messages and dmesg*
3.9 Review.....................................................................................................................................26
4 Modems and sound cards................................................................................................................28
LPIC topic 1.101.3 Configure modem and sound cards [1]
4.1 Modem compatibility and winmodems...................................................................................28
4.1.1 External modems
4.1.2 Internal modems
4.1.3 Winmodems
4.2 Sound cards..............................................................................................................................30
4.2.1 ISA cards ... I/O, IRQ and DMA values
4.3 PnP sound cards.......................................................................................................................30
4.4 Review.....................................................................................................................................31
5 SCSI devices....................................................................................................................................33
LPIC topic 1.101.4 Setup SCSI Devices [1]
5.1 SCSI Architecture....................................................................................................................33
5.2 The Linux view of SCSI..........................................................................................................34
5.2.1 Kernel modules
5.2.2 /proc/scsi
5.2.3 Devices
5.2.4 SCSI naming
5.3 Booting off a SCSI disk...........................................................................................................36
5.4 Review.....................................................................................................................................36
6 PC cards...........................................................................................................................................38
LPIC topic 1.101.5 Setup different PC expansion cards [3]
6.1 Bus architecture.......................................................................................................................38
6.2 Bus resources...........................................................................................................................38
6.3 Bus conflict resolution.............................................................................................................39
6.4 PCI card configuration.............................................................................................................39
6.5 ISA card configuration.............................................................................................................41
6.6 ISA PnP devices.......................................................................................................................41
6.7 Kernel interface commands.....................................................................................................42
6.8 Review.....................................................................................................................................44
7 Device configuration.......................................................................................................................46
LPIC topic 1.101.6 Configure Communication Devices [1]
7.1 PPP connections.......................................................................................................................46
7.2 Types of modem......................................................................................................................47
7.2.1 PPP on analogue modems

7.2.2 pppd call myisp
7.3 ISDN adapters..........................................................................................................................48
7.4 DSL..........................................................................................................................................48
7.5 Diagnostic tools.......................................................................................................................48
7.6 Review.....................................................................................................................................49
8 USB hardware.................................................................................................................................50
LPIC topic 1.101.7 USB hardware [1]
8.1 USB architecture......................................................................................................................50
8.2 USB chipsets and drivers.........................................................................................................50
8.3 USB protocol...........................................................................................................................51
8.4 usbmgr.....................................................................................................................................52
8.5 /sbin/hotplug............................................................................................................................53
8.6 Review.....................................................................................................................................53
9 Partitioning disks.............................................................................................................................54
LPIC topic 1.102.1 Design hard disk layout [5]
9.1 Disks and partitions ................................................................................................................54
9.2 Design criteria..........................................................................................................................56
9.2.1 Mounting partitions
9.2.2 fstab
9.2.3 Swap space
9.2.4 LVM overview*
9.3 Review.....................................................................................................................................57
10 Boot managers...............................................................................................................................59
LPIC topic 1.102.2 Install a boot manager [1]
10.1 Booting and boot managers...................................................................................................59
10.2 LILO......................................................................................................................................60
10.2.1 /etc/lilo.conf
10.2.2 lilo command options
10.2.3 LILO dual boot
10.3 GRUB....................................................................................................................................63
10.3.1 /boot/grub/grub.conf
10.3.2 Creating a boot floppy
11 Installing from source code...........................................................................................................65
LPIC topic 1.102.3 Make and install programs from source [5]
11.1 Unpacking source distributions.............................................................................................65
11.2 Compiling programs..............................................................................................................65
11.3 Simple build and installation.................................................................................................66
11.4 ./configure options.................................................................................................................66
11.5 Editing Makefiles...................................................................................................................67
11.6 Review...................................................................................................................................68
12 Shared libraries..............................................................................................................................70
LPIC topic 1.102.4 Manage shared libraries [3]
12.1 Purpose and structure of shared libraries...............................................................................70
12.2 Using ldd................................................................................................................................70
12.3 Symbol versions.....................................................................................................................71
12.4 Configuring the dynamic linker ............................................................................................71
12.5 Review...................................................................................................................................71
13 Debian package management........................................................................................................73
LPIC topic 1.102.5 Use Debian package management [8]
13.1 Debian and .deb.....................................................................................................................73
13.2 apt...........................................................................................................................................74
13.3 Review...................................................................................................................................74
14 RPM Redhat package manager..................................................................................................76
LPIC topic 1.102.6 Use Red Hat Package Manager (RPM) [8]
14.1 Purpose of RPM.....................................................................................................................76
14.2 RPM database........................................................................................................................77
14.3 RPM functions.......................................................................................................................77
14.3.1 Querying the database and package files
14.3.2 Install and upgrading packages
14.3.3 Erase a package
14.4 RPM integrity checking.........................................................................................................79
14.5 Review...................................................................................................................................79
15 Work on the command line...........................................................................................................81
LPIC topic 1.103.1 Work on the command line [5]
15.1 Command line overview........................................................................................................81
15.2 Command line structure.........................................................................................................82
15.3 Environment variables...........................................................................................................83
15.4 Editing commands and command history..............................................................................85
15.5 $PATH...................................................................................................................................85
15.6 Command substitution $(...) and `...`.....................................................................................85
15.7 Recursive commands.............................................................................................................85
15.7.1 -r switch
15.7.2 cp -r
15.7.3 chown and chmod
15.7.4 grep -r
15.7.5 find for recursive commands
15.8 Bash session...........................................................................................................................87
15.9 Man pages..............................................................................................................................87
15.10 Review.................................................................................................................................87
16 Text filters.....................................................................................................................................89
LPIC topic 1.103.2 Process text streams using filters [6]
16.1 Introduction............................................................................................................................89
16.2 Input and output redirection...................................................................................................90
16.3 Selecting parts of a file..........................................................................................................91
16.4 Sorting....................................................................................................................................94
16.5 Manipulation..........................................................................................................................95
16.6 Formatting..............................................................................................................................98
16.7 Review.................................................................................................................................100
17 File management.........................................................................................................................102
LPIC topic 1.103.3 Perform basic file management [3]
17.1 Files, directories and ls........................................................................................................102
17.2 File globbing (wildcards).....................................................................................................103
17.3 Directories and files.............................................................................................................104
17.4 Copying and moving............................................................................................................106

17.5 find.......................................................................................................................................107
17.6 Review.................................................................................................................................108
18 Redirection..................................................................................................................................110
LPIC topic 1.103.4 Use streams, pipes, and redirects [5]
18.1 Input and output redirection.................................................................................................110
18.2 Standard input redirection (<, <<EOF, |).............................................................................111
18.3 Standard output redirection (>, >>).....................................................................................112
18.4 Standard error redirection (2>, 2>>, 2>&1)........................................................................112
18.5 Command pipelines (|).........................................................................................................114
18.6 Command substitution $(command) and `command`......................................................115
18.7 xargs.....................................................................................................................................116
18.8 Review.................................................................................................................................116
19 Process control.............................................................................................................................118
LPIC topic 1.103.5 Create, monitor, and kill processes [5]
19.1 Job control............................................................................................................................118
19.2 Disconnected processes.......................................................................................................119
19.3 Monitoring processes...........................................................................................................120
19.3.1 ps process status
19.3.2 top
19.4 Signals..................................................................................................................................122
19.5 Review.................................................................................................................................124
20 Nice..............................................................................................................................................126
LPIC topic 1.103.6 Modify process execution priorities [3]
20.1 Process priority....................................................................................................................126
20.1.1 Using nice
20.1.2 renice
20.2 ps and niceness.....................................................................................................................127
20.3 top........................................................................................................................................128
20.4 Review.................................................................................................................................128
21 Regular expressions.....................................................................................................................130
LPIC topic 1.103.7 Regular expressions [3]
21.1 Regular expressions in depth...............................................................................................130
21.2 Using grep............................................................................................................................131
21.3 sed .......................................................................................................................................132
21.4 Review.................................................................................................................................133
22 vi..................................................................................................................................................135
LPIC topic 1.103.8 Perform basic file editing operations using vi [1]
22.1 vi modes...............................................................................................................................135
22.2 Command mode...................................................................................................................136
22.3 ex mode................................................................................................................................137
22.4 Cut and paste........................................................................................................................137
22.5 Review.................................................................................................................................138
23 fdisk and mkfs.............................................................................................................................139
LPIC topic 1.104.1 Create partitions and filesystems [3]
23.1 fdisk.....................................................................................................................................139
23.2 mkfs.....................................................................................................................................140
23.3 Review.................................................................................................................................141
24 fsck..............................................................................................................................................143
LPIC topic 1.104.2 Maintain the integrity of filesystems [3]
24.1 Disk space............................................................................................................................143
24.1.1 df disk free
24.1.2 du
24.2 Detecting and correcting errors............................................................................................145
24.2.1 fsck
24.2.2 ext2
24.2.3 reiserfs
24.3 Review.................................................................................................................................149
25 Mounting.....................................................................................................................................150
LPIC topic 1.104.3 Control mounting and unmounting filesystems [3]
25.1 mount...................................................................................................................................150
25.2 fstab......................................................................................................................................150
25.3 Options for mount................................................................................................................151
25.4 Removable media................................................................................................................152
25.5 Review.................................................................................................................................152
26 Quotas..........................................................................................................................................154
LPIC topic 1.104.4 Managing disk quota [3]
26.1 Overview..............................................................................................................................154
26.2 Enabling Quotas...................................................................................................................154
26.3 Setting quotas.......................................................................................................................155
26.4 Reporting with repquota .....................................................................................................157
26.5 Review.................................................................................................................................157
27 Permissions..................................................................................................................................159
LPIC topic 1.104.5 Use file permissions to control access to files [5]
27.1 Ownership and permissions.................................................................................................159
27.2 chmod...................................................................................................................................160
27.3 File types..............................................................................................................................162
27.4 umask...................................................................................................................................163
27.5 Ext2 attributes......................................................................................................................164
27.6 Review.................................................................................................................................165
28 File ownership.............................................................................................................................166
LPIC topic 1.104.6 Manage file ownership [1]
28.1 File ownership......................................................................................................................166
28.2 Default group.......................................................................................................................167
28.3 Review.................................................................................................................................168
29 Links............................................................................................................................................169
LPIC topic 1.104.7 Create and change hard and symbolic links [1]
29.1 Hard links.............................................................................................................................169
29.2 Symbolic links ....................................................................................................................170
29.3 Review.................................................................................................................................171
30 Finding files.................................................................................................................................173
LPIC topic 1.104.8 Find system files and place files in the correct location [5]
30.1 Filesystem hierarchy standard.............................................................................................173
30.2 find ......................................................................................................................................175
30.3 locate....................................................................................................................................175
30.4 slocate..................................................................................................................................176
30.5 Finding files with whereis....................................................................................................176
30.6 Finding programs with which..............................................................................................177
30.7 Review.................................................................................................................................177
31 XFree86.......................................................................................................................................179
LPIC topic 1.110.1 Install & Configure XFree86 [5]
31.1 X11 architecture...................................................................................................................179
31.2 X server................................................................................................................................180
31.3 Configuration file.................................................................................................................182
31.3.1 Version 3.x
31.3.2 Version 4.x
31.4 Video card and monitor tuning............................................................................................185
31.5 Installing fonts.....................................................................................................................185
31.6 X font server........................................................................................................................186
31.7 Review.................................................................................................................................187
32 X display manager ......................................................................................................................188
LPIC topic 1.110.2 Setup a display manager [3]
32.1 What is a display manager...................................................................................................188
32.2 Runlevels and display managers..........................................................................................189
32.3 Configuring XDM................................................................................................................189
32.4 Configuring KDM................................................................................................................190
32.5 Configuring GDM................................................................................................................190
32.6 Connecting to a remote display manager.............................................................................191
32.7 Review.................................................................................................................................192
33 GUI environment.........................................................................................................................193
LPIC topic 1.110.4 Install & Customize a Window Manager Environment [5]
33.1 Window managers...............................................................................................................193
33.2 .xinitrc and the system-wide window manager...................................................................194
33.3 X applications......................................................................................................................194
33.4 X terminal emulators...........................................................................................................195
33.5 X application library dependencies......................................................................................195
33.6 Remote applications.............................................................................................................197
33.6.1 DISPLAY environment variable
33.6.2 Host based access control
33.6.3 MIT cookie access control
33.7 Review.................................................................................................................................198
34 Glossary.......................................................................................................................................200
35 Index............................................................................................................................................207
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oops
1 Foreword
10
1 Foreword
A is for awk, which runs like a snail, and
B is for biff, which reads all your mail.
C is for cc, as hackers recall, while
D is for dd, the command that does all.
E is for emacs, which rebinds your keys, and
F is for fsck, which rebuilds your trees.
G is for grep, a clever detective, while
H is for halt, which may seem defective.
I is for indent, which rarely amuses, and
J is for join, which nobody uses.
K is for kill, which makes you the boss, while
L is for lex, which is missing from DOS.
M is for more, from which less was begot, and
N is for nice, which it really is not.
O is for od, which prints out things nice, while
P is for passwd, which reads in strings twice.
Q is for quota, a Berkeley-type fable, and
R is for ranlib, for sorting ar table.
S is for spell, which attempts to belittle, while
T is for true, which does very little.
U is for uniq, which is used after sort, and
V is for vi, which is hard to abort.
W is for whoami, which tells you your name, while
X is, well, X, of dubious fame.
Y is for yes, which makes an impression, and
Z is for zcat, which handles compression.
THE ABC'S OF UNIX
/usr/share/games/fortune/songs-poems
This course material is based on the objectives for the Linux Professionals Institutes LPI 101
examination (specifically, release 2 of the objectives). The course is intended to provide you with
the basic skills required for operating and administering Linux systems.
At every good training course the student should come away with some paper in his hand, to file in
the company filing cabinet. A really excellent course will include some knowledge and practical
ability in the student's head as well. We hope to achieve at least the first with these notes. The
second is up to the instructor.
Goal of this course
This course aims to equip you with the knowledge to be able to pass the LPI 101 examination
(release 2). We hope that in the course of doing this course you will acquire the skills that go with
an understanding of how Linux works.
Target audience
This course is aimed at ...
1 Foreword
11
People who wish to write the LPIC 101 exam, as part of the LPIC Level 1 certification.
Technically inclined people who wish to become familiar with Linux, particularly with a view to
administering a Linux system.
Prerequisites for taking this course
People wishing to take this course will probably fit the following profile
You should have basic skills for using Linux, including command line usage. A minimum of 3
months of experience is recommended. Completion of an introductory Linux course is an
alternative to this experience.
You are a system administrator or hold a similar technical position (or you would like a job like
that).
You are interested in technical things and the fascinating little details that make your computer
behave strangely.
You want to know how things work specifically how Linux works, and are willing to spend
some time finding out.
You have practical administrative experience with other computer systems.
You already have some practical familiarity with using Linux. You have probably installed
Linux and have used it without gaining a complete understanding of many functions.
We recommend that this course be followed by professional people who have completed their
secondary education, and possibly an additional qualification. It is preferable that you already hold
a position in which you can use Linux on a day to day basis.
Flow of instruction
Each section in the notes is structured as an independent entity. Each section covers a single LPIC
topic. Each section is structured as follows:
LPIC objectives
Introductory material
Detailed material
Review material (quiz questions and assignments).
Some of the sections are more demanding than others, and the certification does not weight all of
the sections equally.
There are a number of ways to approach this material:
Over a number of weeks, as a self-study course with some classroom time. This approach is
recommended for novices.
Over two weeks, covering all the sections in some detail.
Over a single week, as an instructor-led course. This approach crams a lot of material into a
small time, and is recommended for experienced Linux users as a pre-exam cram.
The following order of study is recommended, especially if you have not previously studied the
material (i.e. for first-time users). This is not the order in which the material appears in the
manuals.
1. Topic 103 GNU & Unix Commands
2. Topic 101 Hardware & Architecture
3. Topic 102 Linux Installation & Package Management
4. Topic 104 Devices, Linux Filesystems, Filesystem Hierarchy Standard
1 Foreword
12
5. Topic 110 X
If you do the material over two weeks, the material can be used in the following arrangement:
101 Part A Tools and Utilities
101 Part B Installation and Configuration
1.103.1 - Work on the command line

1.103.2 - Process text streams using filters
1.103.3 - Perform basic file management
1.103.4 - Use streams, pipes, and redirects
1.103.5 - Create, monitor, and kill processes
1.103.6 - Modify process execution priorities
1.103.7 - Regular expressions
1.103.8 - Perform basic file editing operations
using vi
1.104.5 - Use file permissions to control access
to files
1.104.6 - Manage file ownership
1.104.7 - Create and change hard and symbolic
links
1.104.8 - Find system files and place files in the
correct location
1.101.1 - Configure Fundamental BIOS Settings

1.101.3 - Configure modem and sound cards
1.101.4 - Setup SCSI Devices
1.101.5 - Setup different PC expansion cards
1.101.6 - Configure Communication Devices
1.101.7 - USB hardware
1.102.1 - Design hard disk layout
1.102.2 - Install a boot manager
1.102.3 - Make and install programs from source
1.102.4 - Manage shared libraries
1.102.5 - Use Debian package management
1.102.6 - Use Red Hat Package Manager (RPM)
1.104.1 - Create partitions and filesystems
1.104.2 - Maintain the integrity of filesystems
1.104.3 - Control mounting and unmounting
filesystems
1.104.4 - Managing disk quota
1.110.1 - Install & Configure XFree86
1.110.2 - Setup a display manager
1.110.4 - Install & Customize a Window
Manager Environment
What you need for this course part time over 8 weeks
You will need the following in order to complete this course.

A dedicated computer to work on outside of course contact time. As part of the course, the
existing data on this computer will most likely be destroyed. If you do not have an appropriate
computer, you should consider buying a laptop, or at least a new hard disk for an existing
computer.
Committed time for eight working weeks:
Lecture, tutorial and review time: 2 hours per week (excluding travel time).
Self-study and practice time: minimum of 2 hours per day, Monday to Friday.
What you need for this course instructor led over 1 week
You will need the following in order to complete this course.

Committed time for 1 working week lecture, tutorial and review time: 6 hours per day
The training venue should have a suitable computer.
After the course, it is recommended that you review the material before writing the certification
examination.
Typographic conventions
Command names and example of command are printed in boldface. So for example, ls -la is used
for printing a list of files in the current directory, and pwd prints the current working directory.
1 And when we say his, we mean her if the student happens to be female.
The student is encouraged to try these example commands on his1 computer, as the results may
differ from one system to the next. Often the output shown is incomplete, and a valuable learning
experience awaits the person bold enough to type the bold text.
v
X
v
%X
$ &
EdX
v $ t &
8 % 3
S e ( v $ t w v $ t
yxH ` u
$
%v @%C 3 $
% 3 $"X
$
` G @3 "X
$
@3 "X X X
X
U i f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
@4ByxH ` u
f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
ByxH ` u
a C
b%h$ s
r DphH2db `
V U q i g f e ca
X W V T S R Q I # # C G $ C 3 A
YU 8%P5 3 BH8@FED$ B0
# 6 $ # # $ 3 1
8@987%544 20
In this particular case, it means that you can tell ls to list a particular directory.
Interactive command sessions are shown in a block
( & $ # !
)%'%"
Syntax explanations are shown like this.
1 Foreword
13
2 Legal notices
14
2 Legal notices
2.1 About these notes
Gentle reader, we hope that these notes provide a wonderful learning experience for you. We trust
that you will be kind enough to point out to us the typos, stylistic faults and gross errors in the text.
Also, if you make changes to these notes, or produce them in an alternative format, please do send
us a copy of your revisions.
These notes have been written with the LPI's objectives and criteria for approved training materials
in mind. The modular design makes it possible to build up a course following LPI objectives from
a selection of topics. If you would like to contribute towards the certification of these notes and the
release of other free documentation please contact us.
Bound copies of our LPI 101 and LPI 102 training manuals can be purchased from Leading Edge
Business Solutions (Pty) Ltd see www.ledge.co.za. We offer training courses based on this
material. The contact address for queries related to these notes is lpinotes@ledge.co.za.
2.2 Copyright notice

Copyright 2004 Andrew McGill and Leading Edge Business Solutions (Pty) Ltd
(www.ledge.co.za).
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU
Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 published by the Free Software Foundation; with the
Invariant Sections being the Legal notices section, in particular the About these notes section,
the Front-Cover Texts being the complete paragraph starting This manual ..., and no Back-Cover
Texts. A copy of the license is included in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation
License".
2.3 GNU Free Documentation License

Version 1.2, November 2002
Copyright (C) 2000,2001,2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA
Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
0. PREAMBLE
The purpose of this License is to make a manual, textbook, or other functional and useful document "free" in the sense
of freedom: to assure everyone the effective freedom to copy and redistribute it, with or without modifying it, either
commercially or noncommercially. Secondarily, this License preserves for the author and publisher a way to get credit
for their work, while not being considered responsible for modifications made by others.
This License is a kind of "copyleft", which means that derivative works of the document must themselves be free in the
same sense. It complements the GNU General Public License, which is a copyleft license designed for free software.
We have designed this License in order to use it for manuals for free software, because free software needs free
documentation: a free program should come with manuals providing the same freedoms that the software does. But this
License is not limited to software manuals; it can be used for any textual work, regardless of subject matter or whether it
is published as a printed book. We recommend this License principally for works whose purpose is instruction or
reference.
2 Legal notices
15
1. APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS

This License applies to any manual or other work, in any medium, that contains a notice placed by the copyright holder
saying it can be distributed under the terms of this License. Such a notice grants a world-wide, royalty-free license,
unlimited in duration, to use that work under the conditions stated herein. The "Document", below, refers to any such
manual or work. Any member of the public is a licensee, and is addressed as "you". You accept the license if you copy,
modify or distribute the work in a way requiring permission under copyright law.
A "Modified Version" of the Document means any work containing the Document or a portion of it, either copied
verbatim, or with modifications and/or translated into another language.
A "Secondary Section" is a named appendix or a front-matter section of the Document that deals exclusively with the
relationship of the publishers or authors of the Document to the Document's overall subject (or to related matters) and
contains nothing that could fall directly within that overall subject. (Thus, if the Document is in part a textbook of
mathematics, a Secondary Section may not explain any mathematics.) The relationship could be a matter of historical
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2 Legal notices
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2 Legal notices
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2 Legal notices
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3 BIOS Settings
19
3 BIOS Settings
> valerie kernel: mtrr: your CPUs had inconsistent variable MTRR settings
> valerie kernel: mtrr: probably your BIOS does not setup all CPUs
It indicates your bios authors can't read standards. Thats a quite normal state of
affairs, so common that the kernel cleans up after them
Alan Cox on linux-kernel
This chapter is on the configuration of the BIOS. Although this chapter is mainly information, you
will need to know how to start up your Linux system and execute commands and read files using
less in order to make progress.
LPIC topic 1.101.1 Configure Fundamental BIOS Settings [1]

Weight: 1
Objective:
Candidates should be able to configure fundamental system hardware by making the correct
settings in the system BIOS. This objective includes a proper understanding of BIOS
configuration issues such as the use of LBA on IDE hard disks larger than 1024 cylinders,
enabling or disabling integrated peripherals, as well as configuring systems with (or without)
external peripherals such as keyboards. It also includes the correct setting for IRQ's, DMA and
I/O addresses for all BIOS administrated ports and settings for error handling.
Key files, terms, and utilities include:
/proc/ioports
Linux's view of used I/O ports
/proc/interrupts
Linux's view of used interrupts
/proc/dma
Linux's view of assigned DMA channels
/proc/pci
PCI bus information
3.1 BIOS architecture

If you open up your computer's case, you will see a number of components. You may be able to
identify some of these:
A CPU. For IBM PC clones, this has been compatible with the 8088 processor.
A ROM chip containing the BIOS code
A CMOS memory chip for BIOS settings (Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor).
A battery which makes sure that the CMOS settings are not lost when the power goes off.
The BIOS is the Basic Input/Output System of your computer. In the good old days, this was
intended to be used as the lowest level of the operating system, and was used in that way by MSDOS. Modern operating systems implement the basic I/O functionality themselves.
In recent times, the BIOS has been relegated to a more limited set of functions:
Power on self test. (P.O.S.T.) This includes testing the memory (although the test is not
exhaustive).
Putting the hardware in a sane an predictable state (e.g. setting the display card's video mode and
timing parameters to use text mode; setting up power management; initialising hard disks)
Chipset-specific configuration for your machine (e.g. configuring the PCI bus and built-in
peripherals)
Loading the operating system from the disk (from floppy disk, IDE disk, SCSI, network ...)
3 BIOS Settings
20
Providing basic I/O (keyboard, floppy, hard disk, CDROM).

Modern BIOS programs include an interactive program that can be used to change the configuration
settings, i.e. to change the contents. This is what most people refer to as the BIOS (e.g. Enter
the BIOS and tell it to autodetect the hard disks).
3.2 Changing BIOS configuration

The method of entering the BIOS setup program varies from one BIOS manufacturer to the next.
Various computer vendors use different methods. You should be able to enter the BIOS by pressing
one of the following key combinations either before, during or just after the P.O.S.T. (and usually
after):
Del, F2, Ctrl+Alt+Esc, Ctrl+Alt+S, Ctrl+Alt+Ins, Ctrl+Alt+Del (although this will reboot on
most PC's), F1, F3, F10, Fn+F1 (laptop), Esc.
This necessarily requires that a keyboard be connected to the computer. If you are setting up a
computer that does not have a keyboard, then you will need to plug one in during configuration, but
you will have to make sure that the system works without a keyboard later.
3.3 IDE disks

IDE (Integrated/Intelligent Drive Electronics) disks are the default fixed data storage media for
most PC's. IDE disks are usually described in terms of their size, ranging from small (20Mb) to
large (80Gb2).
The BIOS is involved in the usage of IDE disks for three reasons:
The BIOS must load the essential parts of the operating system from the disk during booting.
The BIOS must provide correct information about the installed media to the operating system.
This information is the number of cylinders, heads and sectors on the disk. In the past these used
to correspond to the number of spinning platters, the number of magnetic read-write heads and
the density of the magnetic media. Although most hard disks have one read-write head, the
number reported depends on the size of the disk. You don't need to worry about it actually.
3.3.1 Disk geometry and addressing

In order to do the important task of loading the operating system, the operating system loader has to
request data from exact locations on the disk. The method of defining exactly where the data is has
changed over time.
Disk geometry refers to the logical dimensions of the disk how many cylinders, heads and sectors
the disk controller can access. These values once corresponded with physical reality but this is no
longer the case. Instead they refer to the 3 sets of coordinates accepted by the IDE interface for
specifying a data sector.
Interrupt 13h
The BIOS function to read a sector of data from disk is accessed via a software interrupt, interrupt
13h (hexadecimal). To read from the disk using interrupt 13h, you specify the exact head, cylinder
and sector numbers. The limits on these are shown in the table.
Parameter
Cylinder
Bits
Maximum
10
1024
2 Well, when we wrote this, a 80Gb disk was large. It might not be large anymore.
3 BIOS Settings
Parameter
Bits
Maximum
Head
256
Sector
64
Total
24
21
16.7 million
The location of the data is specified with 24 bits, which means that you can access a maximum of
16.7 million sectors. With a sector size of 512 bytes, you can access a hard disk of up to 8.4 GB.
There is a problem, however. It is unusual that a disk will have the number of heads and cylinders
that happens to match the limits imposed by the design of interrupt 13h. The first fix for this
problem was to employ various translation modes which shuffle bits between the head and sector
addresses. Doing this meant that it was only necessary to change the BIOS not to change the
operating systems. However, disk sizes soon passed 8.4 GB.
To handle disks larger than 8.4 GB an extended version of the interrupt 13h functions allows the
location of data to to be specified using 64 bits, meaning that it should work until disk sizes hit 9.4
x 1021 bytes, which probably won't happen this year. This is called Logical Block Addressing (LBA
mode). When using LBA mode, cylinder addresses are a single number, and there is no such thing
as cylinders, sectors and heads, except for compatibility with older operating systems.
Normal mode (CHS)
In this mode, the location of data on the disk is described in terms of the Cylinder, Head and Sector3
at which the data resides.
The BIOS interface for reading from the disk is via a software interrupt, interrupt 13h (13
hexadecimal). The limits for the cylinder, head and sector numbers do not correspond with the
limits for the IDE drive interface, although they were adequate for older disk drives.
Interface
Cylinders
Heads
Sectors
IDE/ATA
65536
16
256
BIOS Int 13h
1024
256
64
Normal mode compromise
1024
16
64
In Normal mode, the cylinder, head and sector numbers requested when interrupt 13h is called are
used as-is.
One of the results of this arrangement is that Normal mode cannot handle disks larger than 504Mb
(that is 1024 cylinders, 16 heads and 64 sectors).
Large mode
If the disk size is between 504 Mb and 8Gb, a horrible hack exists to make the disk addressable,
without requiring changes to the software. You may notice that the Heads parameter of the
interrupt 13h service has 4 bits of extra capacity that will never be used with an IDE disk. Large
mode shifts one, two or four bits from the cylinder specification to the head specification. Shifting
4 bits means that you can point to 16 times as much data. It's a horrible hack, but it means you can
have disks as large as 8Gb.
Because the translation mechanism is not easily predictable, the BIOS may not access the sectors
you intend when the cylinder you ask for is above 1024.
3 Hard disks may have a number of electromagnetic read-write heads. Each head can move across the rotating disk
platter to a cylinder and wait for a given sector to fly past.
3 BIOS Settings
22
The disk also looks rather different to what it would in Normal mode.
3.3.2 Logical Block Addressing (LBA)

When a disk is in LBA mode, each location on the disk is specified with a single number, up to 24
bits long. Not every BIOS supports LBA addressing. If the BIOS does not support LBA
addressing, it is generally risky for it to access data which is after cylinder 1024.
There is a complication on this too. The BIOS is responsible for setting up the correct translation
between LBA addresses and CHS addresses. Not every BIOS does this predictably especially
after cylinder 1024 when the translation hacks start coming into play.
To play it safe, many Linux distributions ensure that they create a boot partition which the BIOS
will always be able to read, regardless of whether it supports LBA mode or not. This partition
contains the system files for booting up.
Summary of limits
The various modes of accessing a disk are subject to the following limitations.
Method
Disk size limit
Cylinders
Bits
Normal mode (CHS addressing)
504Mb
1024
24
Interrupt 13h
8.4Gb
1024
24
Large mode (ECHS addressing)
8.4Gb
16384
24
ATA interface
128Gb
28
Interrupt 13h extended
9.4 x 1021 bytes
32
LBA mode
9.4 x 1021 bytes
32
A kernel patch for the 2.4.18 kernel allows it to address disks with up to 48 bits.
3.3.3 Data transfer

PIO modes
The original for reading and writing an IDE disk is called programmed IO. The choice of PIO
mode determines the speed at which the CPU reads data from the IDE interface. Mode 0 is the
slowest, and mode 4 is the fastest.
DMA modes
DMA is the technique where the IDE interface writes data to memory by direct memory access.
This requires little intervention by the CPU, which can spend its time doing more productive work.
Newer hard disks and motherboards do support this. However, if you connect a new hard disk into
an older motherboard, you may have to manually specify that you do not wish to use DMA to avoid
triggering hardware bugs.
If a BIOS supports setting the DMA mode, Mode 0 is the slowest and Mode 5 is the fastest (and
possibly most error-prone).
32 bit transfer
IDE interfaces always use 16 bit transfer. The 32 bit transfer mode setting that you will find in
some BIOS configuration programs refers to transfer on the PCI bus, rather than to the actual
3 BIOS Settings
23
interface. Enabling this causes a small performance improvement.

Block mode
Block mode involves transferring up to 32 blocks of data between the IDE interface and memory
without monitoring by the CPU. On some older motherboards does not work correctly, but the
BIOS still provides an option to enable it.
3.4 Integrated peripherals

Motherboard manufacturers include a selection of useful peripherals in their hardware.
Display adapter
The BIOS will generally offer two settings related to an on-board display adapter.
Enable / disable if you have a display card which you prefer to the on-board one, you will want
to choose to use it.
Memory to allocate on-board display adapters will use the top 4MB to 16MB (or more) of your
system memory. You can set this amount in the BIOS settings.
Network card
If there is an on-board network card, you may want to enable or disable it.
Printer and communications port
Usually a built-in parallel port will allow you to choose the IO address and interrupt to be used for
the port.
Port
LPT1
LPT2
LPT3
COM1
COM2
COM3
COM4
IO address
0x378
0x278
0x3BC
0x3F8
0x2F8
0x3E8
0x2E8
Interrupt
Linux device
/dev/lp0
/dev/lp1
/dev/lp2
/dev/ttyS0 /dev/ttyS1 /dev/ttyS2 /dev/ttyS3
3.5 IRQ, DMA, I/O addresses

IRQ's interrupt requests (this is used for signaling the CPU that data is available).
DMA channels some devices write directly to memory. Each device that does this must use its
own DMA channel.
I/O addresses each device needs to be addressable by the CPU. The I/O address is used for
input and output to the device.
The architecture of the PC demands that only a single device use any of the following at a time.
Since each of these parameters has to be unique, conflicts arise when they are duplicated between
devices.
In terms of configuration to resolve conflicts, you can do the following:
Change the configuration of built-in devices
Change jumpers on plug-in expansion cards.
Configure a device by running software
Not use the device, or not use the feature of the device.
The BIOS automatically handles resource allocation for the following:
3 BIOS Settings
24
PCI devices. Devices on a PCI bus can share interrupts with each other.
ISA Plug and play devices the ISA plug and play protocol is designed to allow the BIOS to
allocate resources to a device and configure it to use them. It is usually better to let Linux
configure ISA Plug and Play devices.
3.6 Error handling

The selection of error handling by the BIOS can determine whether your computer will boot up or
not under certain conditions. One of the peripherals the BIOS checks and initialises is the
keyboard. If the keyboard is not present, the BIOS helpfully says Keyboard error, Press F1 to
continue.
It is better to tell the BIOS to ignore all errors especially in a system that will be run without a
keyboard and a screen.
3.7 Power management*

The BIOS may include a number of power management options. It is customary for these to be
poorly implemented, and to cause problems with Linux systems for example, the BIOS may
decide to power down the hard disk for some reason. If you have problems with random crashes,
these are often related to power management bugs.
3.8 Linux view of the BIOS

When Linux is running, there are a number of commands to determine what the BIOS has been
doing to your hardware.
3.8.1 /proc/{ioports,interrupts,dma,pci}
The /proc file system contains a number of virtual files which show the state of your hardware.
/proc/ioports
This shows the port numbers which are in use by devices for which a kernel module is loaded. If
two devices use the same IO ports, then it is unlikely that they will work together. One of them
needs to be reconfigured either by changing jumper settings, plug and play settings, or
reconfiguring internal peripherals.
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3.8.2 lspci
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/proc/dma
The example above is for a single CPU machine. On this particular machine, the USB controller
and the VIA sound controll.er share interrupt 5.
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a e
e { 8
f
! 1
a
l h h j
'i hh
! 1
a
| s s
f V Q U V e ca
"g W 7EF D2db `
This file shows the interrupt assignments which are in use by devices supported by the kernel and
the loaded modules. If two devices use the same interrupt this is not necessarily a problem.
Devices on a PCI bus will often share interrupts, and this causes no problems. ISA devices cannot
easily share interrupts, since the ISA bus uses edge triggering, while sharing interrupts requires
level triggering.
/proc/interrupts
The I/O port ranges are listed in hexadecimal. Some of the devices are integrated into the
motherboard (such as the DMA controller). The kernel tracks their port numbers so that it can
prevent unexpected interference in their operation (e.g. by user space programs).
t s ~
j m e
( 8s %w 8G H8G w j s m 1 vz%# t y88
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( 8s %w 8G H8G w j s m 1 vz%# t y88
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$
s j m e
s w l { %w j s m 1 vz%# t y88
#

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$
s j m e
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u X
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# 3 2't va
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e $ 6
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m "ga f
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3 BIOS Settings
25
1. You can either disable the parallel port in the integrated peripherals section, or you can change
its settings so that it does not use IRQ 5. You also need to reserve IRQ 5 for the ISA bus.
2. Explained in the text
3. Always
4. Halt on keyboard, etc.
5. pci, dma, interrupts
6. lspci and lspnp (for newer kernels)
Answers to quiz questions
1. Set up your BIOS so that your system will boot up even if the keyboard and screen are absent.
Test whether the system does actually boot up.
2. Configure your BIOS so that your system will not boot up at all, and then fix the problem. What
did you change? Are there other settings that can cause problems?
3. Make a list of the IRQ's which are available on your PC.
Assignment
1. You have a system with an ISA bus and an internal modem requiring IRQ 5. The BIOS assigns
IRQ5 to the on-board parallel port. What problem will result (if any). How do you make the
modem and parallel port work simultaneously?
2. What is the significance of hard disk cylinder 1024 to the BIOS?
3. When is it better to use LBA mode?
4. What are the error handling settings supported by some BIOSes
5. Which files in /proc show the Linux view of the BIOS?
6. Which commands list PCI and ISA peripherals?
7. Why is dmesg significant for diagnosing BIOS problems?
Quiz questions
3.9 Review
The messages displayed during boot up correspond to the kernel initialising the devices installed in
the system. The messages are usually appended to /var/log/messages, and can be displayed with
dmesg after the system has booted up.
3.8.3 boot messages and dmesg*

dgkhdddyu8uuud

hvuuduyuu

hvuuduyuu

y

uuuu uuuhz8uuu

h
uyuunuu uuuhz

dbd uduh8u

yuduuuuzd uuuhu

h7d duyu

'uunu duyuuu

7uuyud uuuhzu
V f R I f e ca
%hE 7"hi2db `
Curent versions use lspci.
3 BIOS Settings
26
3 BIOS Settings
7. dmesg shows kernel messages, and the kernel talks to the BIOS as it boots up.
27
4 Modems and sound cards
28

If you put your supper dish to your ear you can hear the sounds of a restaurant.
Snoopy
This chapter deals with the configuration of modem and sound card hardware. A separate chapter
examines the topic of PPP connections (although it is included in the objectives for this topic). The
ISA PnP standard is discussed more fully in the chapter on PC Cards.
To follow the examples in this chapter, you should install the following software:
setserial
uucp (for the cu program)
ISA PnP tools
LPIC topic 1.101.3 Configure modem and sound cards [1]

Weight: 1
Objective:
Ensure devices meet compatibility requirements (particularly that the modem is NOT a winmodem), verify that both the modem and sound card are using unique and correct IRQs, I/O, and
DMA addresses, (if the sound card is PnP) install and run sndconfig and isapnp, configure
modem for outbound dial-up, configure modem for outbound PPP | SLIP | CSLIP connection,
and set serial port for 115.2 Kbps.
Linux compatibility (including winmodems)
Hardware resource assignment (IRQs, I/O, DMA)
PnP sound cards
Serial port configuration
PPP outbound connections
SLIP outbound connections
CSLIP outbound connections
4.1 Modem compatibility and winmodems

Modem stands for modulator / demodulator, which means that a modem converts binary
information to analogue signals (modulation) and also decodes analogue signals into binary
(demodulation). The binary signals are given by the computer, and the analogue signals fly over
the telephone lines.
Not all modems are created equal. Most modems work with Linux. Just a few don't.
4.1.1 External modems

In the good old days when modems ran at 9600 baud (bits per second), you would plug in your
modem into your computer's RS232 serial port and talk to it with the Hayes AT commands.
If you have an external modem connected to /dev/ttyS0 and you have uucp (or minicom) installed
you can talk to it like this:

# G & & 3
88'8H%D 1
1
& &
%D 3 B@8PBE w
# $ & &
% U
"@8R pg D2db `
W S i
V e ca
29
Q
7R
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U Q i R W
W V f W f U W R W g U S
yydbH'%%27%4 84W

7

8S U

i W S Q R U
hE ' B 8 W D%F '
# $ & # 1
@8BE ` w @8 U

&
%& ` B%P$ 3 Fb t
# v
r
a
#9 5H%D# w
# $ C
3
3 BY@ 1
# & #
%@9 3 s
This same interface is supported by almost all external modems, including ISDN terminal adapters
which pretend to be analogue modems. (An ISDN terminal adapter is not a modem, since it does
digital to digital translation rather than digital to analogue modulation / demodulation).
4.1.2 Internal modems

There is generally no configuration necessary for the first and second serial ports on a PC
(/dev/ttyS0 and /dev/ttyS1 in Linux, or COM1 and COM2 in the DOS world). There is
unfortunately no standard for additional serial ports, so these usually have to be configured
manually.
Internal modems are just like external modems, except that the RS232 port is not outside the
computer, but inside. In order to use an internal modem (and to use additional serial ports), you
need to tell Linux where the RS232 port is, using the setserial command.
Here are the parameters that setserial deals with:
G v $ & G a $
@8 7%72E# 8'py%@
a $ #
f bEC 8
a @"7dx yh Y7 @8nx ' b@" %
e h a $ $
6 a $
f
h h j
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a
a
|
#
~ 6
U i W S R U W f W
@9 "@8%'"'f 0 ) 4$ %w
(
If you have an internal modem with a known port and IRQ setting, you would set the port and IRQ
like this.
l Y t x m % b s x yh a 1 w gx e "@@
f
j
a
a
|
~ 6
W S i R U W f W f I
F"@8Bh2%'"'i 7" 0 ) 4$ %w
(
The "standard MS-DOS" port associations are these:
f nx

4nx

nx

4nx
f
m e
m f
m ` e
m ` f
8gx8
G x r
8gxr f
G x
8gxr e
G x
8gxr
G x
@s
@s
@s
@s
q
f "@@
~ 6
e "@@
~ 6
"@@
~ 6
"@@
~ 6
You will notice that there are two interrupts shared between four ports. This means that the serial
ports will only work correctly if level-triggered interrupts are used, or if additional interrupt lines
are configured. IRQ 5 is a good choice, since the Linux parallel port driver uses polling by default
rather than using an interrupt.
4.1.3 Winmodems4
It can be useful for an internal modem to run at the fastest possible speed, 115200 bps. Some older
applications do not request a connection at speeds higher than 38400 bps. When the application
requests 38400 bps, the actual baud rate will be set to 115200 if the spd_vhi flag is given.
f
h h j
3 6 8'py%@ Y t x m ` % b s x w y a 1 w gx e "@@
G a $
x a
a
|
~ 6
S f W S i R U W f W f I
"h2F"@8Bh2%'"'i 7" 0 da "@ `
c $
There are a number of devices which are called Winmodems including host-based, HCF-, HSP-,
4 Winmodem is a trademark of US Robotics.
30
HSF-, controllerless, host-controlled, and soft modems. Winmodems rely on vendor software to act
as true modems. While software for some versions of Microsoft Windows is available, drivers for
Linux are not always. Many USB modems are Winmodems.
Linux support for Winmodems is coordinated by www.linmodems.org. Winmodems
Require relatively high CPU speeds to operate reliably (better than 400MHz) (although this is
not problematic on modern PC's)
May require closed source software to operate. As a result you may be tied in to a specific
kernel version.
You will generally have to load a kernel module to make a Winmodem work. This may require
some research and recompiling the Linux kernel.
4.2 Sound cards

Installing an ISA sound card is fun, since you seldom have any assistance in selecting the correct
parameters, and you have to specify them correctly for the device to work.
4.2.1 ISA cards ... I/O, IRQ and DMA values

When installing new hardware, you need to choose values for I/O ports, IRQ(s) and DMA channels
that do not conflict with existing addresses. You configure the card to use the values you choose
using jumpers, isapnp or the BIOS.
1. Find out what values of I/O, IRQ and DMA are possible. You do this by reading the
documentation, or by examining the card for jumpers, etc.
2. Configure all other devices.
3. See which values are free for use by your card by checking /proc/ioports, /proc/interrupts and /
proc/dma. If there are no appropriate values, adjust the configuration of other devices in the
system.
4. Configure the card to use the values you choose.
5. Configure the kernel module to use the same values.
6. Test it
4.3 PnP sound cards

sndconfig is the console-based RedHat sound configuration tool. It automatically sets up ISA PnP
sound cards by configuring them to their default settings as given by pnpdump. It is not included
on a default installation.
Kernel 2.2
For kernel 2.2 and before, you use isapnptools. pnpdump dumps all the possible combinations of
the devices. You then edit the file it produces, and it becomes your /etc/isapnp.conf file.
T Q V U f W S I f
% Y@EV Dg 7"hi 0
The resulting file contains a number of commented out lines.

comments, the interesting part of the file looks something like this:
After removing the
$q { @s | @s q
{ l l e m 1
# t
e
h Dl @B ` H%u 0
e f a $ # #
A ~ 6 $
w
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# 6 # u
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m
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# $ q
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r
r f % w } s q w q

r r r o
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0
!
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The corresponding line for modprobe specifies the parameters to load the sound card
module.
m m
@f !Evx f 6 vx l 5 Edx f !Edx { 6nx e 6'98@@%&
j $ &
5 & f
5 G &
5 $ &
5 e
5 G
The following lines are required in /etc/modules.conf:
m m
@f !Evx f 6 vx l 5 Edx f !Edx { 6nx e 6'B"8@
j $ &
5 & f
5 G &
5 $ &
5 e
5 # G
Once /etc/isapnp.conf exists, you can configure the card(s) to the chosen settings by running isapnp,
and then load the sound module.
I f W Q S Q
hpI 7
T Q V U f W U f I f
% Y@EV 4@E 7"hi 7
This is the electronic equivalent of physically changing the jumpers on the sound card to select IO
ports, interrupts and DMA channels.
Kernel 2.4
Kernel 2.4 introduces a kernel module isa-pnp which handles the configuration of ISA PNP devices
automagically. If the module you are using has not been updated to use isa-pnp configuration, you
will have to configure it with pnpdump and isapnp.
4.4 Review
Quiz questions
1. What are the differences between PPP, SLIP and CSLIP? (This is part of the LPIC objectives...)
2. What is the aim of the plug 'n play standard (PnP)?
3. What do you need to do to establish which IRQ, IO Port and DMA settings a PnP compatible
card uses?
4. Which program sets up an ISA PnP sound card?
5. Which modems are generally compatible with Linux?
6. Why is it necessary to set the serial port speed to 115200 baud?
Assignment
1. Use the Hayes AT commands to dial a remote modem.

2. See if you can find a computer with an ISA bus, and a sound card for it. Make the sound card
play sounds using either cat /dev/urandom > /dev/dsp or sox.
1. PPP is newer, and supports a number of options and dynamically configures to the lowest
common denominator. SLIP requires matching configurations at both ends. CSLIP is
compressed SLIP.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Zero configuration of hardware.

Run pnpdump
isapnp with an appropriate configuration file
External modems
You need to be able to get data from the modem as fast as it is providing it.
32
5 SCSI devices
33
5 SCSI devices
SCSI, n. [Small Computer System Interface] A bus-independent standard for
system-level interfacing between a computer and intelligent devices. Typically
annotated in literature with 'sexy' (/sek'see/), 'sissy' (/sis'ee/), and 'scuzzy'
(/skuh'zee/) as pronunciation guides the last being the overwhelmingly
predominant form, much to the dismay of the designers and their marketing
people. One can usually assume that a person who pronounces it /S-C-S-I/ is
clueless.
Jargon File 4.2.0
It will help you to have a system with SCSI devices for this chapter. You can set up IDE-SCSI by
adding hdc=ide-scsi or similar to the kernel command line for your CDROM device.
LPIC topic 1.101.4 Setup SCSI Devices [1]

Weight: 1
Objective:
Candidates should be able to configure SCSI devices using the SCSI BIOS as well as the
necessary Linux tools. They also should be able to differentiate between the various types of
SCSI. This objective includes manipulating the SCSI BIOS to detect used and available SCSI
IDs and setting the correct ID number for different devices particularly the boot device. It also
includes managing the settings in the computer's BIOS to determine the desired boot sequence if
both SCSI and IDE drives are used.
SCSI ID
Each SCSI device has it's own number (usually from 1 to 7)
/proc/scsi/
Linux shows SCSI information here
scsi_info
What you find in /proc/scsi/scsi
5.1 SCSI Architecture

There is a bewildering range of hardware that uses the SCSI protocol, running at speeds from
5MBps to 320 Mbps. Fortunately understanding SCSI cabling is not part of the LPI objectives, so
we wish you well and may your SCSI bus always be correctly terminated (on both ends).
By design, devices connected to a SCSI bus can talk to each other. When you set up a SCSI bus,
your SCSI host adapter is one of those devices, and each hard disk, cdrom, tape, or scanner is
another. In order to use SCSI in Linux the kernel must support the SCSI host adapter. For SCSI
disks, tapes and CD-ROMs, no additional software is required, since the protocols for these devices
are part of the SCSI protocol.
ID's and jumpers
Each device on a SCSI chain must have a unique SCSI ID. This must be set manually, i.e. by
changing jumpers or switches5.
5 An exception to this is SCA disks which set their own SCSI ID by black magic. The SCA connector includes power,
SCSI ID, and the SCSI bus all in one connector. SCA drives are used for RAID and "hot swap" situations.
Each SCSI adapter (or at least its driver) has an entry in /proc such as /proc/scsi/aic7xxx/0. The
e a # "6@ t ~ s ~ t ~ w

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In the directory /proc/scsi you will find useful information about the SCSI subsystem.
A very useful entry is /proc/scsi/scsi which lists the attached SCSI devices.
5.2.2 /proc/scsi
Note that grub does not use the Linux disk naming scheme hd0 means the first hard
disk, and not particularly an IDE hard disk.
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lilo.conf (or grub.conf) must specify that this particular initial root disk is loaded on
startup:
i S Q Q I S r
287 " @"7E@P @"7" 0
Q Q I S
PV 0
And then run mkinitrd.
$ ' G $ $ 3 $
' l (87@8 8 B$
# X &
` y8%%@@
In order to communicate with your SCSI disks, you need to load the appropriate kernel modules, or
compile support for your SCSI host adapter into the kernel. If your root file system is on a SCSI
disk, you will need to modify /etc/modules.conf to contain a line specifying your SCSI host
adapter's driver before you run mkinitrd.
5.2.1 Kernel modules

5.2 The Linux view of SCSI
It is important not to have two devices on the SCSI chain with the same SCSI ID. The host adapter
also needs a device ID. You can use the SCSI BIOS or the Linux tools to find out which SCSI ID's
are taken.
Illustration 1 Jumper settings for device ID=6 (2+4)
o o o o
o o o o
oooo
1 2 4 8
5 SCSI devices
34
st
SCSI tape
Used with tar, cpio and friends, and mt (magnetic tape) for control
sr
SCSI CD ROM Audio and data CD ROMs
or scd
sd
SCSI disk
Name Meaning
Used with fdisk, mount and (to some extent hdparm)

Usage
An example of a Linux SCSI device name is /dev/sda, which is the first SCSI hard disk. Linux
SCSI supports SCSI devices in addition to disks.
5.2.3 Devices
The contents of the file depend on the lower level driver. For some drivers, parameters can be set
by writing to this file.
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driver name can be something like aic7xxx or BusLogic. The digit is the bus number, and is
relevant if you have more than one SCSI bus in your system.
5 SCSI devices
35
5 SCSI devices
Name Meaning
sg
36
Usage
SCSI generic
character
interface
Used by scanners (SANE), CD writers (cdrecord, cdrdao) and for

reading audio CD's digitally (cdda2wav, cdparanoia)
5.2.4 SCSI naming

To address a particular SCSI device, the kernel supplies these details to the SCSI adapter.
host SCSI adapter number The SCSI adapter is a host on the SCSI bus. The numbers start at
0 and are allocated arbitarily.
bus Channel number A single SCSI adapter may have a number of SCSI buses attached.
target id number Which remote host on the SCSI bus is being addressed.
lun Logical Unit Number Which of the devices attached to the remote host is being
addressed.
Sometimes bus 1, target 3 and lun 40 is written as 1,3,0. Unless you are using devfs (device
filesystem), you won't have to pay too much attention to all that.
5.3 Booting off a SCSI disk

You need to convince your motherboard BIOS to boot of the SCSI disk, and you need to tell the
SCSI BIOS which particular SCSI disk to boot off:
1. If SCSI and non-SCSI drives are installed, the non-SCSI disk drive is the default boot device.
This must be changed with the BIOS configuration program, so that the SCSI drive is the default
boot device. On at least some BIOS programs you set BIOS bootorder to SCSI, C, A.
2. In the SCSI BIOS configuration program, you mst set the Boot SCSI ID and LUN to the ID and
LUN of the SCSI disk you wish to boot. The SCSI ID of SCSI disks is normally set with
jumpers or switches on the drive.
If you have an Adaptec SCSI card, you will see a prompt during the BIOS boot sequence,
something like the following:

@8| r 1 q ~ t ~ s 5 `

~
w s
@" !% " 8 s
SCSI BIOS configuration Screen:
$E w
&
"7$%#

l
a %E t ~ s
# $ # & 1
a # v
%
t
a 7Bt ~ s
# #
"% ` $ `

~587 w @88}
G $

3 s
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~ G $
587 w @88}

# t " t ~ s ~

a 8 B 4
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t
a 7Bt ~ s H
~
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6

5.4 Review
Quiz questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
What are the advantages of using SCSI peripherals?

What types of SCSI architecture are available?
Why are SCSI disks more expensive than IDE disks?
What is the purpose of the SCSI ID?
5 SCSI devices
37
5. How does one set the SCSI ID of a device?

6. How does one configure booting off a SCSI disk if an IDE disk is present?
7. Where does Linux provide general information about the SCSI systems present in your
computer?
Assignment
1. Configure your BIOS to boot Linux from a chosen SCSI disk, without relying on a floppy or
IDE disk.
2. Find out which SCSI bus format is the most popular in your country.
3. Find out what ide-scsi is, and why it is used.
1. SCSI removes load from the CPU, as it is a well-designed protocol. As a result, SCSI works
faster.
2. Far too many.
3. They're better.
4. The ID uniquely identifies each device (or controller) on the SCSI chain.
5. Manually usually by changing jumpers, but occasionally via software.
6. Set the SCSI boot device to the disk, and set the BIOS to boot off the SCSI disk. Install a boot
loader on the SCSI disk.
7. /proc/scsi/scsi
6 PC cards
38
6 PC cards
Is there an API or other means to determine what video card, namely the chipset,
that the user has installed on his machine?
On a modern X86 machine use the PCI/AGP bus data. On a PS/2 use the MCA
bus data. On nubus use the nubus probe data. On old style ISA bus PCs don a
large pointy hat and spend several years reading arcane and forbidden scrolls
Alan Cox on hardware probing
For this chapter you should know how to log in as root and execute commands. It will help you to
have a system with unusual ISA and PCI cards to experiment with.
LPIC topic 1.101.5 Setup different PC expansion cards [3]

Weight: 3
Objective:
Candidates should be able to configure various cards for the various expansion slots. They
should know the differences between ISA and PCI cards with respect to configuration issues.
This objective includes the correct settings of IRQs, DMAs and I/O ports of the cards, especially
to avoid conflicts between devices. It also includes using isapnp if the card is an ISA PnP
device.
/proc/dma
Direct memory addressing channels assigned to devices
/proc/interrupts
Hardware interrupts assigned to devices
/proc/ioports
Input/Output ports assigned to devices
/proc/pci
PCI bus information, as shown by lspci
pnpdump(8)
Dump possible settings for ISA Plug and play
isapnp(8)
Tell ISA Plug and play devices what ports to use
lspci(8)
Show PCI bus information
6.1 Bus architecture

A bus is physically a set of parallel conductors that connect the components of a computer6. The
components of the computer use the bus to communicate by sending electrical signals to each other.
The components that are connected by the bus include the CPU, the system memory (RAM and
ROM) and peripherals (e.g. disk interface, display adapter, interrupt controller).
6.2 Bus resources

The following bus concepts are used in both the ISA bus and PCI bus.
I/O addresses to specify a specific component on a bus, the CPU uses its I/O address. This
means that systems on the bus cannot share I/O addresses.
Memory addresses to read from or write to a particular location in memory the CPU hardware
uses a memory address. The ISA bus separates the concept of memory addresses from I/O
addresses, although there is not a huge difference between these.
6 A bus is also a long motor vehicle for carrying passengers, usually along a fixed route. The fixed route part is the
reason that the term is used in computers.
6 PC cards
39
Interrupt requests (IRQs) when a peripheral requires CPU attention, it issues an interrupt
request. The CPU, in response to the request, stops what it is doing, and speaks to the relevant
peripheral (usually to retrieve data from it, or to send more data to it). Busses generally have a
number of interrupt request lines, which enables the kernel to determine which peripheral caused
the interrupt. If two peripherals share an interrupt request line, it is possible that they will trigger
an interrupt request simultaneously. The kernel must respond to both devices for proper
operation. Shared interrupts work when interrupts are Level triggered (e.g. on the PCI bus) and
not possible when interrupts are edge triggered (e.g. on the ISA bus).
DMA channels Direct Memory Access Using a DMA channel allows a peripheral to copy
data directly into or out of the computer's memory. This means that the CPU is not intimately
involved with the data transfer once it is in motion. Use of a DMA channel allows a device to
perform direct memory access. It is generally not possible to share DMA channels between
peripherals.
6.3 Bus conflict resolution

The Linux kernel is responsible for managing the assignment of IRQs (interrupt request lines), I/O
ports and DMA channels. The kernel will not assign a resource to two drivers, unless it is shareable
(i.e. a level triggered interrupt on a PCI bus).
A number of resource conflicts can occur on the bus.
I/O address conflict either one or both of the devices will fail to work. Even if one of the
devices is unconfigured, and no kernel module has been loaded for it, it may respond to its I/O
address and cause problems.
Shared IRQs sharing IRQ's with level triggered interrupts can cause conflicts if the kernel only
services one of the devices, and not both. This is not likely with newer kernels, but it can
happen. Sharing IRQ's with edge triggered interrupts will cause one or both of the devices to
fail. If a kernel module for a given device is not loaded, the device will never generate
interrupts, and will coexist with other devices.
DMA channels cannot be shared. The kernel will refuse to assign a DMA channel to two
devices. The device for which a module is loaded first will work.
To resolve conflicts for resources, you need to reconfigure the devices so that they do not conflict:
Really old cards (and some new ones) are configured by changing jumpers on the card.
isapnp can change the resource assignments for plug and play cards. Some PC BIOS's contain
this facility too.
Often the BIOS includes facilities for changing the interrupts and memory locations of built-in
devices.
IRQ conflicts between devices on the PCI bus and the ISA bus can be resolved by telling the
BIOS to reserve certain IRQ lines for the ISA bus. I/O ports do not conflict, since the PCI bus
uses an independent range of port addresses.
6.4 PCI card configuration

The Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI) bus includes resource assignment as part of its
specification. To make a PCI card work, you merely have to load the correct kernel module. To
determine which kernel module will work, you can consult the output of the lspci command.
The module is then loaded using modprobe modulename. If there are options required for the
modules, you enter them in /etc/modules.conf and run depmod -a.
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tell you what type of device it is.
To list the components on the PCI bus, you can look at the file /proc/pci or use the lspci command.
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lspci list PCI devices
6 PC cards
40
A Plug and Play (PnP) device is very similar to a card which is configured with jumpers except
that the jumpers are missing. ISA PnP devices are automagically configured by the BIOS or the
6.6 ISA PnP devices

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To change the settings that an ISA card is using generally requires changing the jumpers on the
card. The section following this one explains how to change the settings on an ISA card which
supports ISA Plug'n Play. With a few exceptions, the kernel modules supporting ISA cards have to
be configured with specific parameters. Most drivers are capable of detecting interrupt values, so
the critical values to assign are the I/O addresses.
The best way to assign values is to read the relevant documentation and set the jumpers according
to the free resources on your PC. However, you can sometimes guess. Here's an example of
loading the kernel module for a NE-2000 Ethernet Adapter. The NE2000 driver requires the 8390
driver:
6.5 ISA card configuration

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6 PC cards
41
For each CPU /proc/interrupts shows the interrupts which are in use by the kernel, and the number
of times each interrupt has triggered.
/proc/interrupts
The following kernel interface files in /proc display the assigned bus resources:
6.7 Kernel interface commands

Newer kernels include a module named isa-pnp which automatically configures ISA PnP cards.
You can configure misbehaving and unsupported cards manually by writing to /proc/isapnp,
although using pnpdump and isapnp may prove simpler.
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operating system.
Before the ISA PnP standard was devised, many hardware manufacturers configured their
hardware's I/O addresses using special MS-DOS based utility programs. The isapnp program
replaces this functionality.
To configure a PnP device:
Use pnpdump > /etc/isapnp.conf to determine possible configuration settings for the device.
Edit /etc/isapnp.conf and remove comments (optionally change the parameters from the defaults)
Run isapnp /etc/isapnp.conf to set the parameters the device actually uses.
Load a kernel module for the device.
The part of the file /etc/isapnp.conf which needs to be edited looks something like this:
6 PC cards
42
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In this particular configuration, it will not work well to add an additional card requiring the address
0x210, since that is in use (by a 3c509 network adapter).
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6 PC cards
43
6 PC cards
44
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The PCI device in the above listing is a VGA display adapter. Memory mapped devices include
network adapters, PCMCIA, ACPI support and video ROM.
/proc/dma
The dma interface shows the DMA assignments in use for the ISA bus.
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6.8 Review
Quiz questions
The answers to these questions appear in this chapter.

1. What is the purpose of an interrupt?
2. What is the purpose of an I/O address?
3. What is the purpose of a DMA channel?
4. What happens when there is a resource conflict between two devices?
5. Under what circumstances can two devices share the same IRQ value?
Assignment
1. Experiment with lpsci and pnpdump (perhaps lspnp) on your PC. Write an explanation of how
the output from the commands corresponds with the contents of /proc/interrupts, /proc/dma and /
proc/ioports.
2. Obtain an expansion card (such as a network card) and install it in your computer. Explain what
effect merely plugging in the card has on the BIOS, and on the output of various diagnostic
commands. Load an appropriate kernel module for the card, and write an explanation of the
effect this has on the output of the diagnostic commands.
1. An interrupt indicates that a peripheral requires CPU attention i.e. reading or writing data.
2. An IO address is used on a bus to identify a particular peripheral or a component of a peripheral.
3. A DMA channel is used for coordinating data transfers between peripherals and memory. This
frees the CPU for more productive work.
4. Either one or both of the devices does not work. It is possible that one of the devices may
function unreliably.
5. On a bus which uses level triggered interrupts it is possible to share interrupt values. On the ISA
bus and the EISA bus interrupt sharing is not possible. On the PCI bus, interrupt sharing is the
6 PC cards
norm.
45
7 Device configuration
46
Some of my readers ask me what a Serial Port is.
The answer is: I don't know.
Is it some kind of wine you have with breakfast?
the fortune cookie database (no attribution)
ISDN, DSL and PPP are all ways of getting connected from where you are to where you want to be.
Note that some of the objectives in this section are handled in the chapter on modem and sound card
hardware (namely the usage of setserial and modem compatibility requirements). By the end of this
chapter, you should know enough to set up a communications controller, but not necessarily to how
to use it for networking.
LPIC topic 1.101.6 Configure Communication Devices [1]

Weight: 1
Objective:
Candidates should be able to install and configure internal and external communication devices
such as modems, ISDN adapters, and DSL switches. This objective includes verification of
compatibility requirements (especially important if that modem is a winmodem), necessary
hardware settings for internal devices (IRQs, DMAs, I/O ports), and loading and configuring
suitable device drivers. It also includes communication device and interface configuration
requirements, such as the correct serial port for 115.2 Kbps, and the correct modem settings for
outbound PPP connection(s).
/proc/dma
Direct memory accessing channels in use
/proc/interrupts
Interrupts in use
/proc/ioports
I/O ports in use
setserial(8)
Configure serial port access for an internal modem
7.1 PPP connections

Networks like ethernet, frame relay and ATM connect a number of computers together. A
computer connected to the network can speak to a number of other computers simultaneously over
the same connection.
Point to point connections connect two computers to each other. Point to point connections are
commonly used for connecting to an Internet service provider. People pay their Internet service
providers money so that they can join a well-connected network.
There are a number of methods of doing this:
Analogue modem we phone our ISP on a standard phone, and our modem talks to their
modem, so that our computer can talk to their computer.
ISDN modem we phone our ISP on a fancy digital phone, and our ISDN terminal adapter talks
to their ISDN terminal adapter so that our computers can talk to each other.
DSL the telephone company installs a special line that links directly to our ISP's DSL
concentrator via the local telephone exchange(s). Our computer talks to a fancy DSL modem
which talks to our ISP's expensive equipment, which does black magic to connect us to the
network. ADSL is the same, just cheaper (for the phone company, that is).
47
7.2 Types of modem

The basic function of a modem is to provide a
digital text communication channel in two
directions. The point to point protocol (PPP) uses
the modem connection for networking protocols.
Two machines communicating via PPP each run
pppd which sends information to the kernel for
networking processing.
Server
Client
networking subsystem
networking subsystem
pppd
pppd
Modem
Modem
7.2.1 PPP on analogue modems

One of the properties of PPP is that it is a peer to peer protocol. Either or both sides of the
connection can request authentication. Generally, when negotiating an outbound link the person
dialling out will not require authentication, and the server which answers the call will require
authentication.
In order to dial up to an internet service provider (ISP), you will need to find an appropriate means
to supply the following data:
Modem to use (e.g. /dev/ttyS0) (Remember that if this is a winmodem, you will have to load a
working kernel module ... which may not be possible. Also remember that for an internal
modem you will have to first configure it with setserial.).
Telephone number to dial (e.g. 555 5555)
User name that the ISP expects (e.g. user42).
Password for that user (e.g. bigsecret).
There are a large variety of programs that can be used to set up the PPP parameters kppp, wvdial.
A number of distributions provide an interface activation script, and ifup ppp0 will activate the link.
7.2.2 pppd call myisp

To activate your ISP link using pppd directly:
/etc/ppp/peers/myisp this file is consulted when you run pppd call myisp:

8 8
~
e { 2 "@
' G & ! G G G ' # #

x'"'$ 3 8@4$ 3 w
e @"B@"

The chat script /etc/ppp/chat-myisp provides the modem initialisation string and details
how to dial the ISP's number.
'
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' 3 "| y'

~
w
'
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'
y'
' w t
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' w s
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$ '
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1 w
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1 w
To supply the user name and password, you need an entry in either /etc/ppp/chap-secrets or
/etc/ppp/pap-secrets, depending on the authentication method your ISP uses. You can put
the entry in both if you choose.
'
S@%@"'
' e @"y'

48
When you run pppd call myisp, the output is added to /var/log/messages (dependant on the
configuration of your syslogd).
7.3 ISDN adapters

Internal ISDN adapters
The kernel module that supports most internal ISDN terminal adapters is the hisax module, which
supports the hisax ISDN chipset manufactured by Siemens.
External ISDN terminal adapters
There are a number of external ISDN terminal adapters available which emulate the functions of an
analogue modem. To connect one of these, you usually have to specify the correct initialisation
string. This may be one of the following (but consult the .INF file on the Windows driver disk if in
doubt):
X X
X
3 F8%8@F"FB@H B0
~ | # $
& & v # t X X
%PnX 5H%D5@98 p0
$ # v C # 6 t
s s 1
5 s w
1
f w
7.4 DSL
DSL uses a technique called PPP over Ethernet, or pppoe. For DSL to work, you need a properly
configured ethernet card, and then you run
( # G G G G ( # G G G G
E"8@ 8dFiE"8@ 8d
G G G
8
G G G
@8F8G
Fortunately, there's usually a script to do this
7.5 Diagnostic tools

The following tools are useful for diagnostics, even if they are covered in more detail in the
following course.
ifconfig
ifconfig shows the currently configured interfaces. If one of the interfaces is ppp0 or similar, then
the ppp connection is active. If ppp0 is absent, the connection is inactive.
route -n
When a PPP connection is active, there will be a route to the remote side of the PPP connection.
Usually there will be a route to the network on the other side. It is a common PPP error to have a
default route configured to your local network when starting PPP. In this situation, PPP does not
override the default route with its own.
ping
To diagnose a PPP connection using ping, the procedure is:

1. Ping the loopback interface (ping 127.0.0.1)
2. Ping the local side of the PPP connection.
3. Ping the remote side of the PPP connection.
4. Ping the default gateway of the PPP connection.
If one of these fails, you have a routing problem, or a problem with your PPP connection (e.g. an
49
interfering firewall).
7.6 Review
Quiz questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Which communication devices are not generally Linux compatible?

Why is it necessary to use setserial when using an internal modem for PPP?
What is the purpose of the baud rate setting for a modem?
How does Linux handle an external ISDN terminal adapter?
Which modules exist for using with internal ISDN adapters?
Which files configure pppoe?
How do you activate a DSL connection?
Assignment
1. Obtain a modem and a telephone line and then set up an actual network connection to your own
ISP. Check that you can browse the web using a web browser such as lynx or w3m. Make notes
about how you configured the modem.
2. The Linux pppoe daemon, pppoed7 provides the same functionality as a DSL modem. Set up a
pppoed server and connect to it using pppoe from another computer in the network. Diagnose
the connection using the techniques described in this chapter. Does the server route packets for
you?
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Winmodems, which includes a number of USB devices.

To tell the kernel what the IO address and IRQ is for the modem.
To set the speed of communication (in bits per second).
It appears to be an external analogue modem.
hisax and you have to tell it which particular chip it uses.
Usually /etc/ppp/pppoe, but dependant on site configuration.
pppd pty 'pppoe [pppoe_options]' [pppd_options]
7 This question is strictly for those genius types who are too smart for their own good. You guys must learn how to
hide your talents a bit so the rest of us can feel better.
8 USB hardware
50
8 USB hardware
Looks nice to me but about the only way you are likely to get Linus to take in
kernel debugging patches is to turn them into hex and disguise them as USB
firmware ;)
Alan Cox's guide on submitting Linux patches, today
chapter #3, kernel debuggers
For this chapter, it will be helpful to have some USB hardware to experiment with. Get a USB
scanner, a USB memory stick, a USB camera or anything.
LPIC topic 1.101.7 USB hardware [1]

Weight: 1
Objective:
Candidates should be able to activate USB support, use and configure different USB devices.
This objective includes the correct selection of the USB chipset and corresponding module. It
also includes the knowledge of the basic architecture of the layer model of USB as well as the
different modules used in the different layers.
lspci(8)
list PCI devices
usb-uhci.o
UHCI chipset support kernel module
usb-ohci.o
OCHI chipset support kernel module
/etc/usbmgr/
USB hotplug information (the one)
usbmodules
Which USB modules might support connected hardware
/etc/hotplug
USB hotplug information (the other)
8.1 USB architecture

In 1994 Compaq, Intel, Microsoft and NEC designed the Universal Serial Bus (USB) specifications
with the following goals:
Ease-of-use
PC based telephony must be possible
Port expansion (i.e. you are not limited to the number of physical ports on your computer).
USB Version 2.0 was announced in 1999. USB is a hierarchical bus and it is controlled by one
host. All communication on the bus is initiated by the host and devices cannot establish a
connection to other devices. USB version 1 allows 127 devices to be connected at a time, and
operates at a speed of 12Mbit/s. In practical circumstances, actual throughput cannot exceed about
8.5Mbit/s under the best conditions. USB version 2 runs at up to 480Mbit/s approaching the
speed of competing technologies.
To accommodate more devices on the bus than you have ports for, you use a USB hub either bus
powered, or self-powered. Only low power devices can be attached to a self-powered hub.
8.2 USB chipsets and drivers

There are two USB host controller specifications available. Two kernel modules support these
controllers.
8 USB hardware
51
usb-ohci.o The Open Host Controller Interface (OHCI, by Compaq) (used by the Nvidia
chipset)
usb-uhci.o The Universal Host Controller Interface (UHCI, by Intel) standard (simpler
hardware, more complex software, marginally higher CPU load). (Used by the VIA chipset, and,
of course, Intel.)
To determine which controller you have in a particular computer, you use lspci. The particular
controller in the systems shown below is a UHCI controller.
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As USB becomes increasingly popular, you are likely to come across the following kernel modules
which support specific classes of USB devices:
mousedev USB mouse or pointer
keybdev USB keyboard
usb-storage CD-ROM, hard disk, or ZIP drives
audio USB sound cards
joydev USB joystick
All of these rely on the usbcore.o and either usb-uhci.o or usb-ohci.o.
8.3 USB protocol

USB provides the following basic capabilities to the other kernel modules:
Control messages configuration of peripherals and small messages.
Bulk transfers used by scanners and hard disk adapters.
Interrupt transfers these are bulk transfers that are polled periodically with an interval of 1ms
to 127ms.
Isochronous transfers to send or receive data at high speed, but without guarantees of
reliability. Audio and video devices use this kind of transfer.
The USB subsystem of the kernel provides basic USB connectivity (i.e. low level interface). This is
sufficient for a device to appear on the USB bus, but to do something useful, the correct kernel
module must be loaded.
USB devices identifies themselves on the bus by vendor, and also by USB class (e.g. mouse,
keyboard, etc). The kernel makes this information available in /proc/bus/usb/ and lsusb tool shows
it in more readable format.
f
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The vendor directory specifies vendor and product ID's and the corresponding module that
should be loaded.
# #a &
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The class/ directory specifies which module should be loaded for the various classes of
USB device:
#
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If your system does not use the kernel based /sbin/hotplug, you are probably using usbmgr, and
your kernel is probably version 2.2. You will probably also not have lsusb installed.
usbmgr is user-mode daemon which loads and unloads USB kernel modules. When USB devices
connect into or disconnect from a USB hub, usbmgr does the following, based on its configuration
directory /etc/usbmgr/
Loads and unloads Linux kernel modules.
Execute a file to setup USB devices.
Here's what you find in the /etc/usbmgr directory:
8.4 usbmgr
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8 USB hardware
52
8 USB hardware
53
8.5 /sbin/hotplug
When a USB device (or a PCMCIA card, etc.) is plugged in kernel 2.4 this triggers a chain of
events:
The kernel runs the program /sbin/hotplug.
/sbin/hotplug runs the appropriate script from /etc/hotplug/*.agent.
If the device is USB, /etc/hotplug/usb.agent runs usbmodules to find out which kernel modules
may be able to manage interfaces on currently plugged in USB devices.
What /etc/hotplug/usb.agent does is more or less the equivalent of this:
W Q
S
' & e ' v ! ! G
S%%77(4H8@@%&
Q S r s u e 6 ! ! q e & Q
gi t 2"@48%%& '"u)72%%4@T
The configuration files for /etc/hotplug/usb.agent are in /etc/hotplug:

usb.distmap, usb.usermap a list of kernel modules, and the USB id's for which they are
suitable.
usb.handmap a list of kernel modules which are hot-pluggable on kernel 2.2.
usb.rc startup and shutdown script for USB.
8.6 Review
Quiz questions
1. Why are there two USB drivers?

2. What are the layers in the USB model?
3. Which files configure hotplugging?
Assignment
1. Connect a USB device on your computer, such as a mouse, a hard disk, scanner or memory stick.
Write down the name and model number of the device, and identify which kernel modules are
loaded when you plug the device in. If no kernel modules are loaded, verify that hotplug or
usbmgr is configured and running, and whether the device is supported.
2. Configure your computer to use the device, i.e. configure X to use your mouse, or mount your
USB disk, or set up xsane for your hard disk or gphoto for your camera.
1. There are two USB interface standards

2. The basic USB layer, and the high level device communication layer (i.e. usb-uhci, usbcore,
keybdev).
3. Either /etc/hotplug or /etc/usbmgr, depending on your kernel and software versions.
9 Partitioning disks
54
Nine megs for the secretaries fair,
Seven megs for the hackers scarce,
Five megs for the grads in smoky lairs,
Three megs for system source
One disk to rule them all,
One disk to bind them,
One disk to hold the files
And in the darkness grind 'em.
fortune cookie database
In order to keep your computer neat, disk space is divided into areas called partitions.
Partitioning a disk makes it possible to allocate parts of the disk to various operating systems and
specific purposes. For beginners, partitioning disks is the most complicated part of installing a
Linux system.
LPIC topic 1.102.1 Design hard disk layout [5]

Weight: 5
Objective:
Candidates should be able to design a disk partitioning scheme for a Linux system. This
objective includes allocating filesystems or swap space to separate partitions or disks, and
tailoring the design to the intended use of the system. It also includes placing /boot on a partition
that conforms with the BIOS' requirements for booting.
/ (root) filesystem
Where everything goes
/var filesystem
Variable stuff
/home filesystem
User files
swap space
Extra memory
mount points
Directories where file systems appear
partitions
Slices of a hard disk
cylinder 1024
What an older BIOS flips above
9.1 Disks and partitions

The whole aim of partitioning disks is to organise data. Once you have organised the data, the kind
of data you can put in a partition is ...
A filesystem for Linux (e.g. ext2, ext3, reiser, vfat)
A filesystem for another operating system (e.g. Windows NTFS, BSD UFS).
Swap space (extra memory)
Other partitions (logical partitions in the extended partition)
The partition table contains the following information for each partition:
The partition type (i.e. which operating system does it belong to)
The starting cylinder for the partition
The ending cylinder for the partition
55
Linux naming scheme
The Linux disk naming scheme identifies each disk and each partition on each disk. IDE disk
names are prefixed hd (for hard disk) and numbered a, b, c, d (and perhaps e, f
and more). SCSI disks are prefixed sd (for SCSI disk). Partitions are numbered, starting at 1
and up to 32 (if you have 32 partitions, you need help).
Here are a few examples of disk and partition names:
Device name
Meaning
/dev/hda
devices, hard disk a (IDE, primary channel, master)
/dev/hdb
devices, hard disk b (IDE, primary channel, slave)
/dev/hdc5
devices, hard disk a, partition 5 (IDE, secondary channel, master)
/dev/hdd2
devices, hard disk a, partition 2 (IDE, secondary channel, slave)
/dev/sda
devices, SCSI disk a
/dev/sdd9
devices, SCSI disk d, partition 9
Extended partitions
The original MS DOS partition table was limited to four partitions8. To work around this limitation,
the current scheme allows additional logical partitions accomodated in a single extended
partition. If there are more than 4 partitions, one of the first four partitions will be an extended
partition.
/dev/hda (the disk)
hda1
hda2
hda4
extended partition
hda5
ext2fs
/boot
vfat
/mnt/windows
hda6
hda7
swap
reiserfs
/
unused
Illustration 2 Partitions and extended partitions
When you set up a new Linux system you will usually:

Create an extended partition, to put all the actual partitions into.
Create a new /boot partition, around 32Mb, and set its type to 83 (Linux).
Create a new swap partition (your memory size times two), and set its type to 82 (Linux swap)
Create a root partition and set its type to 83 (Linux). If you require a separate /home and /var
partition, create these too.
Instead of starting with an extended partition, you may choose to create up to four primary
partitions.
The Linux fdisk disk partitioning tool is used by some distributions during installation. Most
distributions use either cfdisk (console based, visual layout) or their own graphical partitioning tool.
8 Why would you ever need more than four partitions?
56
9.2 Design criteria

Other operating systems
For dual booting, it is generally best to install the other operating system before you install Linux.
Doing this makes it difficult for the other operating system to delete your carefully installed Linux
system by mistake. Also, Linux is able to handle a number of strange partitioning schemes used by
other operating systems.
When you install an operating system, it is good to decide how much disk space you will require for
your operations on that operating system. Once the file systems have been created, and filled with
important data, it is difficult or impossible to resize them.
/boot within 1024 cylinders
Older BIOS machines struggle to access data beyond cylinder 1024. If the Linux kernel and the
boot loader are stored in a partition above the 1024 cylinder point, it is possible that the BIOS may
not be able to load the operating system at all. To avoid this problem, create a boot partition,
around 16Mb to 32Mb large which is entirely below the 1024 cylinder point.
The filesystem for the boot partition is usually set to ext2fs. LILO can have trouble with reiserfs
partitions if the notail option is not provided when the filesystem is created.
/var, /home and / partitions
It is possible to install an entire Linux installation in one partition. This partition is mounted at the
mount point /. It can be useful to create a partition for /var to limit the size to which variable data
can grow (particularly spool files). If the disk becomes full, the system can become non-functional,
so limiting the impact to the /var directory is beneficial. A fair size for /var is 200Mb to 500Mb,
depending on the application(s) that will be used. For similar reasons /home is often given its own
dedicated partition.
Swap space
The rule of thumb9 for swap space is that you should configure two times as much swap space as
you have RAM. Once you have filled up all your computer's memory twice, things aren't going to
be working so well, and having some swap space available allows you to continue running without
causing application failures.
9.2.1 Mounting partitions

When a partition is mounted, the files on its filesystem become part of the system. In Linux,
partitions are mounted on directories, and the files in the partition becomes files in the directory.
To mount a newly created partition, you would do this:
I I I T e
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I I T e H I R F e R k R
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d H I I R e R d H I Q Q F U I I R
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9.2.2 fstab
Once you have created partitions, you create filesystems in them using mkfs.
9 Uncle Ed's rule of thumb says you should never use your thumb for a rule, because you'll either draw skew, or you'll
hit it with a hammer.
57
When your system boots, the filesystems listed in /etc/fstab are mounted automatically, and become
part of the system. The contents of /etc/fstab show the file systems that are available on your
computer.
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9.2.3 Swap space

Swap partitions are used for extra memory (virtual memory). Before you can use a partition as a
swap partition, you need to write a swap signature to it, using the mkswap command. This
procedure stops you from using that valuable letter to your mom as a swap file by mistake. The
command mkswap /dev/hda7 will create a swap file all over the partition.
If you don't have /dev/hda7 available for destruction, you can get a feel for swap space using a file
instead of a real partition.
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9.2.4 LVM overview*

LVM (Logical volume management) enables disk volume management by grouping arbitrary
physical disks into virtual disk volumes. LVM provides on-line addition and removal of physical
devices and dynamic disk volume re-sizing. When using LVM, instead of mounting partitions, you
can mount logical volumes.
The logical volume manager allows management of storage volumes in user-defined groups,
allowing the system administrator to deal with sensibly named volume groups such as
"development" and "sales" rather than physical disk names such as "sda" and "sdb".
To prepare for using LVM devices, the commands are these:
U i W U V I f
@8@8 7"hi 0
U V f I f
@'% 7"hi 0
After this, the /dev/vg devices are available for formatting and using as filesystems.
9.3 Review
Quiz questions
1. Which /dev/ file represents the secondary master IDE disk.

2. Name 2 advantages of using a swap partition over a swap file.
3. When is it necessary to have a separate /boot partition, and how should it be installed?
Assignment
Design a partitioning layout for a mail server which acts as a file server as well. One of the
concerns of the system administrator is that too much incoming mail must not cause the file server
58
system to stop functioning, and that filling up the file server should not cause the mail server to stop
functioning. The disk to be used is 12Gb in size and has 1467 cylinders.
1. /dev/hdc
2. It is faster, and it can be used when without a filesystem being mounted beforehand.
3. When you have an old or buggy BIOS. It should end before cylinder 1024.
10 Boot managers
59
10 Boot managers
Marvelous! The super-user's going to boot me! What a finely tuned response to
the situation!
fortune database
In order to run Linux, it must be loaded into memory. The program that loads Linux into memory
is called a boot manager.
Read up on editing files with vi (maybe run vimtutor) in preparation for this chapter.
LPIC topic 1.102.2 Install a boot manager [1]

Weight: 1
Objective:
Candidate should be able to select, install, and configure a boot manager. This objective
includes providing alternative boot locations and backup boot options (for example, using a boot
floppy).
/etc/lilo.conf
LILO configuration file (read by /sbin/lilo)
/boot/grub/grub.conf
GRUB configuration file (read at boot time)
grub-install
GRUB installer
MBR
Master boot record where you install a boot loader
superblock
What your filesystems need to know where their stuff is
first stage boot loader
The part of GRUB or LILO that goes on the MBR
10.1 Booting and boot managers

When the BIOS has finished starting up, it loads the first sector of a boot disk into memory, and
runs the code it finds there. For hard disks, the first sector of the disk (i.e. /dev/hda) is the partition
sector. This first sector is known as the MBR (Master boot record).
Boot sector
Data area
Illustration 3 The boot sector on a floppy disk
Microsoft operating systems (FDISK /MBR in MS-DOS) install a partition sector loader which
does the following:
Check which partition is marked as active.
Load the sector from the start of that partition and run it.
10 Boot managers
60
If you install a Linux boot loader, you will usually install it on /dev/hda. If you install it on /
dev/hda1 (the first sector of the first partition), then you require a partition sector loader that load
the code on your boot sector.
Master boot record
Partition information (/dev/hda)
hda1 boot sector

/dev/hda1
hda2 boot sector
/dev/hda2
Illustration 4 Each partition on a hard disk has a boot sector.
Linux boot loaders have the following characteristics in common:

The code stored on the boot sector or the partition sector is just the first stageloader. This means
that it is not responsible for loading the operating system, but only for loading the boot loader
into memory.
The boot loader can be configured to load other operating systems. When loading other
operating systems, the boot loader may load them into memory, or call that operating system's
own boot loader.
You can interactively enter options to be passed to the kernel to be loaded. Kernel options are
used, among other things, to indicate where the root filesystem is (e.g. root=/dev/hda3), and can
be used for debugging (e.g. init=/bin/sh).
10.2 LILO
LILO is the (almost) original LInux LOader. It does not depend on you using a specific filesystem,
it can boot Linux kernel images from floppy disks, and it can act as a bootmanager for other
operating systems.
LILO works something like this:
You create the configuration file /etc/lilo.conf
You run /sbin/lilo
/sbin/lilo maps out the sectors on the disk that contain the data needed for booting (the kernel,
the configuration options)
/sbin/lilo maps out the locations of the disk that contain the data needed for booting (the kernel,
the configuration options). This map is stored in /boot/map.
/sbin/lilo installs the boot loader on the disk, and configures it with the location of /boot/map.
One of the important consequences of the way LILO works is that the location of data on the disk
may not change after /boot/map has been created. This means that if you modify the configuration
10 Boot managers
61
in /etc/lilo.conf, install a kernel upgrade, or rename files and directories, you need to run /sbin/lilo
again before things work as expected.
10.2.1 /etc/lilo.conf
lilo.conf determines the configuration of the boot loader installed by /sbin/lilo. Here's an example
of the contents of /etc/lilo.conf:
$ #

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The first part of the file contains items which apply to the entire LILO configuration:
prompt this means that LILO presents the boot up menu, even if nobody presses the Shift key
during booting up.
timeout=50 50 corresponds to 5 seconds. This allows the user 50 seconds to choose a menu
item, or to change the kernel command line.
default=linux if there is no response for the 5 seconds, the image defined below at label=linux
is loaded into memory.
boot=/dev/hda the first stage boot loader is installed here (as the Master boot record on the first
IDE disk). If this is replaced with /dev/fd0 then /sbin/lilo installs the first stage loader on the
boot sector of the floppy disk. This option can be overridden by running /sbin/lilo as lilo -b /
dev/fd0.
linear This causes LILO to use linear sector addresses instead of sector/head/cylinder addresses
to pinpoint the location of the data files. While this is slightly more reliable with older hardware,
the system may not boot if you install the disk in a different computer (with different BIOS
behaviour). For large disks in combination with an older BIOS, /sbin/lilo may generate
references to parts of the disk that are inaccessible when the system is booted.
These global parameters aren't quite as exciting as the others they could have been left out, in fact,
as they are unchanged from their default settings:
message=/boot/message the contents of this file are displayed when the system boots. In more
recent versions of LILO, this file contains the instructions for the graphical boot menus used by
many distributions.
map=/boot/map this is the file in which the locations of the kernel, and LILO itself are stored.
Generally one does not change this.
install=/boot/boot.b This file contains the data which /sbin/lilo installs in the boot sector.
10 Boot managers
62
This is the part of the file that specifies the loading of a Linux kernel:
' 5 5 ' 5 # G G
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# ! $
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# 5 $
m X ! 9 # 6 5 $ &
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image=/boot/vmlinuz-2.4.18-14 The file /boot/vmlinuz-2.4.18-14 contains a kernel image to be

loaded into memory by LILO.
label=linux this is what you can choose during booting to load the kernel image from /
boot/vmlinuz-2.4.18-14
initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.18-14.img the initial root disk. Most distributions now distribute a
standard kernel without support for vital file systems and hardware (e.g. SCSI controllers).
When these systems are booted, they initially run using a memory disk (file system) which is
loaded from the file specified. After the necessary kernel modules are loaded, booting continues
as normal.
read-only This option is added to the kernel command line, and instructs the system to start up
with the root file system mounted as read-only. The system initialisation scripts will check the
file system while it is mounted read-only before continuing with initialisation.
append="root=LABEL=/" - The text root=LABEL=/ is added to the kernel command line.
This tells the kernel to use the partition labelled as LABEL=/ as the root partition. The regular
way of doing this is to specify root=/dev/hda3 in lilo.conf. You can append a number of
parameters for the kernel command line, such as append="apm=off floppy=nodma
init=/bin/bash". You can see the parameters with which your kernel was booted with cat /
proc/cmdline.
10.2.2 lilo command options

/sbin/lilo installs the boot loader according to the configuration you specified.
Install LILO
To install LILO, you edit /etc/lilo.conf and run /sbin/lilo.

Uninstall LILO
Occasionally, you will want to return to the state of your system as it was before LILO wrecked it.
Happily, LILO keeps a copy of the original sector of each device you install it on (except perhaps
for your floppy disks). If you ask LILO to uninstall itself, it simply copies this sector back to the
device, and the system returns to it's original state.
g i Q R
'R
0 db `
ca
You can also uninstall LILO by reinstalling the boot loader of another operating system. To
reinstall the default boot loader for DOS / Windows 95..ME, the command is
Apa s

b o
LILO boot floppy
If you install LILO on a floppy disk, that floppy disk is able to boot only the computer from which
it was installed. Installing on a floppy makes it possible for you to boot Linux without interferring
with the operation of other operating systems:
S T W S I i Q R
@"4'R
0 db `
ca
10 Boot managers
63
The -b command line option overrides the value specified for boot= in /etc/lilo.conf.
10.2.3 LILO dual boot

Linux and other operating systems can be installed in separate partitions on a single PC. When
booting up, the boot manager decides which operating system to load into memory. The bootloader
that makes the decision can be LILO.
In the lilo.conf given above, the following lines configure LILO to boot another operating system:
C# A !87
5 $
$ # G
%8@
3 @% 3
$
6 5
Most operating systems install their own boot loader at the start of their data partition. Once this
code gets running, the system will start up as designed. All LILO needs to know is which operating
systems can be booted in this way.
If configuring LILO seems hard to you, you can configure boot.ini on a Windows NT system to
load the Linux loader from its partition. If you are using Windows NT, you probably know how to
do this. You must just be sure to install LILO in a Linux partition, rather than all over the master
boot record.
10.3 GRUB
GRUB is the GNU Grand Unified Boot loader. GRUB provides a number of functions which PC
BIOS programs do not:
Provides fully-featured command line and graphical interfaces
Understanding partitions (both DOS and BSD style)
Understanding most file systems
Booting of Linux, BSD and Multiboot-compliant kernels (such as GNU Mach)
GRUB understands enough about partitions and filesystems to find its configuration file grub.conf
without using a map file. GRUB can also boot systems without a configuration file, if the operator
is sufficiently skilled.
10.3.1 /boot/grub/grub.conf
This is the configuration file for GRUB.
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10.3.2 Creating a boot floppy

How about this?
V U S W S S T W S W S
D@"B 0 H"@ `
c $
S T W S ` T Q g R Q Q I ` S
@"68E7"@6T 5S 0 H"@ `
c $
That will copy the kernel image to the floppy, and set the root device encoded in the kernel to /
dev/hda3. The floppy disk is a bootable kernel image. The only problem is that many Linux
distributions require a initial root disk (usually /boot/initrd), so this method is not universally
10 Boot managers
64
successful.
Quiz questions
1. What must be done after editing /etc/lilo.conf to make changes take effect?
2. What is the difference between LILO and GRUB?
3. How would you go about booting up a Linux installation where no boot loader has been
installed?
Assignment
1. Change your boot loader from LILO to GRUB. Install the boot loader on your first hard disk can
create an appropriate configuration file. You should have a rescue system handy when you do
this.
2. Install LILO as your first boot loader (e.g. on /dev/hda), and configure it to load GRUB (e.g.
from /dev/hda3), which in turn loads Linux. This will give you experience in configuring both
GRUB and LILO.
1. Run lilo
2. LILO records absolute sector addresses for the files it loads, while GRUB understand how to
read various filesystems.
3. a) Provide a floppy disk with a kernel image, and supply the correct root device using rdev. b)
Boot off a floppy containing GRUB, and enter the correct parameters to locate the kernel and
root device. c) Boot off a distribution or rescue CDROM, but specify a specific root device on
the kernel command line. d) Boot a rescue system, mount the installed system (e.g. mount /
dev/hda4 /mnt), and change root to the mounted system (chroot /mnt) and then install a boot
loader on a floppy disk or on the hard disk.
11 Installing from source code
65

Life would be so much easier if we could just look at the source code.
Dave Olson
Source code is human readable instructions for what your computer should do with its time. When
your compiler has chewed up your source code, it spits out a binary executable, which is probably
what you want if you were intending to run the program.
You should read up on the following if you are not familiar with them:
downloading files with wget, ftp or a browser
tar and gzip for extracting source code from downloaded archives
editing files with vi
LPIC topic 1.102.3 Make and install programs from source [5]
Weight: 5
Objective:
Candidates should be able to build and install an executable program from source. This
objective includes being able to unpack a file of sources. Candidates should be able to make
simple customizations to the Makefile, for example changing paths or adding extra include
directories.
gunzip
Uncompressing a file using the gzip algorithm
gzip
Compressing a file using the gzip algorithm
bzip2
Use the bzip2 algorithm to do compression
tar
Program for tape archives, and source archives
configure
What you run before make
make
What you run after configure
11.1 Unpacking source distributions

Source code distributions of packages are generally distributed in .tar.gz format (compressed tape
archive). The tool to extract the original files is tar. The exact usage of the command depends on
the format of the archive you are dealing with.
You can first uncompress the file then extract it with tar:
U V i Q f Q Q T i U t $ w
y rb@E E @4%'Pq"@"
U V i Q f Q Q g t $ w
8s y rb@E E @7 E@4q"@"
Alternatively, you can do this in one step with the z switch:
8s y rb@E E @4%hPq"@"
If the file is bzip2 compressed, you can use bunzip2 or the -j switch to tar.
E y rb@E E @4%@Pq"@"

I U V i Q f Q Q T q i U t $ w
y rb@E E @4%'Pq"@"
U V i Q f Q Q g t $ w
8s y rb@E E @7 E@4q"@"
11.2 Compiling programs

Occasionally the program you download will be a simple C program, consisting of a single
executable file. In this case, you can compile it quite simply using cc. The -o switch to cc specifies
X v $ # G $ # G
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R W i i W g T Q V
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The behaviour of GNU autoconf configure scripts can be customized by passing command line
options. Here are some highlights from the help of your average configure script:
11.4 ./configure options

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Most source code is distributed with at least some documentation, and often with too much
documentation. Usually a file named INSTALL or README is included in the tarball, which
describes how to compile the program and the required software and hardware.
Often a program will be distributed with a Makefile. This file contains instructions on how to
compile the program. make relies on these instructions and, in turn, runs the compiler to convert
the source code to binary code.
GNU programs are usually distributed with a script named configure. The task of this script is to
determine the correct contents for and to create the Makefile so that the software can be built.
One of the problems during building software is that often the required libraries and header files are
missing from your system. These need to be installed. On rpm based systems, the -devel package
usually contains the appropriate libraries. You can, of course, download and install the required
libraries too.
If you download a package from the internet, you may find that the following commands produce
an installed version of it for you.
11.3 Simple build and installation

make does a lot more than this, actually. If there is a Makefile present, it can figure out which files
you edited, and only recompile those files.
v
%P!
X v
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r Q Q W r U e ca
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If you can't get used to the idea of using cc directly, you can get make to do it for you:
$ j f l
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b% e a e
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$ j f l
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the output file (instead of the default file name a.out).

66
Source code packages for other Unix systems often work with Linux. However, occasionally there
is a change in a directory name, or a file name which causes a compilation failure. The file to edit
11.5 Editing Makefiles

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If you have previously run configure, you often have to remove the cached results to get it
to work correctly. (Note that the output of configure is a few pages longer than shown
here).
` T W i i W g T Q V
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The default installation prefix is /usr/local, so the programs end up in /usr/local/bin, the man pages
in /usr/local/man, etc. You may prefer to install with a different prefix.
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67
Find, download a source package of your own choice, and install it on your system. If you cannot
find any other download and install the game rocksndiamonds. You can install any libraries
Assignment
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
What is the sequence of commands for unpacking and installing a GNU program from source?
Why must make install be run as root? Are there exceptions to this?
Why should configure and make generally not be run as root?
What options to configure are used to change the installation directory?
How does one add an include directory to a Makefile?
Which file is generated by configure?
Quiz questions
11.6 Review
After these changes the program compiles with the new settings. A side note for this particular
program, it was necessary to run xmkmf before running make, which was explained in the
INSTALL file (quite similar to configure for programs using autoconf).
t |
j 5 7~ w
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t |
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And while we are at it, we'll install in /usr/local/bin rather than in /usr/games (which
doesn't exist on my system). So this ...
t s
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The file /usr/games/lib/jetset/jetset.score.lock is not the ideal value, and we would prefer to
use /usr/share/games/jetset. The file to edit is actually the Imakefile, but we can do as well
by editing Makefile, and changing this ...

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is Makefile, and you should change the offending entry.

If you are busy compiling a jetset willy clone, you may see the following text fly by:
68
69
required by the application from the -devel packages that ship with your distribution. Write
instructions on how to install the application from source on your system, including a list of library
software you installed.
1. tar -zxf file.tar.gz ; ./configure ; make ; su -c "make install"

2. To be able to access the target directories, such as /usr/local/bin. Being root is not necessary if
you have permissions to the destination directory (e.g. ./configure prefix=$HOME)
3. Find the variable listing -Idirectory in the Makefile and add -Iotherdirectory values to it.
4. Usually Makefile
12 Shared libraries
70
12 Shared libraries
Weiner's Law of Libraries:
There are no answers, only cross references.
LPIC topic 1.102.4 Manage shared libraries [3]

Weight: 3
Objective:
Candidates should be able to determine the shared libraries that executable programs depend on
and install them when necessary. Candidates should be able to state where system libraries are
kept.
ldd
Show shared libraries used by a program
ldconfig
Regenerate ld.so.cache
/etc/ld.so.conf
Extra library directories
LD_LIBRARY_PATH
Environment variable for libraries
12.1 Purpose and structure of shared libraries

In Linux, all the really useful functions are done by the kernel. If you choose to write a program
which calls the kernel directly, that's fine and well. Most programmers choose to use the kernel in
pretty much the same ways, and these methods are stored in libraries. The memory used by these
libraries are shared between more than one program, so they are called shared libraries.
When programs are loaded into memory, part of the loading process is to make sure that the
relevant shared libraries10 are loaded when the program loads. If the correct shared libraries are not
available, the program is incomplete, and cannot be run. A library can also require other libraries.
Dependencies between libraries are normal, especially for large applications. A program may use a
graphics library, which in turn uses the X11 library, which in turn uses the C library.
12.2 Using ldd

ldd prints a list of the shared libraries required by a given program or library.

r q e b@X 878B5 e b@X 878
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e
r q j b@z"7878B5 j b@z"7
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h%8 7"PB2db `
The left hand column indicates what the program would like to be linked to (usually no
path name given), and the right hand column shows what the program will actually be
linked to (full path) (often a symbolic link...)
% % !
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! e
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@~ 8

! !
C
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@X f { X e X e "79!!
!
So, bash asked to link to libc.so.6, and it ended up linking to /lib/libc-2.2.93.so.

10 In Microsoft Windows shared libraries are dynamic link libraries (or DLLs), and named WHATEVER.DLL.
12 Shared libraries
71
12.3 Symbol versions

While it is very nice to check that you are loading the correct library, things in the Linux world
change rather quickly, and it is quite convenient if more than one interface for a particular function
is available. This means that older and newer code can continue to work, even if there are changes.
A side effect of this is that the dynamic loader can recognise libraries which are too old and don't
contain all the symbols or contain incompatible implementations.
12.4 Configuring the dynamic linker

The configuration file for the dynamic linker is /etc/ld.so.conf. This contains a list of directories, in
addition to /lib and /usr/lib which contain library files. /sbin/ldconfig updates /etc/ld.so.cache.
Applications can be made to load libraries from directories not listed in /etc/ld.so.conf by setting the
value LD_LIBRARY_PATH. The variable LD_PRELOAD specifies libraries containing symbols
that override symbols in the real libraries. LD_PRELOAD is seldom used except for debugging
and compatibility applications (e.g. SOCKS proxy support).
12.5 Review
Quiz questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Why do shared libraries include version numbers?

Which programs do not include shared libraries?
What is the purpose of LD_PRELOAD?
When is it necessary to run ldconfig?
What is LD_LIBRARY_PATH, and what does it configure?
Where are system libraries found on a Linux system, and what is the purpose of each location?
Assignment
1. Find where the glibc library files are store on your computer.
2. Install either Mozilla or OpenOffice.org. Find the dynamic libraries that are loaded as part of the
application and determine whether these are in the regular library path. Which environment
variables are set during the startup of the application, and what is the actual executable file for
the application?
3. Download and install the a binary of a program dynamically linked against libc5 (or a version of
glibc that you do not have) and make it work. (You will have to download the libraries it links
against, and make them work.)
1. This makes it possible to use new programs together with programs which use older libraries.
2. Including the code from shared libraries would make them bulky, and the system works perfectly
well with the code being shared.
3. This variable can be set to the name of a library which overrides functions from the standard
libraries.
4. It's the search path for the system libraries. It determines which directories are searched when a
dynamic executable is loaded.
12 Shared libraries
72
5. /lib contains libraries required by the system commands in /bin. /usr/lib contains most system
libraries. A complete list of additional directories is in /etc/ld.so.conf, largely for X and its
applications.
13 Debian package management
73

Software suppliers are trying to make their software packages more userfriendly. ... Their best approach, so far, has been to take all the old brochures,
and stamp the words, "user-friendly" on the cover.
Bill Gates, Microsoft, Inc.
Debian (named after Debbie and Ian) is a free Linux distribution. Its package management includes
the aspect of caching packages which are not installed. The cache can be queried, and dependencies
can be automatically determined when installing packages. To really understand this chapter, you
should install Debian in fact, that's one of the assignments.
LPIC topic 1.102.5 Use Debian package management [8]

Weight: 8
Objective:
Candidates should be able to perform package management skills using the Debian package
manager. This objective includes being able to use command-line and interactive tools to install,
upgrade, or uninstall packages, as well as find packages containing specific files or software
(such packages might or might not be installed). This objective also includes being able to obtain
package information like version, content, dependencies, package integrity and installation status
(whether or not the package is installed).
unpack
dpkg first unpacks the files from a package
configure
What dpkg does after unpacking the packages
/etc/dpkg/dpkg.cfg
Configuration for dpkg
/var/lib/dpkg/*
dpkg database of installed packages
/etc/apt/apt.conf
Configuration file for apt
/etc/apt/sources.list
Source location for apt
dpkg
Debian package installer
dselect
Debian package selection tool
dpkg-reconfigure
Debian package configuration
apt-get
Debian download tool
alien
Debian package import / export
13.1 Debian and .deb

The Debian distribution uses its own form of binary packaging to distribute software.
convention for Debian package file names is
The
I 3 %! "86'% G

W S $ # 6 & $
Here's how it looks in practice. The particular FTP server in the example lists Debian Linux i386
and Debian hurd-i386 packages.
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Debian packages contain the following:

A description of the package (including the list of files)
Packages or capabilities that this package requires
The binary files to be installed
Scripts which should be run before and after installation (and package removal).
The following dpkg operations are the most commonly used for installing and querying installed
packages:
dpkg -i package.deb install the package file (like rpm -i package.rpm).
dpkg -r package remove an installed package (like rpm -e package).
dpkg -L package list the files installed with a package (like rpm -ql package).
dpkg -S file search the list of installed files for the pattern given (similar to rpm -qf file, but
more like rpm -qla | grep file).
These dpkg options allow you finer control over when the package you install is configured.
dpkg --unpack package.deb install the package, but dont configure it. The package can be
configured later with dpkg-reconfigure.
dpkg --configure package configure an installed package.
Reconfiguring packages
After a package has been installed it is usually configured automatically by apt (see further on). If
the configuration is incorrect, dpkg-reconfigure reconfigures an installed package. dpkgreconfigure is most often used for reconfiguring the X server, or the mail server.
13.2 apt
apt maintains the cache of packages that can be installed.
apt-cache search searchstring Show information about packages containing the name given
apt-get update Connect to the apt sources listed in /etc/apt/sources.list and determine the
current versions of cached packages.
apt-get install package install a package listed in the cache. The dependencies for the package
are also installed.
apt-get upgrade upgrade all out of date packages to the current versions as known from the
cache.
For complete information on apt, read to the man pages for apt-get and apt-cache.
13.3 Review
Quiz questions
1. What makes Debian package management unique?
75
2. How do you use dpkg to do the following functions:

install a package
obtain package information for an installed package
obtain package information for a package file
remove a package
find out which package owns a given file
find out whether a package is installed
3. How do you use apt-cache to:
find a package that is not installed?
find the full description of a package based on its contents?
4. How do you use apt-get to
install a package?
install a package together with its dependencies?
Assignment
1. Obtain and install Debian.

2. Configure or reconfigure your X server using dpkg-reconfigure. You will need to find the
package name of the X server using apt-cache first.
3. Find a great game using apt-cache, and install it using apt-get. Heroes is quite fun.
4. Use apt-get to check whether there are any upgrades available for your installed distribution.
1. It is possible to install a package together with its dependencies.

2. dpkg ...
dpkg -i package.deb (install)
An exercise to the reader :)
dpkg -I package.deb (information)
dpkg -r package (remove)
dpkg -S `pwd`/filename (search)
dpkg -s package (status)
3. apt-cache search string ; apt-cache show package
4. apt-get install package ; apt-get install package
14 RPM Redhat package manager
76
14 RPM Redhat package

manager
Of course it doesn't work. We've performed a software upgrade.
BOFH excuses from the fortune cookie database
For this chapter, it is helpful to have a RPM based Linux distribution. Examples of these are
RedHat (surprisingly), Mandrake and SuSE.
LPIC topic 1.102.6 Use Red Hat Package Manager (RPM) [8]
Weight:8
Objective
Candidates should be able to perform package management under Linux distributions that use
RPMs for package distribution. This objective includes being able to install, re-install, upgrade,
and remove packages, as well as obtain status and version information on packages. This
objective also includes obtaining package information such as version, status, dependencies,
integrity, and signatures. Candidates should be able to determine what files a package provides,
as well as find which package a specific file comes from.
Key files, terms, and utilities include
/etc/rpmrc
rpm configuration file
/usr/lib/rpm/*
rpm database of installed packages
rpm
rpm command line tool
grep
grep is useful for searching output of rpm -qa
14.1 Purpose of RPM

Not everyone enjoys compiling source code, or has the inclination to trawl the net to find out what
the latest version of each package in existence is. For people like this, there are binary packages
such as used by the Redhat Package Manager (RPM), containing only the executable files,
customised11 for the distribution you are running. Distributions using RPM packaging include
RedHat, SuSE and Mandrake.
When you install a RPM package, rpm does the following for you:
Check that the necessary libraries and programs are installed on your system. If these are not, it
will complain bitterly, and you won't get much further.
Copy files from the package on your file system the program binaries (which end up bin
directories or in opt), configuration files (which typically end up in /etc) and some
documentation (e.g. man pages)
Run a post-installation script to make sure that the package is configured with some basic
functionality (optionally).
In addition to this, rpm keeps track of the packages that are installed, and what they contain.
11 RPM packages are frequently compatible between Linux distributions.
77
14.2 RPM database

rpm keeps track of the files which are installed on your system as part of rpm packages. This
database is stored in /var/lib/rpm. For each package, the following information is available:
The name, version number and revision number of the package
A long description of the package
A list of the files installed by the package, together with their original timestamps and MD5
checksums.
The dependencies required by this package, and provided by this package.
Scripts to be run before and after installation and package removal.
14.3 RPM functions

Here's the brief rundown of rpm functions (excluding query):
Command
Package
Operations on rpm package files
rpm -i package.rpm
Install a package
rpm -U package.rpm
Upgrade a package to a newer version
Operations on installed packages
rpm -e package
Erase an installed package
rpm -V package
Verify what has changed since a package was installed
14.3.1 Querying the database and package files

The RPM query command can query either installed packages or (with the -p switch) packages
which have not been installed. Here's the usage of the rpm query command:
rpm -q -[lRi] [ -p package.rpm | -f /some/file | package-name ]
You tell rpm what you want to see:
-l list the files in the package
-R list the requirements
-i show information
There are three ways of specifying the package you want information on:
-p package.rpm a particular rpm file which you have available.
-f /some/file a file which belongs to a particular package
package-name an installed package (either the short name, or the name and the version)
Here are some specific ways to use the query function:
Query an installed package:
rpm -qi package
Query information of a package
rpm -ql package
Query file list of a package
rpm -q package
Query package name
Query a package file:
rpm -qip package.rpm Query information of a package file
rpm -qlp package.rpm Query file list of a package file
rpm -qp package.rpm Query package name for a package file
Query a file which is part of an installed rpm:
rpm -qif /some/file
Query information of a package owning /some/file
rpm -qlf /some/file
Query file list of a package owning /some/file
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rpm -U will install a package if it is not currently installed. If it is installed, it will be upgraded.
rpm -F will upgrade a package provided it is already installed.
Here's an example of upgrading sendmail on a SuSE Linux system
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When you install a package with rpm, it does the following:

Checks dependencies (all the things that are required should be there)
Checks for conflicts (is there anything in the way)
Extracts the binary files (and the documentation and configuration files)
Runs post-installation scripts
When installing a package here are some options you may use:
-i install
-v verbose
-h hashes indicating progress
--nodeps no dependencies (i.e. just try it, even though it will not work).
Here's how you install a package:
14.3.2 Install and upgrading packages

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Here's an example of what you see for rpm -qi
Query an installed package:

rpm -qf /some/file
Query package name owning /some/file
78
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Before the downloaded update is installed, we check whether it was signed by SuSE's
packaging key, and then install it with rpm -F.
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14.3.3 Erase a package

When you are tired of a package, you can erase it with rpm -e. You can either specify the full
package name with the version number, or just the package name.
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14.4 RPM integrity checking

The RPM database in /var/lib/rpm stores the checksums for each file that was installed by RPM.
This allows one to verify what has changed since package installation. rpm -V prints out a letter for
each file, depending on the changes.
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D Device major/minor number mis-match
L readLink(2) path mis-match
U User ownership differs
G Group ownership differs
T mTime (modification time) differs
? unable to check (e.g. permission denied)
14.5 Review
Quiz questions
1. Which command will list the files that will be installed from the package bogus-10.1.rpm?
2. Which commands will enable you to identify the author of lilo given the file /sbin/lilo was
installed as part of an rpm package?
3. Which flag for rpm -q specifies that you wish to query an installed package by specifying a file
installed by that package?
4. What is the configuration file for rpm?
5. What does the rpm database of installed packages contain?
80
6. How can grep be used together with rpm?

7. How does one check that an rpm file has not been tampered with since it was packaged?
Assignment
1. Find out which rpm package owns the file /bin/cut. Read the package information for this
package. What other files are included in the package?
2. Verify all rpm packages that are installed on your system. Did you personally make all the
changes that are listed?
3. Use rpm from the command line to install a game that is available on your distribution media.
You should find a game for which a number of libraries are required. Find out what the
dependencies for the package are, and install packages to satisfy the dependencies as well.
4. Download an updated RPM for a package you have installed from your distribution's FTP site.
Check the signature and checksum of the package you downloaded, and upgrade the installed
package to the downloaded version.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
rpm -qlp bogus-10.1.rpm

rpm -qif /sbin/lilo
-f
/etc/rpmrc
Information about each package, and about each installed file.
rpm -qa | grep package ; rpm -ql package | grep bin ; and more
rpm --checksig package.rpm
15 Work on the command line
81

Linux: the operating system with a CLUE...
Command Line User Environment
seen in a posting in comp.software.testing
LPIC topic 1.103.1 Work on the command line [5]

Weight: 5
Objective
Candidate should be able to interact with shells and commands using the command line. This
includes typing valid commands and command sequences, defining, referencing and exporting
environment variables, using command history and editing facilities, invoking commands in the
path and outside the path, using command substitution, applying commands recursively through
a directory tree and using man to find out about commands.
.
The current directory
bash
What you bash your commands into
echo
echo
env
Show environment variables
exec
Run and dont return
export
Add a variable to the export list
man
Manual pages
pwd
Print working directory
set
Show environment settings
unset
Clear an environment variable
~/.bash_history
The last n commands you typed
~/.profile
What runs when you login interactively
15.1 Command line overview

The default command line on most Linux systems is /bin/bash the Bourne Again Shell (an
enhanced version of the Bourne Shell /bin/sh). For bash executes programs on your system for
each command that you enter on the command line.
Here are some rules to live by when typing on the command line:
Press Enter a lot If you type something, the computer will only act on it if you press Enter (the
return key). Until you press Enter nothing happens.
Press Ctrl+C If you have a bad feeling about what the computer is doing in response to your
last command, press Ctrl+C. This sends a INTerrupt signal to the program that is currently
running.
Press Tab a lot The bash shell used by most Linux distributions has a handy feature that will
type the rest of commands and file names for you. Together with the help, you get a lot of
annoying beeps.
Press Ctrl+Z, type bg If you are running a process that takes a while, and you want to let it
run, press Ctrl+Z to stop it, then type bg and press Enter to get it into the background.
Press Shift+PgUp You can view the last few screens of text that flew off the top of the display
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Here are a couple of examples of commands.
Commands

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If the prompt ends with # then you are logged in as root. If the prompt ends with $ then you are
logged in as a regular user.
An important concept on the command line is the working directory. The working directory can be
changed using cd (change directory) and displayed using pwd (print working directory). On most
systems, the working directory is displayed as part of the prompt.
File names, by default, are relative to the working directory. Commands like ls and du display
information for the working directory.
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The prompt in bash is programmable. The usual values tell you the name of the machine you are
using (sometimes your user name too) and which directory you are in (either the last part of the
directory name, or the whole path name):
The prompt and working directory
15.2 Command line structure

by pressing Shift+PgUp a few times (this is a terminal function, not a bash function, actually).
82
83
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Each command that bash runs may be passed a number of optional parameters (arguments). Each
argument is separated from the next argument by a space (or spaces, or tabs).
Command
argv[2]
la
ls
argv[1]
/bin
Command line options
Most commands take switches, which is a command line argument which starts with a dash.
command -x A single letter command line option tells a command to behave slightly
differently. For example, to ask ls to use the long format, the command is ls -l. Some of the
more commonly used one-character flags are shown in the table.
Flag
-l
-v
-f
-r
-R
Meaning
Long format
Verbose
Force
recursive
Recursive
Used with
ls
cp
ln, cp, mv, rm
grep
chown, chmod, ls
-xyz For most command which accept single character flags, you can join the flags together in
any order. As a result, the following are equivalent:
--option Many commands allow you to specify options in a more understandable format
(although more keyboard intensive). A common and useful example is --help. Another common
option is verbose.
filename Most commands expect you to specify the name of a file or directory to work with.
These commands include cp, mv and cd. Remember that ../ means the previous directory, ./
means the current directory, and ~/ means your home directory.
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i i f i i U e ca
I U f V U T V i U e ca
7"8s gr 8ID7F2db
7"I8s U fr V8I4RTip7 8!i'fEI WhiW W7F2db
g U W i
i
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7R%'i 2db
W i
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t U i i e ca
2W'8VW 7 p D2db
t i e ca
G p D2db
R R U i i f R e ca
@4B2db
U i f R e ca
@4B2db
f W V W f i T Q i
EE'87 7 7AEE'iV
Q V i Y f W V W f W
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
D2db `
V e ca
15.3 Environment variables

The shell environment contains values called environment variables which can be displayed and
changed. Many applications use environment variables, and you can also use them in your own
scripts. The set command displays the current values of all environment variables. The env
command shows a list of the exported environment variables.
To change the value of an environment variable, you can use the syntax
$ 6 5 w w
b"% % 't w u
Other applications which use environment variables for customising their behaviour include less
(the pager), ssh (secure shell), cvs (concurrent versioning system), make (for compiling programs),
man (system manual pages) and startx (uses the WINDOWMANAGER environment variable to
choose the desktop system to use).
#
8%B#
$ #
@P 7
G
R e ca
%7B2db `
b P D2db `
Q W e ca
R
E7` b 2db `
e ca
#
8%B#
$
@ 7
G
R e ca
%7B2db `
$ 6
H"P 1 t s
b A57% b 4 D2db `
t f W g R U
Q V W e ca
The behaviour of many commands can be customised by setting (and exporting) shell variables as
listed on the man pages of the application.
The lpq command shows the print queue for the current printer. The current printer is set
using the PRINTER environment variable.
5 t
X f 8@! f 787" "1
#
8 ` $ 3 % 8 % 3 % t ~ #
vX t & 5
v X
% t8 % 3 az%@!% P7s B 1 #
&
v v 5 ~ t
5 &
% t ~ 1 ~ t }
# w
3 x # ` 7E& xb@E7$E& x azE @E& "5 w
$
! &
# $ 6
3 ""%7~
$ # 5 }
& 5
8@ 1
$
9sXbXb b ` % 1 ~ }
X 5 w
# w } ~
t s
hh 5 78%1 7~
t |

@$ ` 5 w } "1 B
S U W
D2db `
W e ca
The command env displays a list of all the exported environment variables. These are the variables
that are passed from the shell to applications when the applications are executed.
e ca
2db `
~ w B w } ~
B~ @s ~ 7~
u u t f u u Q V W e ca
% %%6A2% %%69 D2db `
u u W f g e ca
% %%6H'2db `
$ v $ ! & # G ~ w B w } ~
"G 7! 3 %# 3 "8@@ 8787" DB~ @s ~ 7~
u u t f u u Q V W e ca
% %%6A2% %%69 D2db `
To remove a variable, you use the command unset.
Y ` e ca
%8 2db
S e ca
2db
S V e ca
D2db
U ` e ca
%8 2db
W g%D87"@9 I%4Q@T5 VUW'f 7
f f W
ER D2db
W e ca
pqPysD!%2db
t
g p ` e ca
} 7 P!%2db
} ` e ca
t Q V W e ca
% D2db
u D2db
t Q V W e ca
t Q V W e ca
D2db
Q V W e ca
4 D2db
D2db
u t Q V W e ca
4 D2db
u Q V W e ca
f f W W f e ca
ER 'H2db
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
`
The following commands relate to setting environment variables.

84
85
15.4 Editing commands and command history

Bash has a number of command editing features which can speed up your work and give you fewer
headaches than you would otherwise suffer from:
Editing keys while you are typing a command, you can use Backspace to erase what you have
typed, and you can also move the cursor within the line (left and right arrows). You can jump to
the beginning of the line (Ctrl+A) and to the end of the line (Ctrl+E) and cancel the entire
operation (Ctrl+C).
Tab command and file name completion (if you press Tab, bash will complete the file name for
you, and if you press Tab again, bash will show a list of all the options).
Up and Down arrows to show the previous command you typed in, you press the Up arrow.
You can then edit this command with the editing keys.
Ctrl+R history search (press Ctrl+R, type something you typed previously, then Enter or Esc).
15.5 $PATH
When you enter a command, bash searches for the executable program in a number of directories.
The places bash searches are specified in the PATH environment variable.
# # #
# $ #
"@87" a " j 8 7" a "7" a "a "@" % 3
&
D2db `
u t Q V W e ca
One of the places that bash does not search by default is the current directory usually. Some
distributions do include the current directory in the path (spot the difference).
# #
a " 8 % 3 a "@87" a " j 8 7" a "7" a "
# t & # $ #
P4da
u t Q V W
c #
15.6 Command substitution $(...) and `...`

Some commands say interesting things that you want to be able to include as parameters to other
commands. The command substitution operators allow you to include the output of a command in
another command.
3 $"#"ab$% %& 3 a 3 E'~ # a yh a yh a b%

&
a $
Syf%8V PSRUW @2db `
f U W
W e ca
$
%
U Q e ca
"@2db `
It's much easier like using substitution:
3 ""b% % 3 a
$ # a $ &
S f f U W
y%8V
3 ""b% % 3 a
$ # a $ &
S f f U
y%8V
3 E'~ # a yh a yh a b%

&
a $
U Q t W e ca
"@ % @2db `
3 E'~ # a yh a yh a b%

&
a $
W h U Q h
dh"@dq @2db `
W e ca
15.7 Recursive commands

Recursion in terms of Linux commands refers to applying a command to a all the files in a
directory, and all the files in all the subdirectories (and subdirectories of subdirectories). Some
commands, such as ls, chown, chmod, cp, rm and grep support switches of either -R or -r.
For commands that do not have a recursive mode of operation, you can combine the command with
find to achieve your results.
15.7.1 -r switch
A common switch is -r which means recusive. To understand recursion, you must first understand
86
recursion. Here are some commands that support this kind of recursion:
chown -R change ownership
chmod -R change file mode (permissions)
cp -r copy files and subdirectories.
rm -r remove files and subdirectories
grep -r grep in files and directories.
15.7.2 cp -r
Here's how you can use cp to copy a directory:
Y W i
V P7p V {
This will create a copy of etc in your home directory. Of course it's not a very good copy, since the
permissions will change, and symbolic links will be updated. Often what you want is cp -a (archive
copy) instead of cp -r.
15.7.3 chown and chmod

To change ownership recursively, the simplest thing to do is to use the -R switch. There are, of
course a number of other ways to do it:
G X @"4@5 3
! # C
! # C
8@8@y8@y2G X @"4@5 3
G X @"B 3 4%$ X `
# C
#
' ' 1 ) # C !
$hGwG X @"B 3 B nX `
#
Using xargs will fail if there are filenames containing whitespace (i.e. spaces, tabs and newlines)
The last example uses shell globbing and will miss all hidden files and only go to three direcories
deep.
chmod is very similar to chown in recursive usage:
g e q %8 7T
Q S Q V f U
S
c
%g e q B 7p 7T
Q S Q V V W W i
S
g e V
Q
i S Q
15.7.4 grep -r
grep includes an option for recusively reading the contents of each file in a directory. There are
other ways to do this as well:
}c } R R g W S } V Q } W V W W i T W i W S
yl" % % y( q 7H9@V P7T
V % y7p
W } V Q } i
W
The first example of using grep -r will fail if there is a FIFO in the /etc directory, unless some
application helpfully closes the other side of the FIFO after grep opens its side.
Using grep with find is safer, but to force grep to print out the names of the files it finds, you need
to specify /dev/null as a dummy file to search.
15.7.5 find for recursive commands

cat is an example of a command that does not have a recursive function. We can use the recursive
functionality of find to achieve what we want to. find ... -exec can execute a specific command
each time a file is found, or the output of find can list file names on the command line.
%89@V P7T
U V f U T W i
W S
h W T W i S Th U
V 9@7u V
c
% B 7H9@V P7T
U V V W W i T W i
W S
87
Using the parameter -type f to find ensures that we only consider regular files. Of course, find can
use many other criteria to identify files, such as their name, permissions, modification date and
more. find is discussed more fully in another chapter.
15.8 Bash session

During a login session, bash does a number of special things for you:
At the beginning of the session, the file ~/.profile is run automatically. Any special commands
you place in this file are run whenever you log in.
At the end of the session, all the commands you entered are added to the file ~/.bash_history.
Sometimes the contents of ~/.profile will include the exec command which replaces the shell with a
particular application. If you put this in a users ~/.profile, that user will automatically run pine
when logging in interactively.
W I f g V W
7" 7"'P W
15.9 Man pages

Most commands have manual pages which are accessed with the man command. The way to access
these is
# $ & & # # $
E5@E&
# $ & & # $
E5E&
The following sections are used in the Linux man page system
Section 1 User Commands (important commands like ps, ls and ln)
Section 2 System Calls (for programming)
Section 3 Subroutines (for programming)
Section 4 Devices
Section 5 File Formats (like passwd, hosts_access, shadow, inittab)
Section 6 Games
Section 7 Miscellaneous
Section 8 System Administration (like fsck, ping and reboot)
Section 9 Kernel
Section n New
For introductory use, sections 1,5 and 8 provide the most useful information.
15.10 Review
Quiz questions
1. What command will bash attempt to run for the following example:
W W R W Q R R W
@2B7%4% {
2. What is the command to create an environment variable called EXAMPLE and set its value to
"Hello there"?
3. Why will the following code print a blank line?
} W R U W t } Q V
"@8 @ W
} W W Q R R W } `
2%yP8 u g
4. What is the effect of having a "." in the PATH environment variable, and why is this not good
practice?
5. How do you set an environment variable (MYNAME) to contain the contents of a file
88
(/etc/HOSTNAME)?
6. Write a command that will copy the files and subdirectories from /etc to ~/etcbackup.
Assignment
1. Create a directory named testdir in your home directory. Copy /usr/bin/vi to ~/testdir/myeditor
and run it from the command line without modifying the PATH environment variable. Now add
the directory to your PATH environment variable, and verify whether you have modified the
PATH environment variable correctly by running the command myeditor.
2. Use the echo command to show the current value of the SHELL environment variable. What
happens if you run exec $SHELL? (Use echo $$ to show your current process ID before
and after running exec).
3. Set the variable HELLO to the value Hello world. Run a sub-shell (i.e. run bash). Is the value
of HELLO still set? Exit from the sub-shell and run a command which will make HELLO
available to sub-shells.
4. Modify your ~/.profile so that the output of the date command is stored in the shell variable
LOGIN_TIME. Log in at the console and verify whether the variable was set when you logged
in.
5. Read the bash man page. Pay special attention to the SHELL GRAMMAR and QUOTING
sections.
1. bash runs the command hello with the first parameter help the second me and the third
type .
2. The command is
} W W Q R R W } `
2%yP8 u g
3. Environment variable names are case sensitive.

4. . is the current directory. This means that the shell will search for commands in the current
directory. It is not good practice, since the current directory may include undesirable files that
you do not necessarily want to run.
5. To set the variable and display its value:
} u t } Q V
a 7 W
}h u
n V F aP8
W U Vh } ` u
6. This would do it ...
g V U W Y W U i
r 8I V 7V D@p V
16 Text filters
89
16 Text filters
cat > /dev/null
# bash: sorry, no pets

~/.signature
To do bash scripting, you have to know how to filter your text.
LPIC topic 1.103.2 Process text streams using filters [6]

Weight: 6
Objective
Candidate should be able to apply filters to text streams. Tasks include sending text files and
output streams through text utility filters to modify the output, and using standard UNIX
commands found in the GNU textutils package.
cat
Show a file
cut
Cut a column out of the input
expand
Convert tabs to spaces
fmt
Do word wrapping and line wrapping
head
Show the top of the input
join
Text database join
nl
Number the lines of output
od
Octal dump (and other formats)
paste
Merge lines of files side by side
pr
Text to text conversion for printing
sed
Stream editor
sort
Sort the lines in the input
split
Create lots of little files from the input
tac
Print the input backwards
tail
Show the end of the input
tr
Translate character sets
unexpand
Convert spaces to tabs
uniq
Remove duplicates after sort
wc
Count words, characters and lines in the input
16.1 Introduction
Text filters are commands which receive a stream of data in, and send out a stream of modified
data. The filters either select, sort, reformat, or summarise the data that they receive. Text filters
are at the heart of UNIX shell scripting.
When using the text filtering commands, some of the more interesting files to play around with are
these, which you are fairly sure to have on your system:
/etc/services list of TCP/IP service numbers
/etc/passwd list of users on your system
/etc/protocols list of IP based protocols
/etc/profile default login script
/etc/inittab configuration file for init.
16 Text filters
90
Here's a brief rundown of the commands which will be discussed in this chapter.
cat concatenate files (or just show a single file without alteration)
cut cut chosen text out of each line of a file and display it.
expand expand tabs into spaces
fmt reformat a text file with a consistent right margin
head show the first few (10) lines of a file
join join lines of two files on a common field
nl print the file with numbered lines
od octal dump of a file (or hexadecimal).
paste print a number of files side by side
pr format for printing (split into pages or columns and add headers)
sed stream editor (search and replace, append, cut, delete and more)
sort sort in alphabetical order (and numerical order too)
split split a single input into multiple files
tac print the lines of a file from back to front (backwards cat)
tail print the last few lines of a file
tr character translation (e.g. upper case to lower case).
unexpand convert spaces to tabs (unlike expand).
uniq remove duplicate lines from a sorted file
wc word count (and line count, and byte count)
Other textutils programs
A more complete list of GNU textutils programs is this ...
C # # $ # $ $ & G
ED%P"G P@8HPP579"'9@ 7 $ 3 84G
&
G
$ G # & & # t $
@"FP%H7 h %PH 3 ` %& ` "G BH"'pp7"H

# $ G & & & v $
T g Q f p t fp S W f I W f R g R i
k"'hi'7"B q8 W F%Wp De
The programs we are not discussing in this section are:

comm compare two files sorted line by line
csplit split a file into sections determined by context lines
fold wordwrapping (similar to fmt -s -80)
ptx produce a permuted index of file contents
cksum calculate a CRC checksum for files
md5sum compute and check MD5 message digest (checksum)
sha1sum - compute and check SHA1 message digest (checksum)
16.2 Input and output redirection

Bash makes it possible to redirect the input and output of a command. Normally the input comes
from the keyboard (and is ended by pressing Ctrl+D), while the output and any errors are displayed
on the screen. Using redirection you can change the input of a process, its output, and the
destination of the errors.
Redirection
Effect of redirection
command < file
Command reads input from a file
command > file
Output of command goes to file
command 2> file
Errors from the command go to a file
command >> file
Output of a command is added to a file
f
m
%7pG @p7E8gz%H ` e a m e a Pl

$ G $ & G a $

G
e
m

%7pG @9 %kz%H ` e a m e a Pl
$ v a $

G
e
m

%7pG @9 E'pz%H ` e a m e a Pl
$ a $

G
Q R Q Q I Q R U S U W
E%P 0 db
ca
w
w
w
`
By default head prints out the first 10 lines of a file.

head print out the first lines

3

"WRTDWRTP"H D5 db
W R T U V e G & ca

3
W R T U V e G & ca
H D5 db

W R T U V e G & ca
"H D5 db

`
3
3

3
`
W R T W W Q V W e G & ca
2q2 D5 db `
W R T Q R R W Q V W e G & ca
"2q%4 D5 db `
cat can also join a number of files together. This works for text files and binary files.
7 3 %& X 8@88@8'%" ` p

# # # $ # G $ 6
! &

y
j y
7%%C X 8@88@8'%" ` p
v # # $ # G $ 6
! &

7$dX 8@88@8'%" ` p

# # $ # G $ 6
! &

yy

7% 3 X 8@88@8'%" ` p
# # $ # G $ 6
! &

yy
e %# @"% 8787"
6 # ! # #
h
# ! # #
H"% 8787" H@8
!

yyy

{ e

{ h

@!
0
# #
7 3 %& X
# $ x v # x $ # x
nY7%%C X nY7dX nY7% 3 X 54887% 3
# # G v
0
0
t

5 1 Ew
#"C# 787" a #"a #"'%a "'%7" a "7" } @s

# # 5 1 w
3 %"%7~
# 5 }
I U Q V W U V e ca
@ V F D2db `
cat prints out an entire file.
cat - concatenate
16.3 Selecting parts of a file

Q R Q W f f W R
%EBe
Q R Q
%W d EBe
f f W R
f W
fER "WqV B @e
t W V Q W
R R W t W V Q W
"gSWqV B @e
Q%WPWW@U8 8@8 8e
R Q
W R T Q S U Q V S U I
p f S W
htyp'fyf%U8V F De
S f W U V
W R
T5 WR 4Be
U i f R
W R
T d De
U V
W R T f R
2Be
Work through these commands to experience redirection for yourself.

Redirection
command > file 2>&1

command >& file
command &> file
Output and errors go to a file
command1 | command2
Output from command1 is input for command2
16 Text filters
91
a & $a
a
$
da e a e a
#
a "a a

a a
75g y%8V P
i V i V S f f U W S U W
f a $
a &
a %
# & $
a a "
#
a b
a
0 db `
ca
Cut can be used to select certain columns of the input stream. Columns can be defined by either
their position, or by being separated by field separators.
cut can select a certain set of data:
cut pull out columns
tail can be used to watch a file as it grows. Run the command tail -f /var/log/messages on one
console and then log in on another virtual console.
tail -n 20 file or tail -20 file will show the last 20 lines of a file. tail -c 20 file will show the last 20
characters of a file.
e 3 yE 8G f X X X
h e
&
` B ` @" F8@ w i( @e y 3 9 ` a f a 4l G w

v G G
a j f e

e

&
"6 @

xbt5@"B ` @ 8@pa e % '"gi( h { e P ` @f a { e a 4l G w

$ #
# & $ G a
& v

l
r f X X X q f X X X ` ni( @%e y f @87H ` a e a 4l G w
&
# # a j f e
G G

m

r f X X X q f X X X ` ni( %%e y f @87H ` hh a j e a 4l G w
&
# # a h f e
G G

e e
h

r X X X q X X X ` ni( m e y f @87H ` h a j e a 4l G w
&
# # a
G G

e e

r X X X q X X X ` ni( j e y f @87H ` j a j e a 4l G w
&
# # a
G G

& $ #
%'%P@8 3 X X X
m j

8H# t 86 H$ s i( h P ` a e a 4l G w
$ #
# # #
a h & v

3 P"6
$

j
h

l a hj a e ab$a m a { X X X HB %@s s } b87 3 B ` %f a { a 4l G w
# s w
a G

3 P" l a j a ba m a
h
e a $
$ 6
j

& ` { X X X ` 1 %6 s s } b87 3 B ` f a { a 4l G w

~ |
a G

X
b ` 8@HF8@ { A b87 3 B ` f a { a 4l G w
$ $

a G

f W U f f W Q R U R U
EEE% 0 b ` w
a

tail is just like head, but it shows the tail end of the file. Quite often it is used for viewing the end of
a log file:
tail show the end of a file
l
& e a 4l
e

G w hh

! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
I U i f
FR 4R 0 db `
ca
I U S W S
Fy d 7 0 db `
V i S U W
ca
One can also use head to extract an exact number of bytes from an input stream (rather than lines).
Here's how to get a copy of the partition sector of a disk (be careful with that redirection).

6
@
$
$

8
#
"
m ea
m ea
h
%f a
h
Ee a
{ a
m
Pl
m
Pl

2
4l
h
B e
G
G
#$
#
$
@
w e { m
w m
l m
zG m e
zyj {
j {

4 j
! !
% %
C
% %

e
! !
C
% %

h
! !
C
% %

f
! !
C
% %

e
! !
C
e f $
e
i S U W i f R e ca
'R 4B2db `
head can print out a specific number of lines from a file or a stream.
4"G 8@" zkz E'9

5 X # v a
HB ` 3 %79 Y7 db87H

a G 6 a G
47E'zkz E'9
5 X # v a
G ` G b%$ ` dX ` 7bkz E'9
5
X # X 6 G X # a
4E ` 77bkz E'9
5 $ C
G X 6 G X # a

%7 b%9%gb% E'z%P
a # # # & # | a # X

%7 @E'8 ` P%vb% E'z%P
a &
G # # a # X
`
`
j l
hh a e
j ea m e
l
a e
l
a e
l
a e
l
a e
l
a e
`
jhh
jhh
jhh
jhh
j
hh
`
`
m
a Pl
m
a Pl
m
a Pl
m
a Pl
m
a Pl
m
a Pl
m
a Pl
G
G
G
G
G
G

G
w
w
w
w
w
w
16 Text filters
92
W R T W t i U U V e $ # C ca
"FA%8P D2% db `
e h
$ ! $
"G { a 4l

G w 'i j e
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
m l e
$ ! $
"G { a 4l

G w j f
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
m l e
$ ! $
7"G { a 4l

G w j f
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
m l e
$ $ ! $
"G { a 4l

G w j f
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
t i U U i f R e $ # C ca
%8FR 4B2% db `
i U U i W U f i
%88s ' y"78@"@ @9y%'5@"hH2% db `
Q U r V I i R f e $ # C ca
Here's how to use cat to recombine the parts (and using md5sum to check whether the
whole is equal to the sum of the parts).
e h
$ m a 4l

G w 'i j e
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
m l e

$ m a 4l

G w j f
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
m l e
7$ m a 4l

G w j f
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
m l e
$
$ m a 4l

G w j f
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
t U i f R e $ # C ca
SFR 4B2% db `
U i W U f i
8s ' y"78@"@ @9y%'5@"hH2% db `
Q U r V I i R f e $ # C ca
9 $ j
%X dX hh X
j h
e
! 9 # ! & # l m e
%%$ "$ f a 4e h%f
&

&

! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
U i W U f i
8s ' y"78@"@ @BR 4B2% db `
Q U U i f R e $ # C ca
Split can split files into more manageable parts, e.g. for FTP uploads. The parts can be recombined
with cat.
m { e
l
l j
hh
$
{ m {
{ f
e
e
$ j e
3 $ h e
e
m
@f
j
j
l
l j
@f
j
j
@$ m e
f
e e
f
j
j
` $ m e
e h
'%f
j
j

$ e

h l
Ee
j
j
$ e
f
m
j e
j
j

$ %e
e j f
f h
%f
j
j
7$ @e
m h
f
j
j
$
$ h e
t V e ca
S42db `
f W V W f W
EE'iV R 5@"hH2db `
i R f e ca
Split can be used to split a file into multiple parts. If you have a desire to print /etc/services you
may want to print it on a printer which prints 66 lines per page.
split split a file into multiple parts
e
a m zE&
a $
a a ` %8G
` C
a l b$ 3
a
a j a 3
# C
a h z%'
a #
l Y7
a a G
a &
a f $
e a e a %
# & $
a a "
#
a b
a
V T i S i V S f f U W S U W
i rHp75g y%8V P 0 db `
ca
cut can also select based on fields which are separated from each other by field separators. This is
useful in dealing with files like /etc/passwd where each field is separated from the others by a
colon.
$ e
E& a a
a a a a

$ 3 a a
a a ja a
%'a a
#
$ 6 a G
"Y7a
m a zE&
a $
` C
` %8G
l a b$ 3
a
# C
3
h a z%'
a #
l a Y7
a a G
16 Text filters
93
l
l
{ { m
f h h j e
h l j h h
h f
4hh hh { ypyh yBiyh y5%yh yh yh B{ 2 m
{ Bhh yh m l f e @HH5f { 2m 2j Ee F844l 22
j
m f l f e f
e e e h
f e
e
T g i Q f T i S i V S f f U W U V e ca
k"'5'Pp75g y%8V F D2db `
Here's the same command pipeline, but we are removing duplicates with uniq before
formatting.
{ { m m l
j e
h l j h h
h f
fhh4hh hh { ypyh yBiyh y5%yh yh yh B{ 2 4l l { j
m l f e @HH5f { 2m 2j Ee F844l 22BBBBB
m f l f e f
e e e h
f e
e
T i Q f T i S i V S f f U W U V e ca
k'5'Pp75g y%8V F D2db `
hh
yh
uniq is usually used with sort to discard duplicates

Here we are cutting the fourth field out of the password file (the group ID) and sorting in
numerical order. fmt is used to make the results display on a single line.
uniq discard duplicate lines
i Q f W Q S c Q R R W
'5' k%2 u Bkf e dD@ d dD7
t Q V W Q S c e Uc Uc ` U
f e h
3 'Ee

m
3 e e

j
3 { e

3 { m {

j m h
3 y

m f

3 @8 {

3 m {
m

3 j {
l j

3
f

3 @e
Q T e ca
@42db `
sort by default sorts in alphabetical order. This gives slightly strange results as shown
above. To sort in numerical order, use the -n switch.
Q f W Q S c Q R R W
' k%2 u Bkf e dD@ d dD7
t Q V W Q S c e Uc Uc ` U
l

3 {
j

3 j m
f

3 8m
l l

3 l
f

3 e { j
h e h
3 j 'Ee

f h
3 %f {

e m
3

f j
3 l { 8

e
3
4{
Q T e ca
@42db `
sort sort the input
# $ $ 6 &
"F89@PB% 3 @%db% 3 %
X &
#
#
7H ` o @8B EDD8@PFB"'9@"798@ ` 9H7"B"6
& # & G G # G G & $

%& ` vD22db `
$ e ca
$ 6 G & G #
"47"2B8@ ` B@"7"'9DG
G # & & #
8@B ED ` o @87H%9@%db% 3 % 3 9@PB84"
# X &
&
6 $ $ #

%& ` kD22db `
$ e ca
tac reverses the order of the lines in the input stream. This is quite useful for sorting backwards.
tac the opposite of cat
16.4 Sorting
e
9%X dX hh X %%$ "$ m e ` 8m j { " l { $
$ j
! 9 # ! & #
e l e f j
$ l
e

` # m e ` 8m j { " l { $
C
e l e f j
$ l
U i W U f i
8s ' y"78@"@ @H"Bhf 2% db `
Q U W R T W g S e $ # C ca
16 Text filters
94
12 ROT13 really is encryption, even if it's spectacularly bad encryption.
{ { { {
a # # a G G $ 6 a G a a G
a a
a l a { a l { zwa 8 # "'%b878@8'%"Y7a l a Y7
a
{ { { {
a # # a & $ $ 6 a & $a
a a
a l a { a l { zwa 8 # "'%8"a f a $
a
a &
{ { { {
a # # # # & $
a a
a l a { a l { zwa 8 # "'%a "'%a %da e a e a a %
a
# & $
{ { { {
a # # # #
a a
a l a { a l { zwa 8 # "'%a "a "a a a a "
a
#
{ { { {
a a
a l a { a a
j a w } 3 3 % 3 %| l | e a 3 ""b ba a a b
e
6 w
C e } e $ # a a
a
S U W Q S U f W S f f U W i
8hiV Py%8V vp7%Q q 0 db `
ca
Here we are joining /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow based on their first field (the user name).
Since /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow use a colon to separate fields, it is necessary to use the
-t : option.
C # C $ # & # $
%P%ED"G
! $
$ 3 H 3 E'%H
C $ & # $ $
6 # $ 6 $ $
887$5 4"7 8F@"7
S
W Q' WT9SW 'y"57%Q F2db `
f
R
Q f W R T q e ca

%C
# C

# $
"G
$ 3
! $

3 C
$

6 $
887
# $ $
4@"7
SW ' H D2db `
Q f W R T U V e ca
$ #
%E&
# $
"G
$ #
%E&
$

$ & #
E'%$
$

$ 6 $ $
"7 8F@"7
S Q f W R T U V e ca
W 'y"H D2db `
join is capable of combining files based on common fields (similar to the SQL inner join, if you
happen to know SQL).
join join files
f f W
ER g %U 47 v B 2'p@82db `
Q W b u S i

U V i U e ca
tr -d can be used to make normally readable text rather unusable, but it does show that
vowels are not as necessary to the English language as you might have previously
suspected.
g S U Q f Q S S U Q p p S i
Y7" 8 W FG E 8 W gXs7 F2db `
e ca
Here we are using tr -d to delete the Carriage Returns (\r) from a file created with
Windows Notepad.
f f W i u i i U i i u i U U U V i U e ca
ER hEE'8@EDE08H v@8P 2'p@82db `
ROT13 encryption12
W Q S c i U i u } b t } Q V W t } b t }
kfq84E4 va @ %a @
Q S c t
kw7 @4@4e s E@b `
b Q T
C # C a
Convert file names to lowercase.
f f W i u i U U U V i U e ca
ER E8H v@8P 2'p@82db `
Translating from lower case to UPPER CASE:
f f W i U i u U U V i U e ca
ER 84E4 v@8P 2'p@82db `
tr is usually used for converting upper case to lower case. It can also do other character translations.
tr -d can remove specific characters from a stream.
Translating from UPPER CASE to lower case. We are asking man to use cat as its pager,
instead of using less, and opening up the man page for man itself.
tr character set translation
16.5 Manipulation
16 Text filters
95
G
7H86 3 5 3 H%& 3 G 3 H 3 " e
# C
$
$
pXSHW pS'"5k7" B2db `
W f R i T I f R e ca
3 8y'"6
l
9 $ 9 &
j
"6B@ "P%'%P%P
G & $ # # &
3 H"77H86 3 5 3 H%& 3 f

G G # C
G 3 H 3 "F%'%@" e
$
$ & $ # $
v C $ $
'B@X 3 $ 3 $ 3 %$

p p S W f R V i T
XS '"%5k 7" B2db `
I f R e ca
You can also use i at the end of the s command to make the search case-insensitive.
d delete the line. You need to select the lines as explained in the next paragraph.
|
z p 3 b z "}
C
x
pD@P%y'8mpgXj"y D2db `
W Q S W fp S W f } S W f Q S W } Q V W e ca
|
p 3 b z "}
C
x
p@P%y'8mpgXj"y D2db `
W Q S W fp S W f } S W f Q S W } Q V W e ca
$ C
8Fp 3 b z "}
x
p W Q S W fp S W f } Q W U Q S W } Q V W e ca
@P%y'ag P5gXj"y D2db `
sed is a stream editor. sed does text transformations on an input stream. sed works by making only
one pass over the inputs. A sed program consists of one or more sed commands which are applied
to each line of the input. A command may be prefixed by an address range indicating the lines for
which the command should be performed.
Here is a very abbreviated summary of the sed commands
s/PATTERN/REPLACEMENT/g search and replace. If you add the g at the end, the search
and replace is applied as many times as possible to a single line.
sed stream editor
(So as you can see in line 8, the CD ROM in this system is mounted at /mnt/cdrom.)
B x dbx @" j { @

j
# C x $ #
B
f

8%$ `
B

8%$ `
G $ C
7Eh
B

8%$ `
`
G &
B

8%$ `

G
B j 6%& x h 68 88@

e 5
5
G 6
e2
f

8%$ `
B
f

8%$ `
&8 @
# &
& 6
8@ m
w w % w l
1 5
$ $

e 3 @ j
G $ C
7Eh
$
6
& 3 %@
6
#
# h
G

#
#
88G@
6
#
# f
f 3 @ e
% 3
&
$
6
5
% w
I U f T W R e a
@78"V "4b `
Ever wanted your printouts to be numbered? If so, then nl is the tool for you!
nl number lines
#
@X
` # ` X e X x X e x X ! { e n 5t

! a
! #
#@XaBB 5vy4
! !
` ` Aq `
# X

3 ""k 0
$ #
join allows you to specify which particular field to join on, and also which particular fields should
appear in the output (similar to cut)
The script below prints out the permissions (from ls) and file type (from file) for each file
in the current directory. The 9th field from the second file (-2) is used for the join this is
the file name. The actual output (-o) consists of the first field from .fileinfo (1.1), the first
field from .listing (2.1) and the second field from .fileinfo (1.2).
{ { { {
aaa l a { a l {
a
a a
a l
{ { { {
a a
a l a { a l {
a
a a
a
azwa 8 # "'%zE@@8'%"zE& a

# # a $ & G $ 6 a $ e
{ { { {
a a
a { a l { zwb$ 3 "'%a "'%b$ 3 a
a
# # a
a # C # # # C
zwa 3 %"'%a "'%a 3 a a j a
{ { { {
l a { a l { zwz%'%"a "'%z%'a
a a # # # a #
a
a m a zE&
a $
a l a b$ 3
a
a 3
# C
a h a z%'
a #
16 Text filters
96

# #
8 # "'%
#
"
#
"
#
"
3 ""
$ #

S U W V i S U W p p
D7y i%D@5@8 8sy vy%8V F D2db `
S f f U W U V e ca
expand allows you to specify the size of the tab stops with -t. You can specify a single size
for all tab stops, or you can set the tab stops at specific positions.
m
# # $ & G $ 6
8 # "'%FE@@8'%"
$
E&
l

$ 3 "'%
#
#
"'%

$ 3
h
# #
%'%"
#
"'%
#
%'
l
# #
8 # "'% 878@8'%"
G G $ 6
G
7
f
# #
8 # "'%
& $ $ 6
8"
&
$
e
e
#8 # "'%
#
#
"'% %
# & $
#
8 # "'%
#
#
"
#
"
3 ""
$ #

S U W S U W p p
@8 8sy vy%8V F
S f f U W
$
E&

$ 3
#
%'
G
7
&
$
# & $
%
#
"

U V e ca
D2db `
Don't like tabs? Use expand to make them go away!

You may notice with this example that running the output of tr through expand appears to
have no effect this is because tabs look just like spaces on the console.
expand tabs to spaces
3 $"#"y# @@E'B a 8 a { a a @! #

f
a C a & C
w C
@$ ` "b%&8@8'%"a %HE a a m a zE&
# a # G $ 6 # & $ $ e
a $
3 "#"b878@8'%"a %2% s a l a a @"7
$ a G G $ 6 # & $ # #
a
w ! G
3 ""a "'%a %$ a e a e a a @%%
$
# # # &
w ! # & $
3 ""a "a "a a a a @%"
$ # # #
w ! #
3 ""b ba a a a @
$ # a a
w !
h%8 'y%8V F D2db `
f U I p S W f S f f U W U V e ca
S U W p u i
yf
You can also use the line matching together with search and replace. Note that the replacement is
only done on lines containing 'bash'.
#
@"7H `
#
H `
6 H `
# #
#
7"784 `
# #
4 `
# #
` 4 `
$ # #
%4 `
6 $ #
@ 3 H `
G # #
87 3 @"H `
#
`
S U W p S Q T b I f g fp S W f
g @BC 7"' i' 7"'P742db
I f g S T e ca
t
t
t
t
t
t
t
t
t
t
`
Instead of using s/PATTERN/REPLACEMENT/ you can use any other character in the
place of the slash e.g. a colon.
p W U fc Q R Q V Q R Q V f
DyDg %%yp

@ D5
S W f } U f Q R Q V } Q V W e ca
'x5%h D2db `
The commands are most useful if you specify a range of lines to which the command applies.
Here's how to specify specific lines for the d command:
/PATTERN/d delete all lines contains the pattern
4d delete line 4
4,10d delete lines 4 to 10
6,$d delete from line 6 to the last line
The most common way of using sed is to specify the editing commands as a command line
argument. You can specify multiple commands separated by semicolons.
3 8y'""6
9 $ 9 & 6
f
8
16 Text filters
97
%P@82D%D%D%4DPE58 4E@
# $ # 6 & & # & & G & v & # v & v & $ & # v $
# v # v v $ G v C $ & $ #
5B%P%& 8 D"75'8@H%'%@8 3 7%H7 2H@
G 9 G 9 # $ G
2'8H@ ` @$ ` 96 9@ BB 3 FE@B%'%E
v C $ G

# G
v G & & $ # # $ &
& $ # # $ & # &
B%'%E@"28% ` BBB 3 H"775 3 H%& 3
$
G G # C
G 3 H 3 E e 3 " 3 "F%'%@"4'BE'%E'! EB@X 3 $ 3 $ 3 %$
$
$
$ & $ # $ v C $ $ & # & & $ $

T I f R e ca
k7" B2db `
fmt is used to format text into a neatly word-wrapped structure.

The default right margin is 75
fmt format nicely
16.6 Formatting
$ # & $
%E!
$ # & # $ G ! C # C # $
%ED"7%PF"G
$ 6 $ $ ! ! $
"7 8F@"7%$ 3 H 3 D
C $
$ & # $ $ 6 $ # $ $
E'%H! 8875 4@"7
W R T W R T p ip S i
"D7W 7%85 db `
f U e G & ca
You can specify a delimiter between the files which is not a tab space with -d
$ # & $
%E
%#ED"G
$ & # $
C # C # $
%PF"G
"7 86F@$"7
$ $
! $
$ 3 H 3 D
C $
$ & #
E'%$H$ 8875 4@"7
6 $ # $ $
wiS@U8 W"WTDW9W 7%85 db `

R
R T f U e G & ca
$ # & $
%E
$ # & # $
%ED"G
$ 6 $ $
"7 8F@"7
$ & # $ $
E'%H
"H D5 db `
W R T U V e G & ca
C # C # $
%PF"G
! $
$ 3 H 3 D
C $
6 $ # $ $
8875 4@"7
W R T U V e G & ca
H D5 db `
Using paste is like taking two printouts of two files and sticking the right margin of one to the left
margin of the other. The glue between the files is a tab stop.
paste paste two files together
m f
@8m e m e { f
f
l
hh
VS@U8 Wh%8P 2'p@82db `
g f U I U V i U e ca
m f m e { f
l l
f
l
hh
V f U I U V i U e ca
h%8P 2'p@82db `
If you have spaces and want tabs, you can achieve this with unexpand.
Here we are counting the number of lines, words and characters in the man page of bash.
After piping the output through unexpand and replacing spaces with tabs the size is almost
19kb smaller, although it looks the same.
unexpand spaces to tabs
#8 # "'%FE@@8'%"

# $ & G $ 6
#
$ 3 "'%
#
"'%
# #
%'%"
#
"'%
#8 # "'% 878@8'%"
#
G G $ 6
#8 # "'%
#
& $ $ 6
8"
# #
8 # "'%
#
"'%
$ e
E&

$ 3
#
%'
G
7 l
&
$
# & $
% e
h
$
E&

$ 3
#
%'
G
7
&
$
# & $
%
16 Text filters
98

l
m
e
f

m
l
m
e

Q R R W V S i S Q e G & a
%E 7"4D5b `
Here's Hello World in decimal, characters and hexadecimal.

# o
l
m
e
f

}
m
l
m
e

Q R R W V S i S Q e G & a
%47"4D5b `
You can specify more than one format
l
m
e
f

m
l
e

Q R R W S i S Q e G & a
%"4D5b `
od -t d1 specifies decimal format, with a width of one. The more astute among you will
realise that the character encoding is ASCII.
# o

}
Q R R W V i S Q e G & a
%44D5b `

Using the -t switch tells od to use a specific format type (the default is od -t o2). od -t c
means character format. You will notice that file ends in a newline character (\n).

h j j h e j
h e j j j l e h l j l h e
hiPP'EP' B hEB
Q R R W S Q e G & a
%4D5b `
od's behaviour is rather odd when it is used without any arguments. It prints out the octal
value of two pairs of bytes in the file. Sometimes this is useful, but usually it is not.

% A 8}

Q R R W U V e G & a
%P D5b `
Q R R W } S R Q Q R R W } Q V W e G & a
%Fj%P%y D5b `
od, oddly enough, does not just print out in octal, but in other formats.
od octal dump (and other formats)
fER R 4B2db `
f W
i f R e ca
f f W t f Q W e ca
ER 7EV P2db `
In the good old days, when it was traditional to send reams and reams of printouts to a line printer,
it was nice to add file names as headers and to make sure you didn't print on the fold between
papers. This is what pr does for you.
pr format for printing
# G v C $ G & $ # # $ & # # $
"4'8F%'%E@%P%P@8#
6 & & # & & G & v & # v & v
D%D%D%4DP&
$ & # v $ # v #
E58 4E@55B%v
v $ G v C $ & $ #
%& 8 D"75'8@H%'%@8 3 7%
G 9
G 9 # $ G
7 2H@ 4 2'8H@ `
v C $ G

@$ ` 96 9@ BB 3 FE@
# G
v G &
& # # $ & & $ # # $ & # &
%'$%EP B%'%E@"28%
$
G G # C
` BBB 3 H"775 3 H%& 3
G 3 H 3 E e 3 " 3 "F%'%@"4'$
$
$
$ & $ # $ v C
$ & # & & $ $
E'%E'! EB@X 3 $ 3 $ 3 %$

S U W i T I f R e ca
5k7" B2db `
Here we do the same thing with a different margin
$
9
%&'$%E82"E'%E& z""B@ "B%2@@ %P@ %
# # $ & G C 6 $ & # X 6 6 G v # # G # $ #
& $ # # &
%'%P%P 3 % 3 HP%'7p@@9@p@ 3 2%@8@

$ # G
$
#
` @9@ "6 D"6 H& G B%HPP%C EP"4'8F%'%E@%#
C
& & G G # G v C $ G & $ # # $ &
16 Text filters
99
100
# o
16 Text filters
j e
j l
j h j
$ j 4l ` 4'h e ` j j Bm
A

}

wc count words, lines and characters
For each file specified on the command line, wc prints out the number of words, lines and
characters in the file.
dy8@8
# X
v $ X
"y8@8
Cy8@8
$X

8@8
# X
` b@8
$

3 @

3 @

3 @

3 @

3 @

t f Q W V e ca
7EV P2db `
e j

l'%f
h
j {

e
{ e
l
e j

h
j
hEe
j@f
f
f
f
{
wc -l prints just the number of lines, wc -w prints only the number of words and wc -c
prints the number of characters (bytes) in the file. These features allow wc to be used to
count and measure the output from other commands.
e
R R 4B2db `
i V
i f R e ca
Here we are using cat to show the contents of all the files in /bin, and then using wc to add
up the size of those.
e e m j m
l {
V i V t I U V e ca
7 7"F D2db `
16.7 Review
Quiz questions
Which commands perform the following functions:

1. Show the first few lines of a file
2. Show the last few lines of a file
3. Select a column from a file
4. Send the entire file
5. Convert new lines to spaces
6. Convert spaces to tabs
7. Convert tabs to spaces
8. Arrange in alphabetical order
9. Remove duplicate lines
10.Rearrange lines from last to first
11.Substitute all instances of one character with another
12.Add line numbers to output
13.Search for and replace text in a stream
14.Apply a consistent right margin to text
15.Show a file in hexadecimal, octal or other formats
16.Convert a text file to postscript
17.Determine the size of a text stream
16 Text filters
101
Assignment
1. Figure out something useful to do with join (other than join -t : /etc/passwd /etc/shadow)
2. Read the man pages for each of the commands discussed in this chapter, and make notes about
options and modes of operation which have not been described.
3. ls /etc/*.* prints a list of files and directories containing a dot in their name. Use sed to remove
the leading /etc/ from the filenames and format the list for presentation using fmt and pr.
4. Create a tabulated list of user names, home directories and shells from /etc/passwd. Use cut to
select the appropriate columns from the password file; use tr to translate colons : to tab
characters; and use expand to format the output.
5. Concatenate all the data in the files in /etc using cat. Sort the lines alphabetically and remove
duplicates. How many lines were there in /etc before you removed duplicates, and how many
were there after you removed duplicates.
6. The command ls -latr prints a directory listing in reverse order, sorted by time. Use the tail
command to show the newest 5 files from this listing. Do it again using the tac and head
commands.
7. Create a file containing a copy of /etc/services with the lines numbered. Split the file you have
created into parts of 1000 lines each named services-aaaa, services-aaab and so forth in your
home directory. Check how many lines are in each file.
1. head
2. tail
3. cut
4. cat
5. fmt
6. unexpand
7. expand
8. sort
9. sort | uniq
10.tac
11.tr
12.nl
13.sed
14.fmt
15.od
16.pr doesn't none of these commands do mpage does it though.
17.wc -l
17 File management
102
17 File management
Unix is all about files. Everything is a file. Because of this, it's important to be able to shunt your
files around.
Mommy, what happens to your files when you die?
LPIC topic 1.103.3 Perform basic file management [3]

Weight: 3
Objective
Candidate should be able to use the basic UNIX commands to copy, move, and remove files and
directories. Tasks include advanced file management operations such as copying multiple files
recursively, removing directories recursively, and moving files that match a wildcard pattern.
This includes using simple and advanced wildcard specifications to refer to files, as well as using
find to locate files based on type, size, or time.
cp
copy files
find
find files based on command line specifications
mkdir
make a directory
mv
move or rename files and directories
ls
list files
rm
remove files (and directories, if you ask nicely)
rmdir
remove directory
touch
touch a file to update its timestamp
file globbing
*, ?, [abc] and {abc,def} wildcards
17.1 Files, directories and ls

ls lists the contents of directories, and is one of the most frequently used commands on the
command line.
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In the output of ls, the meaning of the columns from left to right are:
file type and permissions (d directory, l symbolic link, r read, w write, x executable or
searchable)
number of links to the file
user name
group name
17 File management
103
size (in bytes, unless you specify -h).

date, time
file name
After the file name ls may print additional information about the file. / it's a directory, * it's
executable, -> somewhere - it's a symbolic link
17.2 File globbing (wildcards)

When playing card games like rummy, the joker is a wildcard and can take the place of any card.
Similarly, in the shell, there are special characters and strings that can take the place of any
characters, or of specific characters.
glob,n. [Unix; common] To expand special characters in a wildcarded name, or
the act of so doing (the action is also called globbing). The Unix conventions
for filename wildcarding have become sufficiently pervasive that many hackers
use some of them in written English, especially in email or news on technical
topics. Those commonly encountered include the following:
* wildcard for any string (see also UN*X)
? wildcard for any single character (generally read this way only at the
beginning or in the middle of a word)
[] delimits a wildcard matching any of the enclosed characters
{} alternation of comma-separated alternatives; thus foo{baz,qux} would be
read as foobaz or fooqux.
Historical note: The jargon usage derives from `glob', the name of a subprogram
that expanded wildcards in archaic pre-Bourne versions of the Unix shell.
the jargon file (edited)
The shell expands the following special characters just in case they are part of a file name.
Filename expansion is only performed if the special characters are in quote
~
/home/user or /root (the user's home directory) echo ~/.bashrc
Any sequence of characters (or no characters) echo /etc/*ost*
Any one character
echo /etc/hos?
[abc]
Any of a, b, or c
echo /etc/host[s.]
{abc,def,ghi}
Any of abc, def or ghi.
echo /etc/hosts.{allow,deny}
Here are some examples:
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rmdir can be used to remove empty directories. If the directory contains any files and directories,
rmdir will fail to remove it (although rm -r can).
rmdir remove directory
0777
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022
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umask Directory mode Directory mode

The permissions for a new directory are determined by the umask value, unless you set them
manually using the -m switch.

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To make a new directory, use mkdir. By default, the parent directory must exist, but with the -p
switch mkdir will create the required parent directories too.
mkdir make directory
17.3 Directories and files

If finding files with shell globbing is not flexible enough, you can use the find command.
X
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17 File management
104
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rm -f causes rm not to complain if the file you are trying to remove is not present.

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rm removes files, and also symbolic links and other strange file system objects.
rm remove files

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touch can create more than one file at a time

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The second time we run touch it updates the file time

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touch was originally written to update the time stamp of files. However, due to a programming
error, touch would create an empty file if it did not exist. By the time this error was discovered,
people were using touch to create empty files, and this is now an accepted use of touch.
touch update a file's time stamp
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17 File management
105
| $ $ # G
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cp -i interactively asks for feedback before it does something drastic, such as overwriting
an existing file.
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cp -v is verbose about the progress of the copying process. In the first example below,
there is no feedback. In the second example, there's a lot of feedback.
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Here we are copying a file (/etc/passwd) and renaming it to copy-of-passwd.
C $
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f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
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S f f U W V e ( v $ t w v $ t
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cp has two modes of usage:

Copy one or more files to a directory e.g. cp file1 file2 file3 /home/user/directory/
Copy a file and to a new file name e.g. cp file1 file13
If there are more than two parameters given to cp, then the last parameter is always the destination
directory.
Here we are copying a file (/etc/passwd) to a directory (.)
cp copy files
17.4 Copying and moving

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rm -rf is used to remove directories and their files without prompting.
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rm -r can be used to remove directories and the files contained in them. Here we are using
-i to specify interactive behaviour (confirmation before removal).
17 File management
106
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yh X h "7 @ $ 3 %7"

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The simplest way of using find is to specify a list of directories for find to search. By default find
prints the name of each file it finds.
Using find
find is able to find files that

have names that contain certain text or match a given pattern
are links to specific files
were last used during a given period of time
are within a given range of size
are of a specified type (normal file, directory, symbolic link, etc.)
are owned by a certain user or group or have specified permissions.
(Not all of these capabilities are discussed here).
17.5 find
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mv -i, like cp -i, interactively asks for confirmation if a file will be overwritten
EE'iV 4 DyxH ` u

f W V W f W V e ( v $ t w v $ t
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mv is the command used for renaming files
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mv, like cp, has two modes of operation:

Move one or more files to a directory e.g. mv file1 file2 file3 /home/user/directory/
Move a file and to a new file name (rename) e.g. mv file1 file13
If there are more than two parameters given to mv, then the last parameter is always the destination
directory.
All of these examples use -v so that mv is verbose.
mv move or rename files

17 File management
107

1. What is the parameter for copy, move and remove that requests confirmation from the terminal
before acting?
Quiz questions
17.6 Review
c R R g W S
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Want to grep through the C files in the kernel? That /dev/null is there to make sure that
grep prints out a file name together with the data from the file.
R yl} %
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Have you ever wondered how many things need to be fixed in the Linux kernel?
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When find finds a file, the default action is to print out the file's name. The one alternative action
that is quite useful is -exec where find executes the specified program, usually passing the file name
to it. find substitutes the name of the command in the place of the special characters {}. The
command must end with ; which must be quoted so that it is not interpreted by the shell.
find -exec
Test
Meaning
-name
find based on the file's name
-iname
case insensitive file name
& $ # ! #
%'%B4 `
-ctime
-mtime
-atime
find based on the time that the file was

created, or last modified, or last accessed
h j o & ! & #
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o & $ ! G & #
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-group, -user
-gid, -uid
find based on the group or user of the file
!
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-perm
find based on the file permissions (exactly,

+including, -all)
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-size
find files of a particular size
o 9 ! #
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-type
find files, directories, pipes, sockets and

links
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Example
find is usually used to search based on particular criteria. The more commonly used ones are shown
in the table.
find tests
v X v
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17 File management
108
17 File management
109
2. Who is the owner of a file created using touch?

3. Which parameter for copy will cause it to copy file permissions and ownership as far as
possible?
4. How do you find files which have not been modified for more than 2 days?
5. How do you find executable files which have the set-gid bit set?
Assignment
1. Perform the following instructions, and make a list of the commands you used
1. Make a directory named stuff for the commands below.
2. Copy the following files to your stuff directory: /etc/passwd, /etc/services, /etc/profile and all
files in /etc starting with the letter h or H.
3. Copy the directory /etc/sysconfig and all of its subdirectories and files to your stuff directory.
4. Rename the file hosts to the name network peers.
5. Delete the files host.conf and nsswitch.conf using a wildcard (but don't delete other files
ending in .conf).
6. Make a list of the files in your home directory which are larger than 100kb using find.
7. Remove the sysconfig directory you copied earlier.
2. Ensure that you have a rescue disk handy before doing this assignment. Do not do this
assignment on a system containing valuable data.
Install the stand-alone shell (sash), and review its manual page, particularly the aliasall
command. As root, enter the command 'mv -f /*'. Now recover your system either use a
rescue disk, or run /var/bin/sash. You can pass the parameter init=/var/bin/sash to the kernel if
you boot from LILO, otherwise you will need to use a rescue disk. What happened? Should you
have known? Did you get some valuable experience with the mv command?
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
-i
The user that ran the command.
-a
find -mtime +2
find -type f -perm -2001
18 Redirection
110
18 Redirection
Row, row, row your bits, gently down the stream...
/usr/share/games/fortune/computers
Redirection is that property of Unix operating systems that makes them quite useful.
LPIC topic 1.103.4 Use streams, pipes, and redirects [5]

Weight: 5
Objective
Candidate should be able to redirect streams and connect them in order to efficiently process
textual data. Tasks include redirecting standard input, standard output, and standard error, piping
the output of one command to the input of another command, using the output of one command
as arguments to another command, and sending output to both stdout and a file.
tee
send output to standard output and files
xargs
expand input to command line arguments
<
redirect standard input from a file
<<
redirect standard input from text in a script
>
send standard output to a file
>>
append standard output to a file
|
pipe a programs's standard output to standard input of another
``
capture the output of a command and use it in a script
18.1 Input and output redirection

The bash shell, and the other shells employed by Linux allow the user to specify what should
happen to the input and output of programs that run.
The shell creates new processes as follows:
1. The shell reads the commands to be executed
2. The shell opens the files which will be needed (open(2) for files, pipe(2) for streams)
3. The shell creates the new processes which will be executed (fork(2) each process)
4. Each new process is connected to the appropriate plumbing (dup2(2) each redirection)
5. Control of the processes is passed to the programs the user asked for (execve(2) each command)
Redirections with pipes (|) are processed first, and other redirections (with > and <) are processed
from left to right.
The following redirections are possible
Redirection
command < file
Command reads input from a file
command > file
Output of command goes to file
command 2> file
Errors from the command go to a file
command >> file
Output of a command is added to a file
h
%f
r b
7"PG
fEW75g A
R Q
W U W W
H
Q R R W
%F
d V e( v $ t w v $ t
d yxH ` u
Read input from the script or the command line. The << operator is traditionally followed
by EOF, but any other letters can be used. When a line is found which consists only of
EOF, that's the end of the input. This is called a here document.
e

e
j
j
V S f f U W U V e ( v $ t w v $ t
y%8V F DyxH ` u
Read input from a program using the pipe redirection. Here cat is piping its output to wc.
e

e
j
j
S f f U W
y%8V d yxH ` u
V e ( v $ t w v $ t
Read input from a file using <. Notice that standard input is anonymous wc does not
know the name of the file which it is reading from.
ey(xH ` u
v $ t w v $ t
m e
F
n8$I
X G
b87"G 3 "gb8@ t
$ x G
$H$ 3 F"% 1 "@FEC t 8%C
# C
X # G $

EB 3 b8@ t nb%C t b8@
# $ & C
x G
$ x #
X G
# $ G
H8@ t b4 3 B8@ t b8}
X #
G
X
V e ( v $ t w v $ t
yxH ` u
Read input from the terminal:

e
j
j
C $ G
%h"@ e
S f f U W V e ( v $ t w v $ t
y%8V PyxH ` u
Standard input is the terminal, by default. The following redirections are possible:
No redirection. Although we are telling wc to examine a specific file in this example, we
are not changing standard input using redirection
18.2 Standard input redirection (<, <<EOF, |)

Q R Q W f f W R
%EBe
Q R Q
%W d EBe
f f W R
f W
fER "WqV B @e
t W V Q W
R R W t W V Q W
"gSWqV B @e
Q%WPWW@U8 8@8 8e
R Q
W R T Q S U Q V S U I
p f S W
htyp'fyf%U8V F De
S f W U V
W R
T5 WR 4Be
U i f R
W R
T d De
U V
W R T f R
2Be
Work through these commands to experience redirection for yourself.

Redirection
command > file 2>&1

command >& file
command &> file
Output and errors go to a file
command1 | command2
Output from command1 is input for command2
18 Redirection
111
& $ # & & &

8%'%B8%B ` v 9"@% a
# $ # 6 &
$
S U W U U T V U e ( v $ t w v $ t
Y@8V PY@8D8BFyxH ` u
We can append the errors to an existing file ...
Q R U T Q V f f W U T Q V f f T V U e( v $ t w v $ t
b87" %DW2% 'iyiV Pb% 'iy98BFyxH ` u
R R g W S T Q V f f W U T Q V f f T V U e ( v $ t w v $ t
"DW2% 'iyiV Pb% 'iy98BFyxH ` u
Here we are sending the errors to a file. It is quite common to send error text to /dev/null
especially when you know what it says.
6 G &
"F""@2 ` 87B Hka
$
# # &
%H E s a 8@B$ s y8@%@ ` E'%@ a
# G # #
a ! $ #
# # &
%H E s a 8@B$ s y8"7878@ ` E'%@ a
# G # #
a $ G #
#
%
# &
E s a 8@B$ s %@ e G # 3 @ ` E'%@ a
# G # #
a G X # v ! $
#
# # &
%H E s a 8@B$ s bE@E'%# 3 @ ` E'%@ a
# G # #
a &
#

$

$
$

$
$

& $ # & & &

8%'%B8%B ` v 9"@% a
# $ # 6 &
$
T Q V f f W U T Q V f f T V U e( v $ t w v $ t
% 'iyiV Pb% 'iy98BFyxH ` u
The output sent to stderr is usually the following:

Error messages (e.g. command 2>/dev/null)
Warning messages (e.g. command 2>> warning.log)
Debugging and progress indicators (e.g. command 2>&1 | less )
Here are the various possible error redirections.
If stderr is not redirected, error output is displayed on the terminal.
stdin (0)
Shell command
stderr (2)
stdout (1)
By default, Linux processes produce two error streams. Regular output is sent to stdout (standard
output, 1) and errors are sent to stderr (standard error, 2).
18.4 Standard error redirection (2>, 2>>, 2>&1)

e
j

V W g e ( v $ t w v $
78yxH ` t
Redirecting to a program. Here the output of uptime is being piped as the input to wc.
e X x e X e X ab@%87H y"@" j x e a m G &

l
x
$ 6 $ $
x
{ X x X x 8 X b@$%87H y"@" j x j e a m G &
m
f
a
6 $ $
x
W R T i W
"78 DyxH
U V e ( v $ t
W R T i W
"78 q78yxH
W g e( v $ t
G a h
G { a h
w v $ t
` u
w v $ t
` u
Redirection appending to a file (>> means to the end of).
{ X x X x f8 X ab@$%867$H y"@" j x j e a m G & G { a h

m
$
x
W R T i W
"78 DyxH ` u
U V e ( v $ t w v $ t
` !%&'8G| { a lBm G w ej

v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
W R T i W
"78 R 4ByxH ` u
i f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
W R T i W
"78 q78yxH ` u
W g e( v $ t w v $ t
Redirection to a file (> means to). If the file already exists, it is overwritten.
e X x e X x e X b@%87H
e
a $ 6 $ $
x
y"@" j x j e a m G & G { a h
W g e ( v $ t w v $ t
78yxH ` u
Standard output is the terminal, by default. The following redirections are possible:
No redirection
18.3 Standard output redirection (>, >>)

18 Redirection
112
C !
8E'"G ` 8887% %%# @ ` E'%@
G ! v C #
Q H Q T H e H U R F I H R
P0Sn!W%a@nS@jP(0SvX0WI
d d H Q Q d eH I H d d
nw06%SnXnljPS0R $PW%S0S6W0!6%$8gX0WI
e Q Q k Q R U d H Q Q I R
nw06%SnXnljPS0R !!8SPiPWS6W0!6%$8gX0WI
Q I T H I R I Q U d H Q Q I R
nw06%SnXnljPS0R !66WnS6W0!6%$8gX0WI
Q F R I e U d H Q Q I R
d
n
d H Q Q d eH I H d d
06%SnXnljPS0R 8!60a%!P8yg6W0!6%$8gX0WI
e d k I R eT d U d H Q Q I R
nw06%SnXnljPS0R iS!S6%6W0!6%$8gX0WI
I Q Q d U d H Q Q I R
d d H Q Q d e
nw06%SnXnlH
I H d d
PS0R h!P8yg6W0!6%$8gX0WI 887% %%# @ ` E'%@
I R eT d U d H Q Q I R G ! v C #
#
@ ` E'%@
g W S S U W e( v $ t w v $ t
8I ByxH ` u
g W S g W S T Q V f f W U U T V U e( v $ t w v $ t
8I W28I % 'iyiV PY@8D8PFyxH ` u
The usage below is wrong, and because of this the results are quite strange. tar is opening
the file debug two times, and writing to the file is not synchronised, and some writes
overwrite others (the error output is in italics).
f f W R U W V U f e ( v $ t w v $ t
ER "W84 7HyxH ` u
f f W V i U e ( v $ t w v $ t
ER "WP7FyxH ` u
f f W U f W Q W S W i f U I e ( v $ t w v $ t
ER "Ww7E2r @@"7EV 4'ph%8yxH ` u
These commands send standard error output to the same destination standard output (a
program).
R R g W S R U S W f
"D8 'pS 7 '2"yxH
W
i R R U R R r e ( v $ t
R R g W S R U S W f
"D8 'pS 7 '2"yxH
W
i R R U R R r e ( v $ t
R R g W S S U S g e( v $ t
"PI W yxH
R R g W S $ ! e( v $ t
!2"W F42yxH
R R g W S & $ # # $ & & # e( v $ t
!2"W%'% ` E 3 %78FyxH
R R g W S T Q V f f W U U T V U e ( v $ t
"W"y% 'iyiV PY@8D8PFyxH
w v $ t
` u
w v $ t
` u
w v $ t
` u
w v $ t
` u
w v $ t
` u
w v $ t
` u
The notation 2>&1 means stderr(2) to copy of stdout(1). The following all send standard error
output to the same destination as standard output
command >file 2>&1
command 2>file 1>&2
command &> file
command >& file (this is not the preferred method)
command 2>&1 | another-command
Here are the examples of using these commands
Here we discard the output and the errors from the commands, sending them to /dev/null.
6 G &
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$ $
# # &
%H E s a 8@B$ s b 3 % d'"@ a
# G # #
a
X & $ G
$
& $ # & & &
8%'%B8%B ` v 9"@% a
# $ # 6 &
$
6 G &
"F""@2 ` 87B Hka
$ $
# # &
%H E s a 8@B$ s y8@%@ ` E'%@ a
# G # #
a ! $ #
$
# # &
%H E s a 8@B$ s y8"7878@ ` E'%@ a
# G # #
a $ G #
$
#
%
# E s a 8@B$ s %@ e G # 3 @ ` E'%@ a
&
# G # #
a G X # v ! $
#
$
%H E s a 8@B$ s bE@E'%# 3 @ ` E'%@ a
#
# &
# G # #
a &
#
$
& $ # & & &
8%'%B8%B ` v 9"@% a
# $ # 6 &
$
Q R U U V e( v $ t w v $ t
b87" %F DyxH ` u
R
Qb87" %WY@8V PY@8D8BFyxH ` u
U S U W U U T V U e ( v $ t w v $ t
6 G &
"F""@2 ` 87B Hka
$ $
# # &
%H E s a 8@B$ s b 3 % d'"@ a
# G # #
a
X & $ G
$
18 Redirection
113
18 Redirection
114
18.5 Command pipelines (|)

One of the most powerful features of Linux and other Unix-like operating systems is the ability to
join the input and output of processes together. This is called piping. To set up a pipe, you use the
pipe symbol (| ) between the command that generates the output and the command that processes
the output. Generally, the data which you pipe is text, and if you can use the text filtering
commands you can do interesting things with it. It is possible to join far too many processes
together with pipes.
Yet another variation of the classical application, with a ROT13 encoding feature.
p i u i i U i p p i u i Up W I I
hEE'8@EyE08d v Ft
Q V W
You can pipe a large number of processes together. Here we are counting how many
unique words appear in the fortune cookie database.
R "'f
i V g Q
p i Up p i up p t c
i8dyqE vhyyf DB e E08@y'f
i u i U fp S W
U V f U p p i W t W g Q T f W U W U f f g f R
%8shp @"yE@8hi' Be
f e
m e
ls lists the files in the fortune cookie directory. grep -v removes the files that have a dot in
their name. xargs runs cat with all of the file names on its command line. cat prints the
contents of the files. sed edits the stream, replacing anything that is not A-Z and a-z with a
space, then removes leading spaces. tr converts everything to lowercase. sort sorts the
words in alphabetical order, and uniq removes the duplicates. wc says how many lines
there were in its input.
If you need to redirect standard error together with standard output, you use the 2>&1 operator.
In the following example, the output of bash -x is linked to the input of less (that's the
pipe). The errors are redirected to the output (2>&1). The regular output is redirected to /
dev/null (but the errors remain redirected).
f f W R R g W S U
ER "A"Ww7f
r @@"7EV 4'ph%8I 0
Q W S W i f U
tee divert a copy to a file
stdout(1)
tee
ls lR /
file1
Interpretation of
ls lR / | tee diverted > file1
diverted
tee is like a tee-piece for pipes13. It allows you to pipe to one or more files and also send output to
13 One difference between tee and a physical tee-piece is that the flow of data is duplicated, and not divided in two like
a liquid would be.

14 This example should work when there are spaces in the file name, because of the quotes .... This example fails
when the file name contains new line characters.
t ! t 1
% "s |
# # $
%%EC

! #
w
3 s 1
!@s } w
w 1 X @s
~ 1 7% s #
| ~
f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
ByxH ` u
W Q S
P
}iEui8UH va @ h%ya @ F
} b t } Q V W t } } b t }
Q
Skctw7 @4@4yxH ` u
b Q T e ( v $ t w v $ t
$ 3 $ 3 %'%# 3 $ 3 %h"7! ` "@
& $
#
C $ G ! G

8%78@
G
G #
@% 3 $
# G
"@
! & G
` %'8|
f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
ByxH ` u
$dX@ ` # E'

dX'"G
$
& $

t
This example renames every file in the current directory to an upper case version of its
name. The command whose output is being captured is echo $FILE | tr a-z A-Z14.
h T V h W U S
5 "d@8 %De
h T V h W U W f U I
5 "d@8 '%8e
h T V h i
5 "dfT %Wp De
Command substitution makes it possible to grab the standard output of a command and put it on the
command line of another command. The two forms `command` and $(command) are equivalent.
Note that the quote is a backward quote this is a little difficult to distinguish from the regular
quote (apostrophe), so some people prefer the form $(...).
Rather than using /usr/bin/ftp we use `which ftp` below.
18.6 Command substitution $(command) and `command`

W T i Q R U i W V i f W
R8H@W v79E S
WRTi8QRHU@iWW v% 64I
V W W W Q S Q
R R g W S V i f W
"Dq79E S
W R T i Q R U i W
8H@W vW S
U
0
0
0
0
Here we are recording the results of loading a kernel module by reading the kernel
message buffer with dmesg. The results are also displayed on the terminal.
Q i Q W Q i R R U f U i W V i i i
R Er @FR 77H@W v"W( E2'"'p De
tee -a does not overwrite the current contents of a file. In scripts tee -a is useful for
appending the results of commands to one or more log files.
R @8PW v7EB V R 4Be

i V W S W f Q W
W
i f R
R @"@"hEBW v7EB V R 4Be
i V W R T f R g f W W f Q W
W
i f R
In the following example tee catches the output of grep in resultsfile, and wc counts it.
f W
fER 8 8 @%7%8r 84W vWp De
Q U Q T W U V U W U i
8 8 @%7%8r 8 d EBe
Q U Q T W U V U
f f W R
8 8 @%7%8r 8F@Wp De
Q U Q T W U V U U i
Q'fSW Q'4W vy%8V 4h%8B @e
f g W S f f U W f U I W
S Q f
W 'g d 'He
Q f
S Q f g S f f U W f U I W
W 'Fqy%8V 4h%8B @e
tee can be used to catch intermediate results in a command pipeline, such as unsorted data,
or data which will be passed to a pager.
f Q i W V W
EW g 7% g BW vW g 0
Q
T Q W i W V W T Q V
% V '% g BW v% @T 0
standard output.
By default tee works like the redirection > and overwrites any contents in the files specified. If
you want to append to the files, use tee -a.
tee can save the results of a command in a file while you view them on the terminal.
18 Redirection
115
116
# t w
~ % A
#
% !! 1 % 1

# t
w 1 X @s ~ 3 ~
z
w } w } } w } t
w 1 # s
18 Redirection
3 s
t !@s
~ w
A ~ @s ! 8 ! !@s
3 s
The grep and cut commands conspire here to find the name server which is in use. This is
then entered into an environment variable.
e X X e {
X m j
6 % De
u t Q V W
u
haTippypS7i5g VT% V'%Q'EWV WP'E@8B ri` 6 % e
Q R f
W W f W U W h
e X X e {
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ippyp7i5g V% V'%Q'EWV P'E@8B @e
T
S
T Q R f W W W f W U W
e X X e { 86 @8%'%#
X m j
& $
T% 'R%'fEWV P'E@8B @e
Q V Q
W W W f W U W
e XX X e { 86 @8%'%#
m j
& $
& X G &
b"'$ 3 %@
$
T Q V R Q f W W U V
% '%'EV F De
18.7 xargs
xargs expands its standard input to be arguments to the command it is given.
The following commands are equivalent:
W W Q W Q
2@2 2
h W W Q W Q Q V W h
2@2 B nq
%82@2 B W
f U W W Q W Q Q V
xargs is often used to handle a list of file names generated by another command. Here we generate
a list of files with grep, and then read the files with less. The actual command run is less file1
file2 ...
V f U
%8
R R g W S t W Q Q i
"WqV FDR p
W
f f W R f U t W Q R R W i
EP%8V P%R p
W
xargs is frequently used with find. find finds the files, and xargs starts up the command that is
going to handle the file.
Here we find regular files that have not been accessed for more than 30 days, and removes them
P@4%87%'9V e
i f U i
%8V e
f U
W78 @H9@p8P7T
U i T W i S
W U i T W i S
78 @H9@p8P7T
18.8 Review
Quiz questions
1. What are the two methods to capture the output of a process and include it on the command line
of another process?
2. How would you send the output of a process to a file named output and the errors to a file
named errors?
3. What would you type in a script to have the standard input of the command defined in the script?
4. How do you send the output of one process as the input of another?
5. How do you send both standard output and standard error output to another program as its
standard input?
6. How would you use tee to capture the intermediate results of find /etc before sorting them with
sort? (Are there any differences between the unsorted and the sorted versions?)
Assignment
1. Create a list of the files in /var/log and write it to a file named logfiles. Edit this file using vi and
18 Redirection
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
117
remove /var/log/messages. Use the file listed in logfiles as the command line arguments for the
wc command, and determine the number of lines in the files. Hint: Use xargs.
Write a single command to sort the file /etc/passwd, write the sorted list to two files named
pwsorted and pwsorted2, and then write the last line of the sorted output to the file pwlast with
the command tail -1. Hint: use tee.
The command ls accepts a number of single letter command line options. Use the command for
LETTER in a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z ; do ls -$LETTER ; done and extract
the lines from standard error where the string invalid option appears, using grep. Use cut to
extract only the letters which are not supported by ls.
Write a command to set the environment variable ISSUE to the contents of the file /etc/issue.net.
Write the output of all the following commands to the file lotsastuff. The commands are: date ;
id ; hostname ; df ; uname -a ; du -hsc /*. Check that you have captured the output. If you run
the commands you used again, how many copies of the output will appear?
Use the redirection commands together with the filter commands and extract a list of all the users
in /etc/passwd whose shell is /bin/bash. For each user, print out that user's name and home
directory. You can use grep to select the lines and cut to print out the relevant detail.
Work out a method to use tee and tail to pipe the results of a command to two processes
simultaneously. For the source command use ls -lR, and pipe this to grep hosts and wc -l. What
are the limitations of your method? Can the limitations be overcome, and how?
1. a) $(process) and `process` b) xargs

2. process > output 2> errors
3. echo input | process; ... or ... process <<EOF
input
EOF
4. one-process | another-process
5. one-process 2>&1 | another-process
6. find /etc | tee unsorted | sort > sorted
19 Process control
118
19 Process control
Zombie processes are haunting the computer.
BOFH excuse of the day
What is process control? Process control is the active changing of the process based on the results
of process monitoring. Of course, that is in the chemical industry. In your Linux system, it's quite
similar you want to talk to the processes running on your computer.
LPIC topic 1.103.5 Create, monitor, and kill processes [5]

Weight: 5
Objective
Candidate should be able to manage processes. This includes knowing how to run jobs in the
foreground and background, bring a job from the background to the foreground and vice versa,
start a process that will run without being connected to a terminal and signal a program to
continue running after logout. Tasks also include monitoring active processes, selecting and
sorting processes for display, sending signals to processes, killing processes and identifying and
killing X applications that did not terminate after the X session closed.
&
Run a task in the background
bg
Start a stopped task in the background
fg
Start a stopped task in the foreground
jobs
Show background jobs
kill
Send a signal
nohup
Block the process from receiving SIGHUP signals
ps
Process status
top
Interactive process viewing
19.1 Job control

Job control is the ability to selectively suspend the execution of processes and continue their
execution later. The shell provides job control in response to signals from the kernel terminal
driver. A job is a process or a pipeline of processes that were started by the shell.
The job which receives keyboard input is called the foreground job. When you type a command,
the shell itself receives the keyboard input and signals. When a foreground process is running, that
process receives the keyboard input and signals. Processes which you start are run in the
foreground by default, and continue until they exit.
To run a process in the background, you follow the command with the special character &, and the
process is run in the background. Processes running in the background may still send output to the
terminal (which can be quite distracting), but they do not receive keyboard input unless they are
brought to the foreground.
When bash starts a job in the background, it prints a line containing the job number e.g. [1], and the
process ID of the last process in the pipeline (e.g. 1181). The command jobs displays the current
list of jobs, which are either running or stopped.
` f I R R g W S ` T Q Q W W S ` S S e ca
j8"68B76T 5D2db `
m
(
19 Process control
119
Q R R W W
y%B @F D2db `
Q S U g W S U V e ca

A 3 @ % @4
G & # $ 6 $
E%# @5 ` B%@5 ` H
5 6 9 6
% ( e
# # #
o
% h(
# # #
!
f
I Q F2db
q e ca
f m
8 ( e
The following key sequences15 can be sent to the foreground process:

Key
Signal
Meaning Usage
Ctrl+C SIGINT Interrupt Interrupt the program running in the foreground
Ctrl+Z SIGSTOP Suspend Suspend the program running in the foreground
The following commands can be entered to control background processes.
Command Meaning
Usage
fg
foreground
Run the background job in the foreground. If it
has suspended, restart it.
bg
background
Restart a suspended job.
The command fg makes the most recently executed job a foreground job. You can specify a
specific job number for fg e.g. fg 2 will make job 2 run in the foreground.

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The command bg makes the most recently executed job continue to run in the background. Like
with fg you can make a specific job run in the background by specifying a job number, e.g. fg 2.
The kill command is able to kill a job based on its job number (instead of its PID) using a
percentage sign to specify the job number:

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Notice that the shell prints out the exit status of jobs that terminate unnaturally, but it doesnt
always print this out immediately when the job receives the signal, and usually just before
displaying the prompt.
19.2 Disconnected processes

The commands nohup and setsid can be used to run processes which are disconnected from the
terminal that started them.
The nohup command sets the signal mask for the process it starts to ignore the SIGHUP signal. The
SIGHUP signal is sent to each process when the shell exits. This happens when you are dialed in
with a serial modem, and the modem hangs up, and also when you exit a session, either on the
15 The key sequences can be changed with stty, but Linux distributions generally use what is shown here.
19 Process control
120
console, or via a network connection. nohup writes the output to a file named nohup.out, unless
you redirect the output yourself.
nohup is generally used when you know that the process you are going to run should continue to
run after your session ends. Quite often nohup is used to wrap commands which will cause your
session to end, such as network reconfiguration commands.
Restoring from a backup can take a while. We dont want to stay logged in while it
happens. Well get the output later by reading the file.
! & G $ 6
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6 ! $

If you restart the network while connected over a network link, the stop will work, but the
restart may fail.
$ v C X #
@8B%# db%8@HG 3 #

Here we hang up a phone line, wait a minute, and then dial again. This is the kind of thing
you will do when you are dialed in via the phone line, and you have reconfigured the
modem. Note that nohup only runs a single command here (bash) which in turn runs the
three commands needed to take the line down and bring it back up.
$ 6 C
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$

Here we run a command, top, with its output displayed on /dev/tty8. The command
continues to run even after the session ends.
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A program run with nohup is still nominally attached to the terminal or pseudo-terminal on which it
was started. This is shown in the output of ps. To totally detach from the controlling terminal, the
setsid command can be used. Processes that run from setsid should handle their output
appropriately (e.g. by redirection to a file).
19.3 Monitoring processes

The Linux system is open in terms of viewing the running processes. Any user can query the list of
running processes.
19.3.1 ps process status

ps gives a snapshot of the current processes. The options supported by ps are somewhat complex,
since the GNU version of ps supports Unix98 options (just letters), BSD options (with a dash) and
GNU options (two dashes).
The options to ps configure the following:
Which processes are displayed in the list
The format of the output (what is displayed for each process)
To ...
Unix98
BSD
Show all processes
ps ax
ps -A
ps -e
Show full information
ps u (user format)
ps -f (full listing)
Show full information for all ps uax

processes
ps -ef
ps -Af
16 pstree is not part of the LPI objectives.
The default columns displayed by top have the following meanings:

PID the process ID
USER the owner of the task
PRI - priority
NI - niceness
SIZE the size of the program itself
RSS Resources the amount of memory in use by the process
SHARE The memory that this process shares with other processes (e.g. shared libraries)
STAT State of the process Sleeping, Running, Zombie, sTopped or in Disk wait state. The
letter N indicates a Nice process, W a process that is sWapped out, and < a process with a
negative niceness (high priority).
%CPU the percentage of CPU time spent on the particular process since the last display.
%MEM the tasks share of physical memory.
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top displays the top processes those processes that use up the most CPU or memory.
19.3.2 top
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The following options for ps are very useful as well:
ps -w display in wide format with more of the command line.
ps -f display in a forest of processes, where you can see which processes are the parents of
which other processes. This is similar to the output of pstree16.

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19 Process control
121
19 Process control
122
TIME the time spent by this process since it started.

COMMAND the name of the command.
By default the process list is sorted by CPU usage, but this can be changed. Pressing h while top
is running displays a help screen, including the following.
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When top is using cumulative time, then the sub-processes started by a process are included in its
own running time. If you have customised the display to your liking, you can save your settings to
~/.toprc by pressing W.
19.4 Signals
Processes in Linux do not communicate with each other directly, but send each other signals via the
kernel. The most common signal sent is SIGTERM, which means Terminate, unless you know
what to do. This is the reason that the command to send a signal is called kill since the process
that receives the signal usually ends up dead.
The following signals are used quite often. The complete list of Linux signals is in the signal(7)
man page.
Signal
Meaning
Usage
SIGTERM
Terminate now (unless you can handle a SIGTERM)
kill pid
kill -TERM pid
kill -15 pid
SIGHUP
The modem hung up (or reload your configuration file if kill -HUP pid
youre not a terminal application)
kill -1 pid
SIGINT
A user pressed Ctrl+C interrupt and exit
Ctrl+C
SIGSTOP
A user pressed Ctrl+Z suspend
Ctrl+Z
kill -STOP pid
SIGCONT
Continue
fg or bg
kill -CONT pid
17 kill is a bash built-in function, primarily so that you dont start up a new process to terminate an existing process.
18 Note that the killall function on some Unix versions kills every process, regardless of its name.
R I I d d I I U R
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killall kill all process with a particular name
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Experiment with killing process with other signals (e.g. SIGHUP, SIGSTOP and SIGCONT).
Heres a short little script to make your Linux machine behave more like another operating system.
6
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kill17 sends a signal to the process or processes listed on the command line. The syntax for kill is
one of these.
kill send a signal
19 Process control
123
19 Process control
124
19.5 Review
Quiz questions
What is a background process?

Name 4 ways you can kill a process which is in your jobs list.
How can you use ps to show a tree of processes similar to pstree?
What is the default signal sent by kill and killall?
If you have a process's name but not it's PID, what can you do to send a signal to it?
What will each of the following commands do, and who may run them?
#
%
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
!
B B%v
s 7B%v
| } ! $
7. What happens if you kill -9 a process which is doing interactive console handling - like man or
vi?
Assignment
xx
Candidate should be able to manage processes. This includes knowing how to run jobs in the
foreground and background, bring a job from the background to the foreground and vice versa,
start a process that will run without being connected to a terminal and signal a program to
continue running after logout. Tasks also include monitoring active processes, selecting and
sorting processes for display, sending signals to processes, killing processes and identifying and
killing X applications that did not terminate after the X session closed.
&
Run a task in the background
bg
Start a stopped task in the background
jobs
Show background jobs
kill
Send a signal
nohup
Block the process from receiving SIGHUP signals
ps
Process status
top
Interactive process viewing
xx
1. Run the command ls -lR / > ~/listing in the background. Write down two ways in which this
process can be terminated.
2. Run the command find / >& ~/listing2 &. Now run the command kill -STOP %1. What effect
did the command have? What methods are there to terminate the job at this point? How would
you terminate it without allowing it to run further?
3. Log in at a terminal and run the command man man. Log in at another terminal and make a list
of the processes which are involved in the session on the first terminal. Use top to terminate the
pager which man is using, and observe the effect on the other processes.
4. Make a list of the signals which you can use to kill an interactive bash session. Hint: kill $$
sends signal 15 to the current shell, which does not exit.
5. Enter this command 30 times, and document the effect this has on your system's performance
using top, uptime and vmstat 1 10. Make notes about the different ways in which the 30
processes can be removed from memory.
6
%# @88F 8@pG 3 #

19 Process control
125
6. Make a list of processes which are part of your graphical desktop. Kill the X server using
Ctrl+Alt+Backspace and then see which of these processes continue to run after the X server has
terminated.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
A process which is not receiving terminal keyboard input.

kill %1; fg and Ctrl+C; killall process-name;kill 9112 (giving PID of process)
ps -axf
SIGTERM (terminate, signal 15)
Use killall rather than kill
Both send a hangup to process 1, init. This causes init to reload its configuration file /etc/inittab.
The console may be in an undefined state, and may have to be reset with the command reset or
stty sane.
20 Nice
126
20 Nice
LPIC topic 1.103.6 Modify process execution priorities [3]
Weight: 3
Objective
Candidates should be able to manage process execution priorities. Tasks include running a
program with higher or lower priority, determining the priority of a process and changing the
priority of a running process.
nice
Make a command be nice in terms of its CPU usage
ps
Show process status (including niceness of processes)
renice
Make a running process be nice
top
Interactive process monitor (shows niceness, and can renice)
20.1 Process priority

In the Linux kernel, the scheduler is responsible for deciding which process is going to occupy the
CPU's attention for the next millisecond. One of the factors for making this decision is the priority
or niceness of the process. Processes with a higher niceness are not scheduled for execution as
often as other processes.
Using nice you can change the niceness of new processes. Using renice you can change execution
priorities of running processes.
20.1.1 Using nice

The command to change the priority of a process when you start it is nice, and in common jargon,
you nice the process. If you nice a process, you make it behave more nicely, in that it does not
monopolise the CPU19. Niceness is usually 0 (not really nice). Niceness values range from 20 (very
nice) to -20 (not at all nice, quite important).
The nice command is used to modify a process's priority when starting the process. The -n switch
specifies just how nice the process should be.
nice -n 15 process start the process with a niceness of 15
nice -15 process start the process with a niceness of 15
nice -n -15 process start the process with a niceness of -15 (higher priority)
The niceness of a process is inherited by the processes it creates. This means that if the login
sequence for a user sets the niceness of that user's processes, all processes run by the user are also
nice.
In this example, we are running yes to burn up CPU cycles. This ensures that nice
processes have something to compete with. Then we are sorting some random numbers
once normally, and once nicely (we cat them first, to make sure that disk caching does not
19 The niceness of a process does not prevent it from monopolising available memory, file descriptors, network
bandwidth, hard disk bandwidth and other scarce resources. The following commands are quite useful for finding out
when things are going wrong.
vmstat virtual memory status for diagnosing excessive memory usage. You have to read the man page to
understand the meaning of each column.
ngrep and tcpdump very useful for find out who is using bandwidth.
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ps can be convinced to display the niceness of each process but seeing how hard it is, I can't think
why you would want to do this. (It's probably not in the exam).
EG
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ps (process status) reports niceness of processes in the STAT column. If the process has any
degree of niceness, the status column includes N.
20.2 ps and niceness

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nice can only be used to set the priority of processes when they start. renice is used to set the
priority of processes that are already running. renice can zap specific processes, or the processes
owned by a user or a group.
renice +1 -p 14292 make process 14292 just a little nicer
renice +2 -u jack make all of Jack's processes two notches nicer.
renice +3 -g users make the processes whose group is users three notches nicer.
Users can only increase the niceness of their own processes. Root can increase or decrease the
niceness of any process. If a process's niceness is 20, then it will only run when nothing else wants
to.
20.1.2 renice
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influence the timing). When sort again nicely, sort takes longer to execute (although the
CPU time is similar in both cases).
20 Nice
127
1. Run yes >& /dev/null with some amount of niceness. Increase the amount of niceness using
Assignment
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Why would one want to run a process with a lower priority?

How does one run a process with a lower priority?
How does one increase the priority of a process when running it? Who can do this?
How do you change the priority of a running process?
What key in top changes the priority of an existing process?
Quiz questions
20.4 Review
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top shows the top processes on your computer, i.e. those that use all the resources. top runs in a
console, and displays some summary information at the top, and a sorted list of processes. By a few
deft key presses, you can change the order in which processes are displayed, and quite often find
out why things are not working as planned.
Heres a screen dump of top where user processes are nice.
20.3 top
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20 Nice
128
20 Nice
129
renice and top. What are the limits of this? What effect does a nice process have on uptime and
vmstat 1 10? How are the nice processes displayed in top and ps?
2. As root run yes >& /dev/null with an increased priority. Increase the priority further using renice
and top. What are the limits of this? How are this high priority processes displayed in top and
ps?
3. Modify your /etc/profile so that all console sessions are made to run more nicely except if the
user is root. Hint: the shell which you want to change the priority of is already running, and its
PID is $$.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
So that the process does not interfere with processes which should be running more urgently.
nice process
nice -n -20 process ... only root
renice +2 pid ... make process 2 notches less important
r for renice
21 Regular expressions
130
regexp /reg'eksp/ n. [UNIX] (alt. `regex' or `reg-ex')
1. Common written and spoken abbreviation for `regular expression', one of the
wildcard patterns used, e.g., by UNIX utilities such as grep(1), sed(1), and
awk(1). These use conventions similar to but more elaborate than those
described under glob. For purposes of this lexicon, it is sufficient to note that
regexps also allow complemented character sets using ^; thus, one can specify
any non-alphabetic character with [^A-Za-z].
2. Name of a well-known PD regexp-handling package in portable C, written by
revered Usenetter Henry Spencer <henry@zoo.toronto.edu>.
the Jargon File version 3.20
Regular expressions were formalised by the logician Stephen Kleene as a method for specifying
syntactic structure precisely. Regular expressions have been a part of Unix for a quarter-century,
and have found their way into many other places. A regular expression is a search pattern written in
a specialized language that is understood by a number of Linux applications. Regular expressions
are used to search through text for phrases according to an exact algorithm.
In this chapter we will look at using two programs using simple regular expressions. We will then
take a slightly more detailed look at regular expressions
LPIC topic 1.103.7 Regular expressions [3]

Weight: 3
Objective
The candidate should be able to manipulate files and text data using regular expressions. This
objective includes creating simple regular expressions containing several notational elements. It
also includes using regular expression tools to perform searches through a filesystem or file
content.
grep
Search the input for lines matching a regular expression
regexp
For people who are too lazy to say regular expression
sed
Stream editor which can do regular expression matches
21.1 Regular expressions in depth

Regular expressions consist of
ordinary characters (like A-Z, a-z, 0-9), which simply match themselves
metacharacters (.^$ or [a-z]) which match something other than themselves, and
modifiers, which do not match a specific character, but determine how many times the preceding
character is to be matched.
These are the metacharacters used in regular expressions.
Metacharacter
Meaning
Regex
Matches
Match any character
foo.bar
foodbar
Match the beginning of line
^hi
lines starting hi
Metacharacter
131
Meaning
Regex
Matches
Match the end of line
hi$
lines ending hi
[ABC]
Match A or B or C
h[ae]ll
hall, hell
[^DEF]
Any character except D or E or F
h[^ae]ll
h9ll but not hall
A character in the range A-Z
A[A-Z]T
ANT, but not AnT
[A-Z]
For normal regular expressions, the following methods of grouping are available.
Metacharacter
(whatever)
Meaning
Regex
Matches
Treat whatever as a single entity
These are the modifiers used in regular expressions. These may follow a character, a metacharacter,
or a group in parentheses.
Modifier
Meaning
any no. of times (including O)
1 or more times
0 or 1 times
{N}
N times
{N,}
N or more times
{N,M}
At least N times at most M times
21.2 Using grep

grep stands for general regular expression parser. And is invoked in the following manner:
! R d F U
"WgnSnqgnSnn!Pge
R d F U d I I R
G
@
By default, grep reads the file(s) or standard input one line at a time and prints the lines that match
the pattern. Here is an example:
X 87% 8BP5 ` 0
# G $ $
C$Xy8@8 3 @D$B%C$ #%8$ 8@8 3 h E& v $ $87HE& v ~ 0
# $
# # G # $

dy8@8 3 @ 0
# X

"7EV F P6db ` t
W S f f Q W U V ca w v $
w s
1
8 s s 4 w a

# $ & ! G
E"@ 3
C$Xy8@8 3 @D$B%C$ #%8$ 8@8 3 h E& v $ $87HE& v ~ 0

# $
# # G # $

dy8@8 3 @ 0
# X

"7EV PV 2 y6db ` t
W S f f Q W W W ca w v $
In the above example the pattern we are searching for is etc. The file we are searching is /
etc/hosts.deny. A simple regular expression merely matches the string given anywhere in the line.
Notice that only the lines containing the string etc were printed!
If grep is invoked without a filename argument it will expect input from stdin.
In this example the output of the ls command is filtered by grep for lines containing host.
C $X
y8@8 3

8@8 3
# X
` b@8 3
f Q W W f R ca w v $
7EB V H6db ` t
G & # X #
dX ` b8@B ` b8@ " h@ ` 7E' o f @8xo 0 (
# X #
o r o G
o G $ &
G Gq
&

@
The next level of complexity is replace only part of the matched expression. This is useful when
the part in the parentheses could contain a number of different values.
This code will generate contents for an inetd.conf file where POP3, IMAP and FTP are
enabled (as well as POP3s, IMAPs). The \1 is replaced with whatever matched between
the parentheses, and the # at the start of the line is not sent to the output.
a 6 $ # &a
z%# @a 3 ""@'y
C $ G
%h"@ " @

sed stands for stream editor. sed is used in the following manner:
sed pattern [filename1 filename2..]
Like grep, sed parses input one line at a time. sed performs basic text transformations on the output
stream. The most-often used purpose of sed is to perform search and replace operations. The
simplest form of these is to search for a fixed regular expression, and replace with constant text.
21.3 sed
The regular expression sbin.*getty matches sbin followed by anything followed by getty
occurring anywhere in the line.
t
l t @@4@ 8"'%7" a '"'8a %f a l p0
6 ! 6 # # C $ G h
t
j t @@4@ 8"'%7" a '"'8a %f a j p0
6 ! 6 # # C $ G h
m ! & # # C $ G h f a
&%& @f @8@"'%7" a '"'8a %e b%& 0

e
86 "@ j { !@@8"'%a '"'8a h a ~ 0
f e
~
! $ # # C $ G
j @9@E@"'%a '"'8a h e a j
f
# & # # C $ G
h @9@E@"'%a '"'8a h e a h
f
# & # # C $ G
f a
# & # # C $ G
@9@E@"'%a '"'8a h e
f @9@E@"'%a '"'8a h e a f
f
# & # # C $ G
e @9@E@"'%a '"'8a h e a e
f
# & # # C $ G
@H@E@"'%a '"'8a h e a
f
$ # ! ! # & # # C $ G
I U W W t I
@@"7EV B@!Y7"hf y6db ` t
W ca w v $
The following example uses a slightly more complex regular expression:
T Q V W W
% S 7EV vp 7 hp @e
p i W
T% S 7EV v ' p @e
Q V W W p
p i W
T% S 7EV v p @e
Q V W W p
p i W
T Q V W W f f W R
% S 7EV EBe
T Q V W W p
% S 7EV v @e
p W
fEWVE'iV vhhp @e
W f W p fp i
W
f W V W f W p fp
EE'iV vh @e
W
f W V W f W f f W R
EE'iV EBe
These examples illustrate the use of switches to grep.

-i
case insensitive
-w
only matches whole words
-v
reverse match (print lines that don't match)
-r
recursive
-l
list filenames only (don't print the matching line)
grep can be used with switches to modify its behavior.

Common switches for grep:
Option Purpose
G X
87y8@8 3
6 X
7%dy8@8 3
dy8@8 3
# X
132
133
21.4 Review
Quiz questions
1. Which commands support regular expressions?

2. Which command can one use to search for the word ftp at the beginning of a line in all the
regular files in /etc?
3. How would one search for the word smtp at the beginning of a line in all the regular files in /
etc and its subdirectories?
4. Explain what the following regular expressions match (all of them are tricky)?
X
zi( { ! z
&
&
)B4e
e
2BP&
i( { ! @Xzi( { ! @zi( { ! @zi( { !
X
X

3 7
C | #
%HD
& $ X X $
'wbwY E&
5. Using sed, how can one search for the phrase big brother or big sister in an input stream, and
replace the big with little?
Assignment
1. Write a grep command line to search /etc/passwd for users that have both a home directory under
/home who also have a shell ending in sh (e.g. bash).
2. Write a grep command line which will match the word imap at the beginning of the line in /
etc/services, but not match the line imaps or imap4. How many entries are there for imap?
3. Write a grep command line to match lines in /etc/inetd.conf that do not start with a hash
character #.
4. Write a grep command line which will match ftp and http at the start of a line in /etc/services
followed by tcp later on the same line. How many FTP and HTTP related services exist?
5. Create a file consisting of the columns Match this and But not this from the table below.
Write regular expressions for grep to match the left hand column, but not the middle column.
Match this
But not this
en2a3
en22a3
en2b3
en22b3
Hint
Use *
part3a
part4x
part9b
part3A
partA3
partx7
Use []
Part34
part3a
part5x
PartA5
Use []
I H
na$PSW%F
0
4. echo "big brother" | sed 's/big $brother\|sister$/little \1/'
| # # $ '

X
zi( { ! z
' %88@# 8h(' h'
&
3
#
&
)B4e
'wB'"7$ 9 w

#
#
e
2BP&
$
"%$ 3 5 ` $ i( { ! @Xzi( { ! @zi( { ! @zi( { !

#
X
X
Sd0R 0

3 7
C | #
%HD
& $ X X $
'wbwY E&
I H F F F 0 x '
na$PSW%F )xa 3 7'
' C # ' C #
S%HH'' 0H S%HB''
' & $ $
x'HBH$ 3 E'
$ &
1. sed, grep and many others.

2. grep ^ftp /etc/* 2>/dev/null (send errors to /dev/null, since /etc is full of directories)
3. Here you go
apples
oranges
anything else
Use $ ...\| ...$
id23x56
id234xy88
id10x32
id9545x452
Use ?
id345x111
id344y231
Use [0-9]
Match this
But not this
Hint
134
22 vi
135
22 vi
vi is a visual editor with a difference it's hard to use.
Anyone who thinks UNIX is intuitive should be forced to write 5000 lines of code
using nothing but vi or emacs. AAAAACK!
Discussion in comp.os.linux.misc on the intuitiveness
of commands, especially Emacs
vi is preferred to other editors by system administrators because it is small and fast, will run on any
kind of terminal, yet is very powerful, efficient and flexible. vi's commands enable you to perform
any editing task quickly without having to leave the main keyboard and reach for the arrow keys. It
is the one editor you will find on every UNIX installation.
vi is standard equipment in Linux. For those trained on other editors, vi does take a little getting
used to. This chapter will enable you to do basic editing using vi.
LPIC topic 1.103.8 Perform basic file editing operations using vi [1]
Weight: 1
Objective
Candidate must be able to edit text files using vi. This objective includes vi navigation, basic vi
nodes20, inserting, editing, deleting, copying, and finding text.
vi
(editor)
/, ?
(search forward, search backward)
h,j,k,l
(left, up, down, right)
G, H, L
(end of file, head of page, end of page)
i, c, d, dd, p, o, a
(insert, change, delete, delete line, paste, add line, append)
ZZ, :w!, :q!, :e!
(save+exit, save, quit, edit file)
:!
(run external command)
22.1 vi modes
Most people are used to editors that have a single mode of operation, namely insert mode, with
additional commands that can be selected from menus (another mode). vi is different in that it has
three modes of operation, and none of these is a menu. vi is mostly used in command mode and
input mode.
Command mode Every pressed key is interpreted as part of a command. This includes the
keys a to z, which is very confusing for beginners. vi starts in Command mode. You can change
from Command mode to Input mode by pressing a key.
All commands may be preceded by a number. This number sets how many times the given
command should be executed. So while dw deletes one word, entering 3dw deletes three words
at once and 10x deletes 10 characters. 20dd deletes 20 lines.
Input mode To enter input mode, you press i (insert), o (add line), a (append) or r (replace). In
input mode, they keys you press are inserted as text, until you press Escape. To change from
Input mode back to Command mode, just press Escape.
20 Nodes? A typo, we think. More likely vi's modes.
22 vi
136
Ex21 mode To enter ex mode, type : followed by the ex mode command. ex mode makes it
possible to interact with the shell in very powerful and sophisticated ways. It is not necessary to
understand most of these, since you can do quite well with only a few elementary commands.
22.2 Command mode

The tables show the basic commands for vi. Using the command mode commands, you should be
able to:
Move the cursor to any line and to any part of the line
Insert and delete text
Undo changes
Search for text
The keys for command mode are shown here.
Key Action
Movement commands
j
moves cursor down one line
k
moves cursor up one line
h
moves cursor left one column
l
moves cursor right one column
Ctrl+F moves cursor down one screen
Ctrl+B moves cursor up one screen
G moves cursor to end of document
nG moves cursor to line n
w move cursor forward one word
b
move cursor back one word
0
move cursor to start of line
$
move cursor to end of line
H move cursor to the top of the page (similar to h)
L
move cursor to the bottom of the page (similar to l)
Changing to input mode
i
change to input mode (characters are inserted at the current cursor position)
a
change to input mode (characters are appended after the current cursor position)
A change to input mode (characters are appended at the end of the current line)
R change to input mode (replaces and overwrites old text)
r
change to input mode (overwrites the one character currently under the cursor
C change to input mode (rest of line is replaced by the new text)
o
change to input mode (add a line after the current line)
O change to input mode (add a line before the current line)
Searching commands
/
search for text
?
search backwards for text
n
find next
N find previous
#
find previous instance of the current word word
Useful commands
21 vi is the visual editor, while ex is the extended line editor that preceded it (no wysiwyg display). These days ex is
not used a lot outside of scripts. ex mode makes vi behave a lot like ex.
22 vi
137
Key Action
u
undo the last change
x
delete the current character (and puts in buffer)
dd delete the current line (and puts in buffer)
dw delete to the end of the current word (and puts in buffer)
cw change word (rest of the current word is overwritten by the input)
yy copy current line into buffer
p
paste text in buffer after cursor position
P
paste text in buffer before cursor position
J
append following line to current line
.
repeat the last command
Improvements available in some versions of vi
ZZ equivalent to :wq save and exit
ZQ equivalent to :q! - exit without saving
v
Visual mode
V Visual mode selection by lines
22.3 ex mode
In addition to the movement commands, you need to know a few commands for ex mode.
Command Action
Movement commands
:q
quit (if all files are saved)
:q!
quit without saving
:w filename write the file (save). The file name is optional.
:wq
save the file and exit
:x
save the file and exit
:e filename edit another file
:e! filename edit another file without saving the current file
Here are a few more useful ex commands that can make your time with vi more pleasant if you are
using a version of vi that supports them:
:syntax on turn on syntax highlighting
:set smartindent automatic indentation as you type program code
:set wrap show long lines over two or more lines
:set nowrap chop long lines shorter.
22.4 Cut and paste

Every time vi deletes text (e.g. d or x) the text is stored in the cut buffer. Text can be copied into
the cut buffer with y. This text can be inserted at the cursor position using p or P.
vim (a very improved version of vi) provides a visual mode which is used for cut and paste:
1. v or V (select area to copy or paste)
2. Mark area using movement commands
3. y (yank/copy) or d (delete/cut)
4. Move to destination
5. Paste using p (after cursor) or P (before cursor).
22 vi
138
22.5 Review
Quiz questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
What are the vi commands for up, down, left and right?
How do you search for the string The at the beginning of a line?
What is the key to exit insert mode?
What is the meaning of ! in command mode?
How do you delete an entire line?
How does vis cut and paste work?
Explain 3 different ways of getting into insert mode.
What is the quick equivalent for :wq?
Assignment
1. Install vim, run the vimtutor command, and work through the tutorial.
2. Don't use any editor except vi for editing files for one month. If you are using a Windows
system, download and install gvim and use that in preference to your regular editor.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
kjhl
/ ^The
Escape
Dont save
dd
d to delete (e.g. dd for a line, dw for delete word, 6dw for delete 6 words), p for paste (or P for
paste before).
7. i (insert), o (add line), O (add line before), a (append). Perhaps even cw (change word).
8. ZZ
23 fdisk and mkfs
139
23 fdisk and mkfs

file system, n.
<operating system> (FS, or filesystem) 1. A system for organizing directories
and files, generally in terms of how it is implemented in the disk operating
system. e.g., The Macintosh file system is just dandy as long as you don't have to
interface it with any other file systems.
The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing
If you are familiar with MS-DOS, you will have come across the notion of formatting a disk. This
is roughly what mkfs does it makes an empty filesystem into which you can put files. fdisk is
used to edit the partition table.
LPIC topic 1.104.1 Create partitions and filesystems [3]

Weight: 3
Objective
Candidates should be able to configure disk partitions and then create filesystems on media such
as hard disks. This objective includes using various mkfs commands to set up partitions to
various filesystems, including ext2, ext3, reiserfs, vfat, and xfs.
fdisk
edit partition table
mkfs
make filesystem
23.1 fdisk
fdisk edits the partition table. For each partition, the following information appears in the partition
table:
Active if the partition is marked as active, the default DOS MBR loader will load the boot
record from it during startup. (The default DOS MBR is installed with FDISK /MBR in DOS or
Windows)
Starting offset of the partition where on the disk the partition starts
Size of the partition where the partition ends
Partition type each operating system has a code allocated to its partitions.
In the listing below, the commands that are not used often have been removed.
x X X
r B t
i~ "@ e @~ x ~ "@ ~ bq
B t
~ 3 5 ` E ` @5%"F98 r e

&
$ C # # $ G # $ #
r t ` F" "8Fdbq %'B8F4"P$ 3 BE ` @Fr
# 6 x X X & $ # $ C
a 3 E"@F@"4EG @5H%H$
C & G $ # $ # #
e
x #$ 3 H44 3 Bgb$ 3 3 EFF 3 H 1
$
x
C # C # # 3
X
f e B@B57F 3 H ` ""7 ` H8P 1
v

#
& # 3
U S W S r f S
4h%@T 0 "w
$
# $ G
"7$H"F 3 B%G
#
G
# $ G C # $
"2DH$
#
# &
% 3 B%G
#
&
88@H#"4P@
G
$ G # C # v
#"H
$ G $
# $ # $ & &
HE s
a r G
vx)7 3 ` q E s

& # $ & &
mkfs is the interface through which you can make any kind of filesystem that Linux supports. The
most important option is the -t option which specifies the filesystem type.
23.2 mkfs
j
6
B"@ a

X v # #
y"72%7~
Xb8@P P 3 BH@"P8ED"75P 1
#
$ C $ C # 3
X $
b"7BB 3 F8@"D@2P 1
# v 3
X
Y'"F%@8
# t w
$ # $ G
"7H"F 3 2 a % A
# $ !
3 ED$ `
C
X $ # $ G $ ! r q #
b"7H"FPi9$ s
$ #
58$ 3 "7H"F 1
$ # $ G 3
C a r G
vx)7 3 ` q E s

& # $ & &
After you have modified the partition table, you write it to the disk using w. If there are mounted
partitions on the partition you modify, the kernel will not re-read the partition table, and the changes
do not take effect until the system reboots (or until the partitions are unmounted, and fdisk is run
again).
V axr88H@H248@q 8}
G

a
nxr l ! q 8B$ s
& # #
a r G
kx)7 3 ` q E s

& # $ & &
After creating the partition, we set it's type. This is actually not necessary, since the
default type is 83 (Linux). If we were creating a swap partition, it would be good practice
to set the type to 82 (although not strictly necessary).
h h
Ee
h
axr hhEe %$ ` dx hEe ! q %25 %o2B
B 9 o 9
9
I R U
FTw0H26$PSdyn!Ihn
U d I H d
a
xr %$ ` dx j

l
a r
nx@!
$ 6 #
"F%$ ` 2 E|
%o2H"7H@8
# $
"F%$ ` 2 E|
$ 6 #
! q "7H@"
#
& # #
8B$ s
q
d H I I R e R e R I R
0iih0gfS0a0f@!Pa
r@! q "B E'%G

# $ G $ &
G
ri86@H h q 8

$
# $ # $ & &
HE s
a r G
vx)7 3 ` q E s

& # $ & &
d H I I R e d R I R
0iih0g6a@!Pa
)0iih0g2!PW%lQ
d H I I R e 1 F F R U e
d H I I R e R I F
0iih0gf@!8@%
a
nxr h ! q 8B$ s
& # #
S a r G
gx)7 3 ` q E s

& # $ & &
To create a new partition, use n for new. Here we are deleting a partition, and creating it
again.
r w $q

8
#
#

8
#
G $ C
7Eh 8
#
e 1 w
f h { A
#
&
@E7~
f
8m
f
8m
e
m

m
l h h
o 'h yh
j
e
e e
o e { l
j h e
hEm e
v
"%
l l
l
l
j
j l
l
j e
h h
Ee
#

h 3 @
$ 6
$ 6
@ 3 @
f 3 @
$ 6
e 3 @
$ 6
3 @
$ 6
6
P"@
l l
l
l l
l
hj e
jhEe
h
$
~
h j j
e
88 hh ` F""798%|
# 5 #
h h a $ 6 v
# l
""7 j y"@ 8j y8 3 Ee z 3 @27
x f x $
a r G
vx)7 3 `

&
q
# $ & &
E s
A partition table may look something like this:
# $ v $
B57BB"7B%C
& # $ G $ #
p@E'B "H$ 3
# # 6 C
8$ 3 9"7$ 9 3 ED%
23 fdisk and mkfs
140
1. Name five file systems that can be created with mkfs.

Quiz questions
23.3 Review
m
X 6 ! !
b%8@BP5P4 ` e B@E| b@" ` 8%58@ 3 3 vyE7
#
X
& 6
C x $
# l
F8%& e 8@B 3 7EH8EB@E'8 ` 1
6 v $ $ & $ C &
3
# # $ & # # # $ &
da E ` 9p@E'8 ` 4"" 8G 75% A
# $ v #
# a $ # #
dy8"7B9% A
h 'h x j { x 'h e x f { m
f l
l l
a v # v $ v
y""4B@BEG "4" 8G ~
G 288 m e
G #
x G v
G 28G8#%@@% ` e { m YG 28"" e { m

& $
v
EG 2" m
%"B@"
5 v $ $
{
l e

@"B8G 79 3 H ` 86 @8 r X h q "" j f

v
v j f h h x # m f j
"" @j y89 @8
r y 6 9%@@%
5 q e 5 9 # & $
r y 6 %
5 q e 5 9 v
8b8@P~
# a G
5 $ &
!87p@E'8
iYp7EC H s
r #x q | $
# $
hFU@RGQ CDIAB%Sdk @
H
Xb"@P8'"Hp@ j
6 $ G v $ #
e ! $
l
r e %E'! m q e X ` e &
v
@ S 448% 7"hi5 db `

W i f T r If e G & ca
Here's an example of mkfs using the ext2 file system
Q
Fg g 0
g
hf 0
S V
De
U i f R
R 4Be
S V
PDe
575P7EW 8 g 0
Q Q R Q i W R T f
Q
g
hf 0
W R T f f T W r I f
7EW 8 7"hie
W R T f U i f R
7EW 4R 4Be
` Q V r ` f I W R T f
7P%g 2'847EW 68B76T 5De
` T Q Q W W S ` S S
Of these filesystems, you should understand the following:

mkfs -t ext2, or mke2fs or just mkfs the second extended filesystem. Better than minix.
mkfs -t ext3 ext2 with journaling (more reliable, and slower for some applications).
mkfs -t reiserfs, or mkreiserfs a journaling filesystem for Linux with efficient file storage, and
quick directory lookups.
mkfs -t vfat the native filesystem used by Windows 95 to Windows ME.
mkfs -t xfs SGI's journaling filesystem, ported to Linux.
Work through these commands to make a filesystem inside a file. Once you have done it using
ext2, repeat the exercise using each of the other filesystems discussed in this chapter.
` y ` &
X
v
` @y ` &
X
v
8@& y ` &
X
v
%E& y ` &
# X
v
` y ` &
tX
v
f dy ` &
X
v
e dy ` &
X
v
` y ` &
X
v
` '%y ` &
& $ X
v
` &
v
` @"'%P2db `
v & # e ca
d H I F e H d F d R H Q R H U 9 9
0i8an!Ga@S0an!W6%206R 4 6R 4
The following filesystems may be available on your system:
U S W S ! Q d H I e H Q U ! e I Q U I ! 3
8 8P0i!%67lWS%m654
f T r
8%
To create a filesystem on /dev/hda1, you would use mkfs something like this
23 fdisk and mkfs
141
23 fdisk and mkfs
142
2. When does the kernel read the partition table on the hard disks?
3. Under what circumstances will the kernel not reread the partition table after running fdisk, and
what error message is displayed?
4. What is the command to make a vfat filesystem on an existing partition, hda3?
Assignment
1. Run fdisk on /dev/hda (or your first hard disk). Make the following changes, but do not save
your changes (unless you want to practice using gpart):
a) Delete all of the partitions one by one using the d command.
b)Create a 64M primary partition, a 256Mb primary partition, and an extended partition
covering the rest of the disk.
c) Divide the extended partition into two equally sized logical partitions.
d)Set the type of the second partition to Linux swap, and set the type of the first logical partition
to Linux LVM.
2. Create one of each of the filesystems discussed above in its a partition. Mount the filesystems,
and copy the /usr tree to the new filesystem. Record the differences in the amount of free disk
space (df) and inodes (df -h) before and after copying the data. Suggest reasons for the
differences between filesystems.
3. Find out what a superblock is, and see what mkfs options each filesystem has with regard to its
superblock.
1.
2.
3.
4.
ext2, jfs, ext3, minix, msdos, reiserfs

At startup and after running fdisk
When one of the partitions is in use mounted or used as swap space.
mkfs.msdos /dev/hda3
24 fsck
143
24 fsck
fsck, <operating system> file system check. The Unix program that checks a file
system for internal consistency and bad blocks etc. and can repair some faults.
fsck is often used after a crash when the file system has been left in an
inconsistent state, e.g. due to incomplete flushing of buffers.
Used on Usenet newsgroup alt.sysadmin.recovery as substitute for **** and
became more main-stream after the Communications Decency Act.
The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (edited)
LPIC topic 1.104.2 Maintain the integrity of filesystems [3]

Weight: 3
Objective
Candidates should be able to verify the integrity of filesystems, monitor free space and inodes,
and repair simple filesystem problems. This objective includes the commands required to
maintain a standard filesystem, as well as the extra data associated with a journaling filesystem.
du
disk usage
df
disk free
fsck
filesystem check
e2fsck
filesystem check for ext2
mke2fs
make ext2 filesystem
debugfs
debug ext2 filesystem
dumpe2fs
show ext2 filesystem parameters
tune2fs
change ext2 filesystem parameters
24.1 Disk space

There is only so much space on your disk for data. When all the space is used up, you can't put
anything else on. Because of practical limits to the organisation of filesystems, your disk may be
full before every nook and cranny is crammed with data. Linux filesystems also reserve a certain
amount of data for the use of root this space cannot be used by a non-root user. The idea is that
root should continue to be able to make files, even when the disk is full.
24.1.1 df disk free

df shows the amount of disk space free. As optional parameters, you can pass a list of files, and df
will show the space available for each of those files' filesystems.
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directories, i.e. including the files in those directories).
The most useful switches for du are these
-h human readable. By default du displays the number of disk sectors used.
-s summarise (show totals for each directory, not detail)
-c count (show a grand total)
24.1.2 du
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24 fsck
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24.2 Detecting and correcting errors

Linux makes changes to filesystems in the following manner:
Changes are made to the in-memory buffer cache
The changed buffers are written to disk (some time later).
This scheme makes it possible to avoid unnecessary writing to the disk, especially when many
changes are made to a single buffer. If there is a disk error, or a system crash of some sort, the
modified buffers are not necessarily written to the disk, and unusual inconsistencies arise. The
various fsck programs check filesystems and correct the errors.
24.2.1 fsck
fsck is the interface for checking any given filesystem. During startup fsck -A is run to check all
the filesytems listed in /etc/fstab. Depending on the filesystem to be checked, fsck will use one of
the following programs.
e2fsck or fsck.ext2 second extended filesystem (ext2)
reiserfsck check a reiser filesystem (this is not possible if the filesystem is mounted, even readonly)
fsck.minix minix filesystem
fsck.msdos FAT filesystem22
fsck.vfat Windows 95 to ME VFAT filesystems
fsck.xfs XFS filesystem check
fsck cannot check a filesystem while the filesystem is in use (mounted read-write). This is because
fsck may make changes to the filesystem which make the kernel behave badly, since the data on the
disk changes in unexpected ways. reiserfsck has the additional restriction that you cannot check a
filesystem which is mounted read-only, which makes it a little difficult to recover from serious
errors without the use of a rescue system.
24.2.2 ext2
e2fsck
e2fsck checks the consistency of the file system. If there are errors, it will make changes to the file
system to correct the errors.
Deleted files which have not been removed from their parent directories are removed. It is quite
common for a file which is in use to be deleted, but to remain open. The problem is fixed
automatically.
The filesystem check may locate files which have become detached from their containing
directory. These files are saved in the lost+found directory in the root of the filesystem (e.g. /
home/lost+found if the filesystem is mounted at /home). The file name used is based on the
inode number, although this is seldom useful, since the file name is missing.
Cross linked sectors are sectors which are allocated to more than one inode (file). This problem
is resolved by copying the sector and allocating one copy to each inode.
Various inconsistencies are eliminated, such as incorrect hard link counts, parent directories not
22 fsck.msdos will destroy data on a vfat filesystem if you are unfortunate enough to try it. The two filesystems are
almost compatible, but using the incorrect filesystem check scrubs off vfat information.
23 Or even if you do speak Greek, and you can't understand it.
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Don't feel bad if some of the output is Greek23 as the BUGS section of the man page explains,
You need to know the physical filesystem structure to understand the output.
dumpe2fs
The debugfs program is an interactive file system debugger. It can be used to examine and change
the state of an ext2 file system. When debugfs is running, you can enter specific commands
detailed in the man page. These can also be entered on the command line with -R command. -w
enables write mode, in which changes may be made to the filesystem.
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The following options are useful with e2fsck (or fsck.ext2)
-f force a check, even if the filesystem was cleanly unmounted.
-p preen fix without questions.
-n assume an answer of no to any question, and do a read-only check of the filesystem.
-y assume an answer of yes to any question.
-c check the disk using the badblocks program.
24 fsck
146
24 tune2fs is shorthand for tuna fish, as in I can't tune a piano, but I can tune2fs.
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24.2.3 reiserfs
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You probably don't want to change these options on your filesystems too often.
-c max-mounts-count how many times it can be mounted without a fsck.
-i 10d the number of days (d) or weeks (w) or months (m) the filesystem can go without a fsck.
-e remount-ro what the kernel should do if it finds an error in this filesystem. Options are
remount-ro (read-only), continue and panic. The default is to continue.
-g group -u user -r reserved-blocks-count which group and user can use the reserved blocks on
the disk. The standard options reserve a few blocks for the user root and the group root so that
the system still functions when the filesystem is full.
-U UUID set the universally unique identifier for the filesystem. This can be used in /etc/fstab
and for locating the journal of a filesystem.
Here is how you add a journal to an existing filesystem using tune2fs. This converts it from ext2 to
ext3.
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tune2fs change ext2 filesystem parameters

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24.3 Review
Quiz questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
In which two ways can a Linux file system become full?

Where are lost files stored when they are recovered during a filesystem check?
How does du differ from df?
What is debugfs, and for which filesystems is it available?
Why are deleted files often found during a filesystem check?
Assignment
1. Set up an ext2 filesystem in a partition. Set the label of this partition to CRASHME and mount
the filesystem at /mnt/crashme. How large is the partition? How many inodes are available?
How much space is available for files?
2. Copy a large directory tree (e.g. /usr) to your filesystem (cp -a /usr /mnt/crashme). While this
copy process is in process, reboot the computer forcibly by pressing the reset button. Use the
diagnostic commands to examine the effect of doing this.
Now set up a journal for your e2fs partition, and repeat the operation above. Make notes on
what you observe.
3. Repeat the previous assignment with the other filesystems you have available. Do any of these
survive the treatment?
4. Create an ext3 filesystem, and copy some files to it. Use tune2fs to remove the journal from the
ext3 partition and convert it into a ext2 partition.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Run out of space, and run out of available inodes.

lost+found in the root directory of the filesystem.
du reads the disk like ls, while df display summary information only.
debugfs shows filesystem information. It's available for ext2/3. Tools do exist for other
filesystems, but do not have the name.
5. Linux allows open files to be deleted. The files stay on the disk, but their directory entries are
removed.
25 Mounting
150
25 Mounting
Recursive traversal of loopback mount points.
BOFH excuse of the day
Linux does not have A: for its floppies, C: for its hard disk, D: for another hard disk and H: to Z: for
network connections. Instead all files are arranged in a big tree, the file hierarchy, rooted at /. The
files can be spread out over several devices. The mount command attaches the filesystem found on
a device to the file hierarchy. The umount command detaches filesystems from the file hierarchy.
This chapter is primarily concerned with hard disk partitions and removable media, and omits
mention of the various network filesystems that Linux supports.
LPIC topic 1.104.3 Control mounting and unmounting filesystems [3]

Weight: 3
Objective
Candidates should be able to configure the mounting of a filesystem. This objective includes the
ability to manually mount and unmount filesystems, configure filesystem mounting on bootup,
and configure user mountable removeable filesystems such as tape drives, floppies, and CDs.
/etc/fstab
file system table
mount
mount a filesystem
umount
unmount a filesystem
25.1 mount
The mount command without any options shows the filesystems which are mounted as part of the
filesystem.
On this system, partitions of the first IDE hard disk /dev/hda are mounted at / and /home.
The additional entries are kernel virtual filesystems (/proc, /dev/pts, and /dev/shm).
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During the boot sequence, the command mount -a is run. mount -a reads /etc/fstab and, for each
line, mounts the appropriate filesystem at the designated mount point.
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What to mount usually a partition
Mount point where to mount it. swap is a special mount point for swap files and swap
partitions (virtual memory).
Filesystem the -t type of the filesystem must be given. If the filesystem is auto, mount will
try all the filesystems supported by the kernel (listed in /proc/filesystems).
Options the -o options required for mounting the partition are given. If no special options are
required, the word defaults is used. noauto tells mount -a that the filesystem should not be
mounted when the system starts up. ro is read-only, and rw is read-write.
Dump if you use dump for backups of your filesystems, you will set this value accordingly.
Pass at which point must this filesystem be checked by fsck during boot-up. 0 means no
check, 1 means first, and is used for the root filesystem, and higher values are used for the
other filesystems.
25.3 Options for mount

The following switches for mount are available regardless of the type of filesystem being mounted.
mount -t filesystem mount as if the device contains a specific filesystem, e.g. iso9660, reiserfs,
ext2, ext3, etc.
mount -V show the version of mount (doesn't actually mount anything).
mount -a mount all filesystems
mount -o option1,option2,option3 this sets the options for mounting.
mount -n mount without changing /etc/mtab. You need to do this when /etc is on a read-only
filesystem, i.e. mount /dev/hda2 / -n -o remount,rw
Each filesystem has a number of -o options which are supported by it.
The following -o options usually appear in /etc/fstab to control the mounting behaviour of the
filesystem.
auto this option is used in /etc/fstab to specify that the system must be mounted automatically
at boot-up. The opposite is noauto.
user this option specifies that a regular user may mount and unmount the filesystem. The
default is nouser. The users option specifies that any user can mount and unmount a filesystem
(not only the user that mounted it).
The following -o restrict the way in which a mounted filesystem can be used. Often the nosuid,
noexec and nodev restrictions are used for removable media for security reasons.
ro read-only (no changes are written to the filesystem) (opposite is rw for read-write).
suid set-uid bits on file permissions are honoured (opposite is nosuid).
exec executable files are allowed on the filesystem (opposite is noexec).
dev character and block devices are allowed on the filesystem (opposite is nodev).
These -o options don't fit into the categories above.
async changes are written to the filesystem asynchronously, and not as they occur (opposite is
25 Mounting
152
sync, where any changes are written to the filesystem before processing continues).
remount When the filesysem you mount is already mounted, to change the mount options, you
use -o remount.
defaults equivalent to rw, suid, dev, exec, auto, nouser, and async.
25.4 Removable media

Floppy disks, CD-ROMs and other removable media need to be mounted before they are used,
unless you use some tool such as the mtools package (for floppy disks), cdparanoia or dd to read the
device directly.
Usually, a line like this appears in /etc/fstab (sometimes specifying /floppy or /mnt/floppy instead of
/media/floppy).
# x $
%'x @"b#

$
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6
This means that any user can access the floppy disk with any of these commands. The user cannot
specify any options to override the options listed in /etc/fstab.
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The lines for a CD-ROM are typically something like this (from various machines). All of the fstab
lines specify user (so that a regular user can access the media) and noauto (so that the media is not
mounted by root during startup).
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25.5 Review
Quiz questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
Write the full command to mount the first partition of the third scsi disk on the /mnt directory
How would you allow a non root user to mount a cdrom on /mnt/cdrom?
How does one prevent a filesystem from being mounted at bootup?
Who can use the umount command?
Assignment
1. Create an ext2 filesystem on /dev/fd0 using mke2fs. Mount the floppy disk as read-write and
copy /etc/passwd onto the floppy. Remove the floppy disk and set the read-only tag. Configure
your system to mount the floppy disk read only when you boot up. Does it work? If not, make it
work. What can a floppy disk like this be used for? What happens if the floppy disk is not in the
drive when the system is booted?
2. Configure your system so that a regular user can mount and unmount the floppy disk, but ensure
that no executable files on the floppy disk can be run. Test whether your changes work. (You
will need to undo the effects of the previous assignment.)
3. Create a loopback filesystem, and mount it on /mnt/loop. To create the filesystem you can use
the following script or any other method.

` @" ` e &
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Which option is required to mount in order to use the filesystem you have created?
25 Mounting
153
1.
2.
3.
4.
mount /dev/sdc1 /mnt

Create an entry in /etc/fstab with user and noauto in the options column.
Add noauto in the options column in /etc/fstab.
Only root, unless the filesystem was mounted by the user and the options column in /
etc/fstab includes user.
26 Quotas
154
26 Quotas
I hate quotas.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, when his system administrator
said he couldn't have another 50 Megs
Quotas are the nemesis of disk hungry users and programs. Actually, they cause problems. Quotas
enable the administrator to restrict the amount of disk space available to a given user or a given
group. Quotas are often used on web servers to restrict the size of a user's web directory. Quotas
on mail servers prevent a single user's mail from filling up the disk.
LPIC topic 1.104.4 Managing disk quota [3]

Weight: 3
Objective
Candidates should be able to manage disk quotas for users. This objective includes setting up a
disk quota for a filesystem, editing, checking, and generating user quota reports.
quota
Show disk usage and limits
edquota
Modify quotas for a user or group
repquota
Report on quotas
quotaon
Turn quotas on for a filesystem
26.1 Overview
In order to use quotas, the kernel must be compiled with quota support. When quotas are enabled,
the kernel notes each operation that causes a change in the amount of disk space allocated to a user
or to a group.
The quota commands are used in the following sequence.
1. Add the usrquota or grpquota option to /etc/fstab for the filesystems that require quota support.
2. Run quotacheck -avug to determine the amount of disk space allocated to each user and group,
and create the quota files quota.user and quota.group in the root directory of the filesystems.
3. Run quotaon to enable quotas.
4. Run edquota to set quotas for users
5. Run repquota to view the usage of quotas.
The quota commands discussed in this section have the following switches in common:
-v verbose
-a all file systems with quotas as listed in /etc/fstab
-u user quotas (the default)
-g group quotas
26.2 Enabling Quotas

When a filesystem is mounted with the usrquota or the grpquota option, the kernel applies quota
control on that filesystem. The quota system must be initialised before the system is mounted.
If you set up quotas on an existing system, you might do it something like this. The first
step is to modify fstab.
The edquota command allows the administrator to edit the quota for a user or a group. edquota's
26.3 Setting quotas

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To make these quotas come into effect, we run quotaon -avug. This requires quota support in the
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single before running quotacheck, without -m.
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Now it can't find the file. So let's give it the file. For version 1 quotas, it would be
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26 Quotas
155
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The blocks and inodes columns specify the amount of blocks and inodes actually in
use, according to the kernel quota system.
Disk quotas are a really good reason not to get on the wrong side of the system
administrator.

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default mode of operation is to edit the quotas for a user

edquota allows you to edit a temporary file that sets the quota for the user. The blocks
parameter indicates the number of blocks in use. The actual size allocated depends on the
size of the blocks on the filesystem. The inodes limit allows the administrator to limit the
number of files the user may create.
26 Quotas
156
1. Set up quotas on a filesystem as explained in the notes above. Edit quotas for a user and allow
the user 50Mb more space and 50 more files than the user currently has available. Run the
command dd if=/dev/zero of=dir/$RANDOM.junk bs=1k count=1000 until the quota is reached,
and write down an explanation of the behaviour you see.
2. Set the grace period for users exceeding the soft limit to one minute, and explain the behaviour
of commands when the quota is exceeded.
Assignment
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Name 2 Linux filesystems that support quotas, and name one filesystem that does not.
What happens when the soft limit is reached?
What happens when the hard limit is reached?
Who can adjust filesystem quotas?
If changes are made to the filesystem while quotas are not enabled, which command must be
used for quotas to work correctly?
Quiz questions
26.5 Review

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26.4 Reporting with repquota

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disk space usage.
If we remove a file, we should have some inodes spare, and some space too.
26 Quotas
157
26 Quotas
158
1. reiserfs does not support quotas in some kernel versions. Ext2, ext3 and others do support
quotas. Read-only file systems do not support quotas.
2. Nothing happens. quota -q begins to display a warning message.
3. The filesystem behaves as if it is full.
4. Only root.
5. quotacheck -avug (or specify the specific filesystem)
25 Kernel patches that implement access control lists for certain filesystems are available. These are not standard
equipment on a Linux installation. Having only one owner and one group makes Linux a simpler and more robust
system.
Every file has one owner and one group25. Only the owner or root can change a file's permissions
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The items that affect the permissions of a file are displayed when using the ls -l command:
The file type (e.g. a regular file, a directory, a symbolic link, etc). This is the first character on
each line in the output of ls.
The permissions of the file (e.g. rwxr-xr-x).
The user and group of the file.
27.1 Ownership and permissions

Weight: 5
Objective
Candidates should be able to control file access through permissions. This objective includes
access permissions on regular and special files as well as directories. Also included are access
modes such as suid, sgid, and the sticky bit, the use of the group field to grant file access to
workgroups, the immutable flag, and the default file creation mode.
chmod
Change file mode
umask
Change user mask
chattr
Change file attributes (ext2 only)
LPIC topic 1.104.5 Use file permissions to control access to files [5]
Linux restricts access to the filesystem based on one of these ...
The owner of the files
The permissions of the files
The permissions and ownership of the parent directories.
This chapter discusses the permissions of filesystem objects.
Mom
No.
27 Permissions
27 Permissions
159
27 Permissions
160
using chmod. The owner can change the group of the file to any group of which he is a member
(using chgrp).
File permissions are represented with the letters r (read), w (write) and x (execute).
User Group Others
rwx
rwx
rwx
The interpretation of the permissions are as follows.

r read permission (for a directory, that means you can view the file listing)
w write permission
x execute permission (for a directory, that means you can use the files inside the directory)
- no permission (if there is a dash in the place of the letters r, w or x, then that permission is
absent).
s sticky bit (this can appear in the place of x for the user or group).
t sticky bit (this can appear in the place of x for others).
The sticky bits are explained in detail for each file type.
27.2 chmod
chmod changes file access permissions.
Symbolic chmod
The symbolic syntax for chmod allows you to change the permissions of a file for the category user,
group or others.
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You can specify multiple changes by separating them by comas.

Symbol
Usage
$

user, group, others26 or all. Default is all, but limited by umask value.
5 !
!8o
add, subtract or set permissions

r read permission
w write permission
x execute permission
X execute permission provided the file has execute permissions
already
s set user id or set group id
t sticky
u same as user's permissions
g same as user's permissions
o same as other people's permissions

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26 It is rather easy to think you are changing the owner's permissions with o, which actually stands for other.
27 Octal is a base-8 number system, using the digits 0 to 7. Decimal is base 10 (0 to 9), binary base 2 (0 and 1) and
hexadecimal base 16 (0 to 9 and A to F). The reason octal is used is that each permission is represented as a bit
which is either set or unset, and octal conveniently allows you to group three bits into one digit.
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V U q x g
ca
&
E8G
# # $
B%8G t ` 88 % 3 f` F" E8P8$ 3 nb%& 3
a C $ v $ t &
v # & G # # a
r Y g e h" V 0 db `
V U q
g i Q
i S Q
ca
chmod -R changes the permissions of a directory and its files and subdirectories.
Here we remove permissions from all other users for jack's home directory, and make sure he has
write and execute permissions on his own files. We discover that we can't change the mode of the
immutable file (see the section on ext2fs attributes).
Recursive chmod
Symbolic
Octal
Example
!%%E
! ! ! ! C
! %
! !
C
! ! !
! %
C
0750
/home/user
0751
/etc/ppp/peers
0644
/etc/bashrc
! ! ! ! ! ! C
%E
0640
/etc/aliases.db
%7%
! !
C
% %7
! ! C
4755
/bin/ping
2755
/usr/bin/write

C C C
1777
/tmp
Some examples of symbolic and octal permissions.

4 2 1 4 2 1 4 2 1 4 2 1
s s t r w x r w x r w x
Sticky
User
Group Others
Every letter in rwx corresponds to a bit: --- is 0, --x is 1, -w- is 2, r-- is 4. The idea is to
add the digits together as well, so -wx is 3 and r-x is 5.
t

!
1 s ( # G
'8 w @8 E"8@

%& 3
The octal mode of chmod sets the file permissions to exactly the value specified as an octal
number27.
Octal chmod
W R T U i f R
2R 4Be
I T d R 1 I 1 R d H
!86%xqS0fw!i2aa0Sn6%y6PPE
d H Q Q
X06%Snle
v t r q i c g f e c a Y X
4usFpi hBbdb`BW
W R T U i f R
2R 4Be
27 Permissions
161
27 Permissions
162
27.3 File types

File types on Linux are identified by the left hand character in the output of ls. The following
possibilities exist:
regular files
d directory
l symbolic link
b block device
c character device
p named pipe (made with mkfifo)
s socket (unix domain socket)
Each type of file has slightly different behaviour based on its permissions.
Regular files
Regular files are identified by - before the permissions.
G z$
X $
m a
hh { e
j

G w e {

! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
! e ( v $ t w v $ t
F42yxH ` u
The following permissions are quite common for a file.

rw-r--r-- 0644 only the file owner may modify the file
rw-rw-r-- 0664 the user and the group may read and write the file
rwxr-xr-x 0755 This file is executable, and can be modified by the owner.
rwx------ 0700 The file is executable, but only for the owner.
For a executable files, the set-uid bits have the following meanings:
Set user-id bit: the program may choose to set its real user id to the effective user id of the file.
This allows a program to do privileged operations as root, or as some other user.
Set group-id bit: the program may choose to set its real group id to the effective group id of the
file. The file can then do actions requiring the permissions of the specific group.
Under Linux, effects of settings the other sticky bits are largely undefined. On non-Linux systems,
setting these bits requests in-memory caching of the file, and mandatory locking (except for NFS).
Directories
Directories are identified by a d in the directory listing. The interpretation of permissions for
directories is as follows.
r Read permission means a user can observe the list of files in the directory.
w Write permission means a user can create files in the directory.
x Execute permission means a user can open files inside the directory (provided the user has
permissions to read the actual file).
The following permissions are quite common for a directory:
drwxr-xr-x 0755 The owner can make files in the directory, and others can read the files that
are there.
drwxr-x--- 0750 The group can read from the directory, but not modify it, and all others are
barred.
drwx------ 0700 A directory for the exclusive use of the owner.
drwx--x--x 0711 All users, except the owner, can open files in this directory, if they happen
to know the file names. This permission is suitable for a web server.
For directories files, the set-uid and sticky bits have the following meanings:
27 Permissions
163
Set group-id bit New files created in the directory are given the group id of the directory, rather
than the group id of the process that created them.
Sticky bit Files in the directory can only be deleted by their owner. This permission is used for
the /tmp directory, to prevent denial of service and symbolic link race attacks between users.
Symbolic links
Symbolic links are created with the ln -s command. The owner of the symbolic link is the user that
created the link, but the permissions for a link always look like this.
C $ G ! C $ e f
%h"@B!H%h"G e a 82f

G w
v $
t
v $
t
C C C
S f f U U i f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
y%8FR 4ByxH ` u
S f f U W f i R e ( v $ t w v $ t
y%8V p7ByxH ` u
When chmod is used on a symbolic link, it acts on the file that the link points to.

`
f f

` e a 82f

G w
!5 e a 82f G w
! v # f f
v $
t
v $
t
v#H `

v #

v #
H

f
8hh
C C C
f
8hh
! ! ! ! ! ! ! C
E!
$ ! e ( v $ t w v $ t
42yxH ` u
j %& 3 2yxH ` u
e ( v $ t w v $ t
! # e ( v $ t w v $ t
` 52yxH ` u
3 %4yxH ` u
e ( v $ t w v $ t
The permissions for a symbolic link are therefore largely irrelevant, since they can not be changed.
Having a link pointing to a file does not provide a user any additional permissions to the file.
C ! v # l f
$ 3 %@B!5"& e a 82f
# # &
%H E s a "vb
v # & a $
r R U V e ( v $ t w v $ t
7E P DyxH ` u

G w
v $
t
v $
t
C C C
r R i f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
7E R 4ByxH ` u
r R Q S U f W f i R e ( v $ t w v $ t
7E 28hiV p7ByxH ` u
Pipes, sockets and devices
Named pipes made with mkfifo (p) allow programs to stream information to each other. Both
programs require permissions on the FIFO for this to work, and the sticky bits have no particular
significance.
UNIX domain sockets (file type s) allow programs on a single machine to communicate using
sockets. On Linux UNIX domain sockets respect the permissions of the directory they appear in.
The set-id and sticky bits have no particular significance.
Character devices (file type c) and block devices (file type b) behave like regular files as far as
their permissions are concerned.
27.4 umask
The umask setting of a process determines the permissions with which a file is created by default.
During login an initial value is set usually in /etc/profile.
If the umask is 000, then files are created with permissions of 0666 (rw-rw-rw-) and directories with
permissions of 0777 (rwxrwxrwx). The umask value is subtracted from the permissions that the file
would be created with. Usually umask digits are either 0, 2 or 7.
0 read, write and execute allowed.
2 no read permissions for files or directories.
7 no permissions at all.
The more common values for umask are shown in the table.
C # $
t ` HF%@ `
C h a
%C Ee 2f
% Ee 2f
C h a
h a
C
t ` Ee 2f
q T S
682 0 xH ` w
( $

T S
6q8D e 8 V 0 xH ` w
U
( $

a C
b%h$ s
g f e ( $ w v $ t
hHyxH ` u
#@9 3 CDE&8GFB%8G a $ 3

# # $

q T
68SD e 8 DyxH ` u
U V e ( $ w v $ t
C C ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
%@X !
%X !
C ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
C ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
t ` X !
ByxH ` u
U f R e ( $ w v $ t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
R 4ByxH ` u
i f R e ( $ w v $ t
G w
G w

G w
vt
$
vt
$
v $
t
The chattr command manipulates ext2 filesystem attributes. lsattr displays these attributes. The
following attributes can be set on the ext2 filesystem (and not on other filesystems):
i immutable the file cannot be changed, unless the immutable bit is removed first
a append only this file can only be appended to, not rewritten.
s secure deletion after the file is deleted, the blocks that stored its data are blanked out.
Here's an example of setting the immutable flag on a file.
27.5 Ext2 attributes

l X

j X

h X

X
f X

e X

X

X

S r
%gc
hh
hh
hh
hh
hh
hh
hh
hh

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f
G
G
G
G
G
G
G

G
w j {
w j {
w j {
w j {
w j {
w j {
w j {
w j {
%% h%84kc 2
u t r f U g Q S
l b
X
j b
X
h b
X
X
b
f b
X
e b
X
b
X
b
X
g Q c
V
e
` 'h
e
` 'h
e
` 'h
e
` 'h
e
` 'h
e
` 'h
e
` 'h
e
` 'h

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f

a 2f
G
G
G
G
G
G
G

G
vt
$
v $
t e
! !
!
!
vt
$
v $
t e
!
vt
$
v $
t e
! C
E'!
'!
vt
$
v $
t e
C
vt
$
v $
t e
! !
%
%
vt
$
v $
t e
!
vt
$
v $
t e
! C
E

v $
t
v $
t e
C
t %SBR 4Byx7EP `
S U i f R e ( v $ &
W Q S
kc %% C %S
u t
%% @4yx7EP `
u
Q T e ( v $ &
V
4q997
C C

C C

C C

C C

C C

C C

C C

C C

w v $ t
u
w v $ t
u
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! ! C ! C
EE!
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! ! C ! C
EE!
v $
t
v $
t
! C ! ! C ! C
E'EE!
v $
t
v $
t
! C ! ! C ! C
E'EE!
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
vt
$
v $
t
! C ! C ! C
EEE!
vt
$
v $
t
! C ! C ! C
EEE!
t WR4R 4Byx7EP ` u
T i f R e ( v $ & w v $ t
W Q S
kc %% C T
u t W R
%% @4yx7EP ` u
u
Q T e ( v $ & w v $ t
w
w
w
w
w
w
w
%% h%84kc 2
u t r f U g Q S
And here we do it for directories.
V
4q997
Of course, the umask values can be set to any value from 0 to 7.
!!
! ! ! !
!! %
! !
% %
! !
%
!
C
! ! ! ! ! ! ! C
E
! ! ! ! ! ! C
%E
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E
! ! ! C ! C
%EE
C

C

C

C

077
027
022
002
Umask
27 Permissions
Directories
Files
164
27 Permissions
165
# # &
%H E s t ` da 3 "
a C
$
C
t ` 2 0 xHw
( $ #
C C ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
%@X !
%X !
C ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
C ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
t ` X !
R 0 xH ` w
U f
( $

& G # # $
E8FB%8G t ` v 8@%Pn
a C
6 & # # $ a &
rt ` v ` @8H% P7%D8@%k
| C

G & $ G ! C 6 & a &
27.6 Review
Quiz questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
What is the effect of setting the sticky bit for a file?

What is the meaning of chmod 640 filename?
Which users may change the permissions on a given file?
What are the default permissions for a file and for a directory when the umask is 0027?
What is the effect of the set group-id bit for a directory?
Which filesystems support chattr and lsattr?
Assignment
1. Write down the commands do do the following. Create files using touch and set the following
permissions:
file1 -rw-rw-rw-; file2 -rwxrwxrwx; file3 -rwsr-xr-x; file4 -rwx------; file5 ---------x;
file6 -r-xr-Sr-x; file7 -rws------ (that's an entirely useless set-uid bit that is).
Create directories using mkdir and set the following permissions:
dir1 drwxrwxrwx; dir2 drwx--x--x; dir3 drwxrwsr-x; dir4 drwxrwxrwt; dir5 ----------;
dir6 drwxr-xr-x; file7 drwxr-x--2. Run the command chmod -R 000 ~. What happens, and why? How can you fix it? Hint: find
-type d | xargs chmod something {} \; ... repeat ...
3. Use find to create a list of the files on your disk which are world writable.
4. Sort this list into different types of files. Hint: use ls -ld to show the file type ...
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Nothing happens, except that the sticky bit is set.

Set permissions to rw-r----- for the file.
Root and the file owner. Not group members.
For a file 0666 - 027 = 0640 (rw-r-----), for a directory 0777 - 027 = 0750 (rwxr-x---).
Files and directories in the directory receive the group of the directory.
ext2 and ext3
28 File ownership
166
28 File ownership
I really hate this damned machine
I wish that they would sell it.
It never does quite what I want
But only what I tell it.
(All the good quotes were taken)
In Linux, you get your own files. Nobody else can fiddle them, unless you allow them to. This
chapter is about setting the ownership of files.
LPIC topic 1.104.6 Manage file ownership [1]

Weight: 1
Objective
Candidates should be able to control user and group ownership of files. This objective includes
the ability to change the user and group owner of a file as well as the default group owner for
new files.
chmod
Change file mode (permissions)
chown
Change file owner (and maybe group too)
chgrp
Change file group
28.1 File ownership

Every file on the Linux filesystem is assigned a single owner and a single group yes, only one
group. Linux allows you to assign permissions for the owner (user), group, and other users, namely
permission to read, write and execute (or search, for directories).
The user that creates a file is the owner of the file, and the assigned group is the primary group of
the user (by default). If the permissions on the file permit reading, writing or executing by the
group, any member of the group can exercise those permissions.
The owner of a file can change its group to any other group of which he is a member. The
command for this function is chgrp. Root can change the group of any file to any value.
The user root is able to change ownership of files using chown.
One day jack deletes his .bashrc. Oops.
V f U I
h%8
DyxH ` u
e ( v $ t w v $ t
So root made another one for him (because jack didn't know how to do it himself, I
suspect).
$
% 3 "X
f a
% B
7$EF e

! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
V f U I
h%8 R 4fR 0 xHw
i
( v $ t #
Vhf%U8I'%hfiV W4 V 0 xHw
R W r
( v $ t #
a C
b%h$ s
g f e ( v $ t w v $ t
hHyxH ` u
Unfortunately, the ownership was incorrect but that was fixed with chown. In fact,
chown can set the group as well.
V f U I
h%8

@" W 0 xHw
( v $ t #
f W f g V U q Q
E'Yr H V 0 xHw
( v $ t #

` yh a j2f G w

v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!

$
R 4B5G 8# db `
i f R e
C G & ca
W R T
5 g Q F5G 8# db `
V e
C G & ca
x v $
r88$ 3 #8q xrityq yh EG riyq yh 68iyq yh 6%

5

v $ t 5 r v $ t 5
S e
B5G 8# db `
C G & ca
2D2db `
W S V e ca
H'%2db `
W i S r e ca
Here we do it with newgrp. newgrp creates a session with a different primary group, which is why
we have to exit.
e ` # j a 2f G w

C
j
$ #
8 3 8 t
v $
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!

` # h a 2f G w
C
j
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
% %
X
X h a 2f G w j {
j
v $
t
v $ e
t
! !
C
X j a 2f G w j { D8 3 8 t e

j
$ #
v $
! C C
%7
m
$
U i f R e G & ca
R 4B2@8 db `
W R T W V e G & ca
"B g Q F2@8 db `
f e q D2@8 db `
S Q V e G & ca

` # h a 2f G w
C
j
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
% %
X
X h a 2f G w j {
j
v $
t
v $ e
t
! !
C
X h a 2f G w j { D8 3 8 t e

j
$ #
v $
!
%
C C
m
$
U i f R e G & ca
R 4B2@8 db `
W R T W V e G & ca
"B g Q F2@8 db `
% %
X
X h a 2f G w j {
j
v $
t
v $ e
t
! !
C
%
X h a 2f G w j { D8 3 8 t e
j
$ #
v $
!
C C
m
$
U i f R e G & ca
R 4B2@8 db `
E B 8 D2@8 db `
f S U W W Q I V e G & ca
f S V c f i S r e G & ca
7EW 8 2k7EW 8 H'%2@8 db `
r $ # x r v $ t 5 r v $ t 5 r v $ t 5
88 3 8q xiyq yh EG iyq yh 68iyq yh 6%
S e G & ca
B5 db `
There are three distinct ways of setting the group of a new file:
Set the set-gid bit on the directory
Use newgrp before running the command.
Change the group after the fact with chgrp.
To set the set-gid bit on a directory, use chmod after setting the group with chgrp.
28.2 Default group

% 3 $"X % B
f a
$ e
7EF
$ #
8 3 8
v $
t
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
V f U I U i f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
h%8 R 4ByxH ` u
V f U I f S U W W Q I V e ( v $ t w v $ t
h%8 E B 8 DyxH ` u
r88 3 8q xiyx hh EG iyx hh 68iyq 8hh 6%
$ # x r v $ t q 5 r v $ t q 5 r v $ t f 5
S e ( v $ t w v $ t
ByxH ` u
& G # # $
E8FB%8G z% 3 "X f` 9G B8$ 3 nYG 3
a $ v
# # a
V f U I f W f g V e ( v $ t w v $ t
h%8 E'B 8 DyxH ` u
A user can only change the group to another group of which he is a member. Here jack
discovers he is not a user.

% 3
` G @3

@3
@ 8@3
3
"X
$
"X
$
"X
$
$
"X
f a
% B
m a
hh { e
h a Bm

m h
@f a 2f
$ e
7EF
f
G w 8 e
G w e
h h j

G w
Vhf%U8 r H
I
V U q
"@"

vt
$
vt
$
v $
t
U
R
t f U I
Sh%8
V e ( v $ t w v $ t
8 DyxH ` u
v $
t
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
v $
t
! ! ! ! ! ! ! C
E!
v $
t
! ! ! ! ! ! ! C
E!
v $
t
! ! ! ! ! ! ! C
E!
i f
4R 0 xH ` u
( v $ t w v $ t
If jack doesn't like the file's group being users, he can change it.
28 File ownership
167
28 File ownership
168
r88$ 3 #8q xi$yq yh EG iyq yh 68iyq yh 6%

x r v t
5 r v $ t 5 r v $ t 5
S e
B5G 8# db `
C G & ca
W e
@" D5G 8# db `
C G & ca
e ` yh a 2f G w
j

$ #
8 3 8 t
v $
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
j
` yh a 2f G w
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!

$
R 4B5G 8# db `
i f R e
C G & ca
W R T V e
5 g Q F5G 8# db `
C G & ca
r88 3 #8q xri$yq yh EG 88 3 8q 68iyq yh 6%
$
x v t 5
r $ # 5 r v $ t 5
S e
B5G 8# db `
C G & ca
f S U W W Q I W e
E B 5G 8# db `
C G & ca
And of course chgrp after the fact would work as well.
28.3 Review
Quiz questions
6. Under what circumstances would one use the command chmod 2775 directoryname?
7. Which users may change the group of a file?
8. Which users may change the ownership of a file?
Assignment
1. Create a new user using useradd username, but do not create a home directory for the user.
Manually copy /etc/skel to the users home directory using cp -r /etc/skel ~username/.. Now fix
the ownership of the files you copied so that they belong to the user.
2. As a regular user, use the id command to see which supplementary groups you are a member of.
Create files named after each of the groups you are a member of, with the group set
appropriately. Set the permissions on these files to -rw-rw-----. Log in as a different member of
the group, and see whether you can do the following:
a) Delete the file.
b)Rename the file
c) Edit the file using vi
d)Change the permissions of the file
e) Change the owner of the file
f) Change the group of the file
3. Change the permissions and ownership of your /bin/su so that only members of the group trusted
can use su to become root (you will have to create the group). Check that su still works for
members of the group and for root. Check that users who are not members of the group
trusted cannot use su.
1. To set the directory to give its group away to all the files created in it.
2. The owner and root.
3. Only root.
29 Links
169
29 Links
And we can always supply them with a program that makes identical files into
links to a single file.
Larry Wall in <199709292012.NAA09616@wall.org>
LPIC topic 1.104.7 Create and change hard and symbolic links [1]
Weight: 1
Objective
Candidates should be able to create and manage hard and symbolic links to a file. This objective
includes the ability to create and identify links, copy files through links, and use linked files to
support system administration tasks.
ln
Link command for hard and soft (-s) links
29.1 Hard links

The data for a file in Linux is located by its inode number. If two files have the same inode
number, then they refer to the same data28. Modifying one file will cause both files to change. This
is a hard link. Linux keeps a link count for each file in the filesystem so that it only deletes the data
when all the links have been removed.
To create a hard link using the ln command the syntax is
$ $ # #
"G P%8@%H
or, more simply, to link to an existing file in another location,
$ # & #
%8@% %@%2
There are a few provisos when making hard links
The permissions and ownership of the new link is the same as the permissions and ownership of
the original file. If a user creates a link to a file he does not own, he will retain his own copy
of that file if the original is deleted.
You can't make hard links to directories (usually but you probably shouldn't want to either.)
Hard links can be identified in the output of ls by the link count, which is the second column (just
after the permissions). For regular files the link count is 1. For files with hard links, the link count
is 2 or more. (The link count for directories is based on the number of files in the directory).
C C
%%B%$
Q R R W U V e ( v # w v $ t
%P DyxH ` u
878WWyq%%g D%84 DyxH ` u

S R Q R W V R R W W U Q V W e ( v # w v $ t
C
%%D8}
W W U V e( v # w v $ t
878G DyxH ` u
l

3 a { Pe
$
7E e
v $
t
v $
t e
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
l
# a { Pe

7E e
$
v $
t
v $
t e
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
R 4ByxH ` u
i f R e ( v # w v $ t
W W Q R R W R e( v # w v $ t
878q%B7ByxH ` u
l

3 a { Pe

7$E e
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
R 4ByxH ` u
i f R e ( v # w v $ t
Q R R W S R Q Q R R W Q V W e ( v # w v $ t
%Fq%P%4 DyxH ` u
28 Hard links are like cross-linked files in older filesystems with the difference being that the operating system
understands they are supposed to be there.
Symbolic links much like hard links, with the following differences
Symbolic links can cross filesystems
Symbolic links can point to directories
The link is owned by the user that created it
The destination does not have to exist. A symbolic link becomes useless if the original file is
$ # & ! #
%8@% %@%D5
or, more simply, to create a symbolic link to an existing file in another location, where the symbolic
link has the same name as the original file,
$ $ # ! #
"G P%8@%F5
To create a soft link using the ln command the syntax is
29.2 Symbolic links

h
C G & h
$ 3 % i a Ee
h
%h" i a Ee
C $ G G & h
h
C h
$ 3 %@ i a Ee
h
C $ G h
%h"@ i a Ee
Q S U f W Q S U f
8hiV B8hi
m h h

G w h

G w h e

m h h

G w h

G w h e

S f f U W S f f U
8Py%8V Py%8

e %9 j e
! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! m

e %%E! j e
! ! ! ! ! C j m

e %9 j e
! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! m

e %%E! j e
! ! ! ! ! C j m
i f R e G & w v $ t
8R 4By( B ` u
Using ls -i (show inode numbers) you can see that the link and the original file share the
same inode number, which makes them equivalent.
& # # $
E8GFB%8G $ 3 v 8@%Pn
a C
6 & # # $ a &
&
E8GF#B%8G b%h"G v 8@%Pn
# $
a C $
6 & # # $ a &
Q S U f S f f U T i
8hpy%8Dp Dy( B ` u
e G & w v $ t
# # &
%H E s $ 3 pb
a C a $
Q S U f
8h Dy( B ` u
U V e G & w v $ t
h
h
m h
C$ 3 i a Ee G w hh

e
! ! ! ! ! ! ! !
%!

%Ch$"G hi a hEe G w h e

e
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
X a { Pe
7E e { m
$

f
%e %
C C C
QSU8hfpSy%8g R 4By( B ` u
f f U
S i f R e G & w v $ t
Q S U f W R e G & w v $ t
8hiV 47By( B ` u
S f f U W R e G & w v $ t
y%8V 47By( B ` u
This example shows how permissions are shared between files with hard links. (Files
cannot be removed from /tmp because of the sticky bit on the directory permissions).
6 $
"@! 8H"6 # t b%h"@ v
a C $ G
v #

C $ G
db%h"X v H$ 3 na
v #
# $
#
S f f U W R e ( v # w v $ t
y%8V 47ByxH ` u
You cannot create hard links between filesystems.
f a
% B
$
% 3 "X
f% B
a
f a
% B
$ X X
% 3 "X
$
% 3 "X
$ e
7EF
$ #
8 3 8
v $
t e
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
$
7EF e
$ #
8 3 8
v $
t e
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
V
hf%U8I h%8 R 4ByxH ` u
V f U I U i f R e ( v # w v $ t
e
$
7EF
8$ 3 8
#
v $
t e
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!
V f U I U i f R e ( v # w v $ t
h%8 R 4ByxH ` u
V f U I
h%8 7ByxH ` u
R e ( v # w v $ t
When using ln to create a link to a file in another directory, specifying the file name is
sufficient.
#
a { Pe
C C
%%B%$
W U V e( v # w v $ t
878WG DyxH ` u
v$t

v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!
R 4ByxH ` u
i f R e ( v # w v $ t
Q R R W e ( v # w v $ t
%B DyxH ` u
$ e
7E
When one of the files pointing to the data is removed, the data remains accessible via the
other file.
29 Links
170

9
# ! C
2!H%
C !
%2!H 3
87 ` !!
6
9 ! #
G!H
3 2!!5 `

` !H867 `
!
X
X
X
hi
hi
hi
hi
hi
hi
hi

h
i
a { Pe
a { Pe
a { Pe
a { Pe
a { Pe
a { Pe
a { Pe
a { Pe
a { Pe
9. How does the output of ls identify a hard link?

Quiz questions
29.3 Review
"v#B8& ' ` F8@ ED 1 a pb

6
# $ &
a $
t U V e( v # w v $ t
DyxH ` u
$
7E
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
%EE!

$
7E f
v $
t
v $
t
C C C

$
7E f
v $
t
v $
t
C C C

$
7EF
v $
t
v $
t
C C C

7EF
$
v $
t
v $
t
C C C

7$E h
v $
t
v $
t
C C C

$
7EF
v $
t
v $
t
C C C
$
7E j {
v $
t
v $
t j e
! ! ! ! !
!
C
%
$
7E j {
v $
t
v $
t e
!
C C
U i f R e ( v # w v $ t
R 4ByxH ` u
f W T f i R e ( v # w v $ t
7p'Fp7ByxH ` u
W T Q T f i R e ( v # w v $ t
'9g @Fp7ByxH ` u
g @9p7ByxH ` u
Q T W W f i R e ( v # w v $ t
W2@p7ByxH ` u
W Q f i R e ( v # w v $ t
Q W Q f i R e ( v # w v $ t
@2 p7ByxH ` u
W Q Q W f i R e ( v # w v $ t
B74p7ByxH ` u
Q W
7p g Q FyxH ` u
V e ( v # w v $ t
There is a limit to the number of symbolic links that Linux will follow before arriving at
the file.
C $ G ! C $ h
%h"@B!H%h"G Ee a { Pe
$
7E

v $
t
v $
t
C C C
S f f U i f R e ( v # w v $ t
y%8R 4ByxH ` u
S f f U W f i R e ( v # w v $ t
y%8V p7ByxH ` u
You cannot create hard links between filesystems.
$ X X
% 3 "X
$ X X
% 3 "X
!B% 3 "X
! $
f a
% B
e a { Pe
$ e
7EF 8 3 8
$ #
v $
t
! ! ! ! ! C
%%E!

7E
$
v $
t
v $
t
C C C
V f U I
h%8 h%8 R 4ByxH ` u
V f U I
i f R e ( v # w v $ t
V f U I
h%8 p7ByxH ` u
f i R e ( v # w v $ t
When using ln to link to a file in another directory, specifying the file name is sufficient.

3 !9
! #

3

3 !9
! #

3
HB ` 3 %79 b

a #
a $
878G DyxH ` u

l a { Pe
$
7E h
v $
t
v $
t
C C C
R 4ByxH ` u
i f R e ( v # w v $ t
Q R R W e ( v # w v $ t
%B DyxH ` u
C C
%%B%$
Q R R W U V e ( v # w v $ t
%P DyxH ` u
878yqSR%%g D%84 DyxH ` u

W W

Q R W V R R W W U Q V W e ( v # w v $ t
C
%%D8}
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l
a { Pe
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v $
t
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! ! ! C ! C
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l
a { Pe
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$
v $
t
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C C C
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i f R e ( v # w v $ t
W W Q R R W f i R e( v # w v $ t
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l
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e

7$E
v $
t
v $
t
! ! ! C ! C
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i f R e ( v # w v $ t
Q R R W S R Q Q R R W Q V W e ( v # w v $ t
%Fq%P%4 DyxH ` u
moved, removed or renamed.

Symbolic links are identified in the output of ls by a l in the first column, just before the
permissions.
29 Links
171
29 Links
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
172
How can you use ls to identify which two files are hard links to each other?
Why does an empty directory show contain 2 links?
Which flag for ln will request it to overwrite an existing file or link?
What happens when you delete a file to which a symbolic link points?
What happens when you delete a file to which a hard link points?
Assignment
1. Create a symbolic link to /etc/profile. Copy the link using cp. Do you get a regular file or a
symbolic link? What option to cp changes this?
2. Create symbolic links in your /etc/skel directory pointing to /usr/share/doc and /etc. What effect
does this have when you add a new user using useradd or adduser? Does the user get a symbolic
link or a regular file?
3. Run the commands below, and find the reason for the output:
! e ( v # w v $ t
42yxH ` u
# $ e r
dr y)P5Hd@ " !yq ` yxH ` u
! $ q q e ! # r r o o $
$
5 $q
e ( v # w v $ t
3 %4yxH ` u
e ( v # w v $ t
Hint: check which of the files you can read...
4. Copy /etc/hosts to your home directory. Create a hard link to this file named link1. Now create
a hard link to link1 named link2. Change the permissions of link1 to 0600. What happens to
the other files? What happens if you change the group of the link link2? What happens to the
original file and to link2 if you delete link1? Explain why the behaviour is as you observed.
5. Create a regular file named symlink using ls > symlink. Now create a symbolic to the current
directory named symlink using a single command. What happens to the previous contents of the
file symlink?
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
The second column contains a number other than 1.

ls -i shows inode numbers. If the inode numbers are the same, the files are the same.
The link count for the directory is the number of inodes in it one for . and one for ...
-f
The symbolic link is unchanged, but points to nowhere.
The other part of the hard link remains the same.
30 Finding files
173
30 Finding files
Making files is easy under the UNIX operating system. Therefore, users tend to
create numerous files using large amounts of file space. It has been said that the
only standard thing about all UNIX systems is the message-of-the-day telling
users to clean up their files.
System V.2 administrator's guide
With hard disk sizes getting awfully big, it is wonderful to have an orderly arrangement of wheredata-goes. The basic separations are between program code and data, between static data and
dynamic data, and between shareable files and non-shareable files.
LPIC topic 1.104.8 Find system files and place files in the correct
location [5]
Weight: 5
Objective
Candidates should be thoroughly familiar with the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard, including
typical file locations and directory classifications. This objective includes the ability to find files
and commands on a Linux system.
find
find by searching the filesystem
locate
find by querying the locate database
slocate
secure version of locate (enforce user permissions)
updatedb
update locate's database
whereis
look in common locations for a file
which
find the path name of a command
/etc/updatedb.conf
configuration file for slocate
30.1 Filesystem hierarchy standard

The Filesystem hierarchy standard (FHS) is a collaborative document that defines the names and
locations of many files and directories in Linux systems29. The FHS guidelines are intended to
support interoperability of applications, system administration tools, development tools, and scripts
as well as greater uniformity of documentation for these systems.
If you examine the root filesystem of your computer, you will find the following directories, most
of which are specified by the FHS:

7"
G &

6 7

#
"'

G
G
8@
#
&
&
% 3

$
"6
6
@ 8 "

#
H4db ` t
f R
ca w v $
The root hierarchy
/ The root directory. Everything is in this directory.

/etc This directory contains configuration files for the system. Many programs have their
own subdirectory of /etc for their configuration files, such as /etc/X11.
/home, /root Each user has a directory here, where they can store their files. The super-user
29 Other UNIX systems do not enjoy the same level of standardisation as Linux does.
30 Finding files
174
root has a separate directory outside the /home directory to maintain the separation between
users and administrators.
/bin, /sbin, /lib These are the directories containing the essential programs for booting the
system. Program files (binaries) are stored in directories named bin. The main bin directory
contains files which are required by scripts (and also the script interpreter /bin/sh). The sbin
directory contains supervisor binaries, such as network configuration and testing programs. The
essential library files are stored in /lib.
/usr This is the secondary hierarchy of the filesystem. Just about everything ends up in /usr
everything users need while operating the system. In the /usr directory, there are sub-directories
for binaries (/usr/bin), supervisor binaries (/usr/sbin), and library files (/usr/lib). For example, /
usr/bin contains programs, similar to /bin, but not vital to the system's basic operation.
/var Variable files that are modified by programs are stored here including, log files and files
in transit.
/opt Complete add-on applications like netscape and kde tend to end up here. Each program
is stored neatly in its own sub-directory, not overtly interfering with the rest of the system.
/mnt, /cdrom, /floppy These directories are used for file systems that are mounted
temporarily. To access a CD-ROM, you run mount /cdrom and its files appear at /cdrom.
/dev The files in /dev represent devices which may be attached to the system, such as hard
disks, etc. The files are generally character devices and block devices.
/boot Files used by the boot loader (e.g. LILO or GRUB).
/proc Originally for providing an interface to process information, /proc now provides a
general interface to the kernel. The /proc interface is used to set networking and virtual memory
parameters, for example.
In addition to specifying directories, the filesystem hierarchy standard also specifies the presence of
specific files in specific directories. Here are a few ...
/bin cat, chgrp, chmod, chown, cp, date, dd, df, dmesg, echo, false, hostname, kill, ln, login, ls,
mkdir, mknod, more, mount, mv, ps, pwd, rm, rmdir, sed, sh, stty, su, sync, true, umount, uname.
/etc - csh.login, exports, fstab, ftpusers, gateways, gettydefs, group, host.conf, hosts, hosts.allow,
hosts.deny, hosts.equiv, hosts.lpd, inetd.conf, inittab, issue, ld.so.conf, motd, mtab, mtools.conf,
networks, passwd, printcap, profile, protocols, resolv.conf, rpc, securetty, services, shells,
syslog.conf (if the associated programs are installed).
/sbin fastboot, fasthalt, fdisk, fsck, fsck.*, getty, halt, ifconfig, init, mkfs, mkfs.*, mkswap,
reboot, route, swapon, swapoff, update (all of these are optional, but usually do appear).
The /usr hierarchy
If a system is FHS compliant, it is possible to mount /usr as a read-only filesystem. This means it is
possible to share a single /usr filesystem using NFS (since there is no conflict between systems
wanting to make modifications). Apart from essential files for booting up, the bulk of the files
making up a standard installation appear in /usr.
/usr/bin, /usr/sbin, /usr/lib Binaries that are not essential to the system starting up appear under
the /usr tree. Again, bin is for everyone, sbin for the supervisor, and lib is for the libraries that
these programs require.
/usr/local this is the third hierarchy, for files which are used only by the local site e.g.
programs compiled from source code, local scripts and such like. /usr/local is often used for
installing plug-in applications like /opt is. In most distributions, /usr/local is untouched by the
30 Finding files
175
standard packaging tools.

/usr/X11R6 XFree86 is installed here, with its own subdirectories /usr/X11R6/bin and /
usr/X11R6/lib. XFree86 is a large program which could be installed under /opt, but it never is.
/usr/games various games make their own files under this directory, for high scores, etc.
/usr/include Include files for compiling from source code are stored in this directory. If you
install the development packages for various libraries (e.g. glibc-devel) this directory will be
populated with files.
/usr/src This is where program source code is stored. The kernel source code is often found in
/usr/src/linux. If source code is to be modified, this directory is often implemented as a separate
and writeable partition (since /usr should be read-only).
/usr/share This contains shared data files, such as documentation which are not specific to the
architecture of the installation. As the name implies, this means that the data can be shared
between different Linux platforms.
The /var hierarchy
The /var hierarchy is for things that change during the running of the system. This includes mail
and printer spool directories, administrative and logging data, and temporary files.
/var/lib state information for programs. Programs such as logrotate, NFS client utilities and the
PCMCIA utilities store their state here.
/var/lock Lock files. Lock files are a way for programs accessing a single resource to make
sure that they don't fight with each other.
/var/spool Various message queues go here, such as printer queues,
/var/log Log files (what has been happening). The most important log files are /
var/log/messages and /var/log/mail or /var/log/maillog.
/var/run Data used by running processes. Mostly this contains files with the current process ID
(PID) of processes (such as /var/run/crond.pid).
/var/tmp This is very similar to /tmp, but files might not be deleted quite as often.
30.2 find
The find command searches the specific directories for files that match your criteria.
( $ ( X X
%%uyX
e

#
`
To find a file on Linux, you often know the name of the file, and something about its location. To
use this information with find you would use the -name criterion, or -iname (case insensitive).
dy8@8 3 %'%94 `
# X
& $ # ! #
' $ & ' & $ # ! #

E'w%'%9 $ 3 %7" 4 `
The find command is discussed in more detail in the chapter on File Management.
30.3 locate
Although locate is not installed by default on many distributions, it is a useful tool. When locate is
installed and set up, you can use it something like this:
9%X h Xb%@ h E@E@ $ 3 %7"

& # $ & # $ &

@Xb%& '"@%@%78
& $ G
&
%@@
S 4W H6db ` t
Q
U V Q R ca w v $
You may notice that locate runs significantly faster than find. The reason for this is that locate does
30 This same file is used by the original GNU locate.
9 X # $ & # $ & # a
%X y8 E@E@ $ 3 %7" D8" y
f R f W W e ( v $ t w v $ t
P%yxH ` u
The whereis command searches a list of commonly used locations for the file name specified. It
tends to find man pages, configuration files and similar lost objects.
30.5 Finding files with whereis

I W g 0 xH ` w
S U S
( v $ t

a C
b%h$ s
g f e ( v $ t w v $
hHyxH ` t
$ $ $ $
@"7B
$ $ 9 $ # $
%$ ` PHHB% 3 HP5 3 Y@8G ka P$ `
a $ $
I W yxH ` u
S U S g e ( v $ t w v $ t
The updatedb command has to be run by root. It is run periodically (usually daily by
cron), and it takes quite a while.
~ 1 w
"} @s s 8G
|

~ s 8G
|

'
S# D ` 8H"H7" Hh!"} @s s
$ G & $ 6 G & G & ' 5 ~ 1 w
|
j $
' j { @H4 ` 4 ` h2 ` 4 ` D~ 88@'!~ s
$
& G
$
# G 6 ' 5
|
T Q V S U S g W U V e ( v $ t w v $ t
% YI W V F DyxH ` u
When slocate updates its database, it uses the file /etc/updatedb.conf. This file explains which
directories and filesystem types should be excluded from the slocate database30.
!@8G "7"
! $ #
$ #
%"7"
$ ! $ #
5!H8"7"
I W XW
S U S g
e
e
e
e
e
e
XW
U V Q R
$

l

$

C C C
e y@f
# z j j $

%7% !
! !
C
l

$

C C C
f 7"'R 4ByxH ` u
U V Q R
I f g i f R e ( v $ t w v $ t
slocate is just like locate, except that it records the permissions and ownership of each file so that
users cannot see files they do not have access to. (locate achieves the same result by running
updatedb as the user nobody when run from the cron.daily script.)
In order to have permissions to read the database, which contains privileged information, slocate is
a set-gid application. If your system has slocate installed, you can still use the locate command,
which is simply a symbolic link to slocate. updatedb is also a link to slocate, but it has the good
sense to update the database when you run it in this way.
30.4 slocate
` C 867$H
#
$

@8G
$
7
3 %

` 87$
C # 6
The command that updates the locate database is updatedb.
#
`
G
@
$
"@" 4
$ $
H
G $ # G $
7%F
#E!@s
t 3 s $
# t 3 s $
E!@s
not search the entire filesystem, but searches a database which was created by updatedb. This
works out significantly faster. The one drawback is that the database is not always up to date. If
you try to find a file that was created recently, it will not be in the database.
30 Finding files
176
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
What is the distinction between /usr/bin and /bin?

What determines whether an executable is in /usr/bin or /usr/sbin?
When should files appear in /usr/local?
Why is /lib separate from /usr/lib?
What is the relationship between the which command and the PATH environment variable?
Quiz questions
30.7 Review
j
j ! h X E& @#
! G
q R V t T i e( v $ t w v $ t
w@%Q B " %y8Wp DyxH ` u
One of the most useful applications for which is together with rpm, to find the package which
provides a specific command.
i S U W i
"7i
p S i Q f x Q S i Q f i i f U R
XWR8h8)7h4%U
'R" Q7i@iip V" 7"I'fgqf%dpD`8 V" %B6db$ 3 t
U R U
f U R U ca w v $
G ! G
Y7H8@d5 3 3 $

C $
" %B6db@"7%t
V f U R U ca w v $
Many distributions define useful or unusual aliases for which. The redhat example below
corresponds with the recommended usage from the which man page.
r #
i"v
$t8 %& 3 a #" j 8 7" a 8 #"7" a "@87" a "7" a "q

# $ # #
# #
HHka 3 3 @"7"

C #
S V V I f g e ( v $ t w v $ t
2 " 7"'yxH ` u
3 "
#
Q 2 " 7"'yxH ` u
V W V I f g e ( v $ t w v $ t
G #
%C "
S B " 7"'yxH ` u
V I f g e ( v $ t w v $ t
#
8"
f R
" 7"'yxH ` u
V I f g e ( v $ t w v $ t
Heres a few examples of using which for satisfying idle curiosity.
# # $ # #
# v $ t & #
"8 % 3 a " j 8 7" a 8 "7" a "@87" a "7" a "
DyxH ` u
u t Q V W e( v $ t w v $ t
When you enter a command, the shell searches the directories listed in the $PATH environment
variable for the program to run. The command which searches for, and prints out the location of the
command which is executed.
30.6 Finding programs with which

$ C
7E
C $ G
%h"
X #
` #b4
8G7$ 8
#
G
8@ 3

3 "74
$ G $
C $ G
%h"
3 "
$
3 C
3 C
3 C
3 C
3 C
3 C
3 C
3 C
Here are some whereis commands to work through.
9 X
%X h y8@8 3 h E@E@ $ 3 %7"
# $ & # $ &
v $ X
"y8@8 3 @D8@8 3 @H dy8@8 3 @9y8@8 3 @ y8@8 3

# X
C $X
a
f f Q f W W e ( v $ t w v $ t
"7E%yxH ` u
9 X C # $ & # $ & C #
%X y 3 @ E@E@ $ 3 %7" D 3 @"7" y 3 C
a
f W W f W W e ( v $ t w v $ t
% %yxH ` u
30 Finding files
177
30 Finding files
178
Assignment
1. Write down where would you expect to find the following files, and them find them using the
tools listed in this chapter.
a) cat (show file contents)
b)ls (show directory listing)
c) traceroute (find route to given network)
d)ifconfig (set up network interface configuration)
e) syslog.conf (configuration file for syslogd)
f) cat.1.gz (man page for the cat command)
g)messages (growing file of various system events)
2. Write a command to find all the files in /etc which are smaller than 12kb. Write a command to
list all files in /etc which are larger than 12kb. Do the two lists comprise all the files in the /etc
directory?
3. Download the filesystem hierarchy standard document from the internet or find it on your
distribution media. Read it and make notes.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
/bin contains files which are essential for booting when /usr may not be available.
The contents of /bin is standardised, but anything can appear in /usr/bin.
When the files have been prepared for local conditions, e.g. customised programs, etc.
boot time vs run time when /usr is available.
which searches the directories in the PATH variable.
31 XFree86
179
31 XFree86
If the designers of X-window built cars, there would be no fewer than five
steering wheels hidden about the cockpit, none of which followed the same
principles but you'd be able to shift gears with your car stereo. Useful feature,
that.
From the programming notebooks of a heretic, 1990.
LPIC topic 1.110.1 Install & Configure XFree86 [5]

Weight: 5
Objective
Candidate should be able to configure and install X and an X font server. This objective includes
verifying that the video card and monitor are supported by an X server, as well as customizing
and tuning X for the video card and monitor. It also includes installing an X font server,
installing fonts, and configuring X to use the font server (may require a manual edit of /
etc/X11/XF86Config in the "Files" section).
XF86Setup
ncurses based X configuration tool
xf86config
command line X configuration tool
xvidtune
video mode tuning (for modeline)
/etc/X11/XF86Config
default X server configuration file
.Xresources
31.1 X11 architecture

The X Window System is the display system used by Linux and other Unix systems and hardware.
The X11 architecture consists of a number of elements:
X servers, which have a display (screen), input devices (keyboard and pointer devices) and other
resources. On Linux, the most commonly program which runs as an X server is called
XFree8631. Commercial X servers are available, but are seldom used.
X clients, which are programs capable of displaying their output on a X servers display. It is
possible to run programs on a number of machines distributed over the network, with their
output displayed on one X server. X clients include xterm, xeyes, OpenOffice, Gnome and
KDE.
The X11 protocol, by which X clients talk to an X server. The X11 protocol works over
networks as well as over the local connection (TCP/IP and UNIX sockets are supported).
Because the X Windows system uses a well defined protocol, X applications are independent of
the graphics hardware on which they rely.
While X client applications generally require no special configuration to work with an X server,
installing an X server can be quite difficult. The problematic aspects are usually:
Display adapter configuration (choosing software to match your hardware).
Configuration for monitor (setting up the software to match the monitor, usually without the
monitors specifications).
31 There is an intentional pun here its X Windows for the 80386. Actually, XFree86 is used on more than just 80386
based machines.
31 XFree86
180
Font installation
31.2 X server
The task of configuring an X server means setting up the following:
Software installation (XFree86, version 3.x or 4.x)
Graphics card
Monitor
Keyboard
Mouse
Other input devices (joystick, graphics tablet, etc).
Configuration programs
The following programs are capable of configuring XFree86:

xf86config a text based program which is part of the XFree86 distribution. xf86config asks a
number of questions, and then creates a configuration file in accordance with the supplied
answers.
XF86Setup this is a graphical program which is distributed with XFree86 version 3.x. It runs
in graphical mode (16 colours, 640x480), and emits a configuration file based on your choices.
After creating the configuration file, the X server is started using your choices, allowing you to
test whether it works.
Xconfigurator this is the configuration program for Red Hat Linux. It is an improved version
of xf86config which scans the PCI bus to see which graphics card is installed.
dexconf the Debian distribution uses this configuration program. It is a menu based program
which emits a configuration file according to the chosen settings similar to xf86config. To run
this program once Debian is installed, the command is dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86.
sax and sax2 the SuSE X configuration programs, based on XF86Setup with some additional
PCI bus scanning. sax is used for configuring version 3.x of the X server, and sax2 for version
4.x of the X server.
X -configure XFree86 version 4.x will generate a configuration file according to what it
autodetects in your hardware.
Things to configure
Keyboard the relevant information is the number of keys (pc101, etc), language (US, UK),
options
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up a wheel mouse, the wheel corresponds to the z-axis mapping.
Choosing the mouse protocol
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range. These settings are used as protection against the X server asking the video card to drive
the monitor too hard. Unfortunately, you have to set your own levels of protection when you
configure the system.
The horizontal sync specification is the rate at which the monitor moves from one pixel to
the next.

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Graphics card For version 3.x it is necessary to specify the X server to use (although
XF86SVGA supports most of the supported graphics cards). Newer hardware is a great deal
easier to configure and you will not have to enter ClockChip values, which are nearly impossible
to obtain.
The XFree86 server supports an enormous range of graphics cards.
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setting is /dev/mouse is generally set up to be a symbolic link to the actual device.
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31 XFree86
181
32 For XFree86 version 3.x, the command X can only be run by root. Other users must run Xwrapper.
Module (Dynamic module loading) in version 3.x modules are only used for certain input

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Files (File pathnames) - location of fonts and font servers
31.3.1 Version 3.x

The configuration file for XFree86 is /etc/X11/XF86Config. A number of other configuration file
locations are also possible, although these are used only in special circumstances. The complete list
is give in the XF86Config(5x) man page. If both version 3.x and version 4.x of XFree86 are
installed, the file /etc/X11/XF86Config-4 is used by version 4.x, while version 3.x uses /
etc/XF86Config.
The XF86Config configuration file consists of the following sections:
31.3 Configuration file

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The command X is used to start the X server32, and is what ends up running at some stage after
running startx. For version 4.x, each video driver is supplied as an independent module, which is
loaded when X is run. For version 3.x, a large number of video drivers were provided in a single
precompiled binary the most widely used being XF86SVGA. Because of this, it was necessary to
set up X as a link to the correct binary.
For version 4.x, X is a link to XFree86 binary. For version 3.x, X must be set to point to the X
server with compiled-in support for your particular hardware.
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Pointer (Pointer configuration) - Mouse or other pointing device configuration. The two most
important parameters in this section are the Protocol parameter and the Device parameter (e.g. /
dev/mouse).
Monitor (Monitor description) one or more Monitor sections provide the specifications of a
monitor and list the video modes which can be used. Important parameters in this section are ...
HorizSync 30-57 the horizontal frequency (kHz) range supported by the monitor
VertRefresh 43-72 the vertical refresh rate (Hz) range supported by the monitor
ModeLine 800x600 ... the exact timing for the mode.
Device (Graphics device description) this defines the video adapter (e.g. VGA display
adapter). In the example below, the graphics card is automatically detected, because support for
it is compiled into the X server.
Screen (Screen configuration)
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ServerFlags (Server flags) this section sets X server options, some of which are helpful in
debugging (e.g. with AllowMouseOpenFail set, the server will start if the mouse is
misconfigured).
Keyboard (Keyboard configuration) Specifies the keyboard input device, parameters and
mapping options.
31 XFree86
183
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The components of output devices (e.g. graphics board with a Device section, and a monitor
with a Monitor section) are bound together in a Screen section which is listed in the
ServerLayout section.
InputDevice section for a mouse or a keyboard. Heres the InputDevice section for a
Keyboard.
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In the configuration file for XFree86 version 4.x there is a new top level section, the
ServerLayout section. The Keyboard and Pointer sections have been replaced by
InputDevice sections. The Device section has been supplemented by module-specific sections,
DRI and VideoAdapter.
31.3.2 Version 4.x

XInput (Extended Input devices configuration) this is optional, and used for strange input
devices.
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31 XFree86
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The ModeLine configuration lines usually are not necessary for configuring XFree86 version 4.x
since the standard VESA modes are built into the server. As a result, the configuration file looks a
great deal simpler, and the ModeLine parameters are omitted.
31.4 Video card and monitor tuning

The xvidtune utility produces tuned mode lines for your monitor. It looks something like this,
Controls:
Left, Right, Wider, Narrower adjust the horizontal position and size of the display
Up, Down, Shorter, Taller adjust the vertical position and size of the display.
Test try the settings and see what the effect is.
Auto try the settings as you make changes. This usually leads to an unusable display.
Show - When you click Show xvidtune prints output which is appropriate for the Modeline
parameter in the XF86Config file.
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Horizontal Sync and Vertical Sync ranges are incorrect for your monitor.
31.5 Installing fonts

Fonts in X have long and unwieldy names specifying the exact details of the font, separated by -.
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bitmap which can be displayed on the screen. Heres the configuration file /etc/X11/fs/config.
31.6 X font server

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1. Make a new directory for the fonts, either under /usr/X11R6/lib/X11, or under /usr/local/fonts.
2. Copy the font files into this directory.
3. Run mkfontdir or similar in this directory.
4. Include this directory in the FontPath element in the Files section of the XF86Config file, or
the catalogue value in /etc/X11/fs/config, or use xset +fp pathname.
In the font directory, the following files may exist (and are made by mkfontdir):
fonts.dir bitmap fonts directory, made by mkfontdir or ttmkfdir > fonts.scale
fonts.scale scalable fonts directory, made by mkfontscale
fonts.alias font alias names (you can make this directly)
To temporarily add a directory to the running X font server font path using xset, the usage is
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31 XFree86
186
31 XFree86
187
31.7 Review
Quiz questions

1. Is xterm an X client application, or an X server?
2. What are the physical meanings of the HorizSync and VertRefresh parameters in the
XF86Config file?
3. What is the purpose of an X font server?
4. What must you do to install a new font for your X server?
Assignment
1. Set up an X font server, and configure your X server to use it.

2. Find a font on the internet (search for truetype font download) and install it into your systems
X font server. Can you use the font you installed?
3. Configure your X server from scratch using xf86config. Set your graphics card to run your
monitor at the highest resolution and refresh rate possible. Increase the number of available
colours for your X server, until you have the most colours possible for your video card.
4. Install and configure the version of XFree86 that you do not currently have installed i.e. switch
from XFree86 version 3.x to 4.x or visa versa.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Client
Limits of pixel to pixel clock and screen redraw frequency.
To translate vector fonts into bitmaps (pictures) for use by an X server.
Set the font path to include the directory, and create the appropriate directory file.
32 X display manager
188
I have never seen anything fill up a vacuum so fast and still suck.
Rob Pike, on X.
Steve Jobs said two years ago that X is brain-damaged and it will be gone in two
years. He was half right.
Dennis Ritchie
Dennis Ritchie is twice as bright as Steve Jobs, and only half wrong.
Jim Gettys
(/usr/share/games/fortune/computers)
LPIC topic 1.110.2 Setup a display manager [3]

Weight: 3
Objective
Candidate should be able setup and customize a Display manager. This objective includes
turning the display manager on or off and changing the display manager greeting. This objective
also includes changing default bitplanes for the display manager. It also includes configuring
display managers for use by X-stations. This objective covers the display managers XDM (X
Display Manger), GDM (Gnome Display Manager) and KDM (KDE Display Manager).
/etc/inittab
Configuration file for init which may start xdm
/etc/X11/xdm/*
XDM configuration
/etc/X11/kdm/*
KDM configuration
/etc/X11/gdm/*
GDM configuration
32.1 What is a display manager

If a system has X installed, it can generally be started by a regular user logged into the console with
the command startx. startx starts an X server on the local machine, and then runs ~/.xinitrc (or /
var/X11R6/lib/xinit/xinitrc if the user does not have a .xinitrc file).
The display manager makes it possible to rearrange things slightly.
Console login and startx
Display manager login
1. xdm, kdm or gdm started by boot scripts
1. startx starts X server
2. X server started by display manager
2. startx runs ~/.xinitrc for the user
3. Set up session (change ownership of console devices, etc)
3. Run the window manager
4. Start selected window manager (kdm and gdm) or run
~/.xsession for user
After the X server is started, the display manager is run by root, and presents a login window to
users.
For remote displays, xdm and other display managers do the following:
Wait for a XDMCP query from a X server requesting a session on its display. This will only
happen if the display manager is listening for TCP connections (the initial connection is actually
UDP).
189
Display a menu of available machines to log in to (the chooser). This happens when the remote
machine uses X -indirect xdmhost2
Send a XDMCP query to the selected machine to display a login screen on the X server (if the
selected machine is the machine running xdm, then it displays the login screen itself). The query
that is sent is the same as sent by X -query xdmhost2.
A login window is displayed by the display manager on the selected host.
Start a session for the user by running the appropriate window manager.
32.2 Runlevels and display managers

Although xdm and other display managers are regular programs which happen to start a graphical
login, they are treated specially in the runlevel configuration. For other applications it is sufficient
to make sure there is an appropriate link in /etc/init.d/rc*.d. For the display manager, the
convention is to change the default runlevel to one that includes the display manager.
The parameter in /etc/inittab that sets the default runlevel is initdefault. The system here is
running a display manager.
a # a
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Linux distributions use different standard values for the runlevels. Debian is the one distribution
that does use special runlevels for graphical login if you install the display manager it will be
started during boot-up.
Distribution
Console login Display manager
runlevel
runlevel
RedHat and Mandrake
3
5
Caldera
3
5
Slackware
3
4
SuSE Linux version 7.2 and above
3
5
SuSE Linux up to version 7.1
2
3
Debian
2
2
32.3 Configuring XDM

The configuration directory for xdm is /etc/X11/xdm, and the main configuration file is /
etc/X11/xdm/xdm-config, which references the other configuration files.
Listening to remote requests
In order to serve remote XDMCP requests, the following line must be adjusted in xdm-config. The
default configuration is that xdm does not request a listening TCP port. kdm shares this
configuration, and is adjusted in the same way.
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xdm Xresources
When xdm starts up, it loads /etc/X11/xdm/XResources as a X resources database (using xrdb).
This defines the greeting that the system displays, and other interface settings which can be
modified such as the border width.
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The Gnome display managers configuration is stored in /etc/X11/gdm/gdm.conf. gdm is derived

from xdm, but many of the functions have been rewritten. The program gdmconfig edits this file,
so generally you dont have to do it directly.
32.5 Configuring GDM

Configuring kdm is a great deal
easier than configuring xdm
primarily because the KDE project
has written a graphical client to
modify the configuration file /
etc/X11/xdm/kdmrc.
Of course,
your distribution may hide kdmrc
somewhere else, such as /
etc/kde/kdm
or
/
opt/kde3/share/config/kdm.
Because kdm shares its code base
with xdm, you will find the same
files as used by xdm along with the
kdm configuration file Xresources, Xsession and friends.
32.4 Configuring KDM

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The script /etc/X11/xdm/Xsetup script will generally set the image on the root window using
xsetroot or xsri and open up xconsole to show console messages. It could be abbreviated something
like this.

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In /etc/X11/xdm/xdm-config, a line will appear specifying the script to run to set up the display for
the login window to appear on.
XSetup
One non-obvious thing in the above is that the logoFileName parameter must refer to a XPM file
(X pixmap).
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190
191
32.6 Connecting to a remote display manager

In order for an X terminal to initiate a login session from a remote display manager, the display
manager must support the XDMCP protocol usually via a TCP connection.
To connect to a X display manager via XDMCP, there are three different queries that the X server
can choose to send:
X -query somehost request a login session on a particular machine somehost.
X -indirect somehost request a chooser screen from a machine named somehost, which will
in turn send the request for the login window to the host you choose.
X -broadcast send a broadcast request for a chooser screen. (You can get the same behaviour
using X -indirect 255.255.255.255). A host that feels capable of popping up a chooser window
on the terminal will do so.
Xaccess
xdm and kdm use the Xaccess file to determine whether a XDMCP request is accepted or refused.
For gdm there is a XDMCP configuration tab in the configuration tool. Xaccess also determines the
fate of indirect requests, which may be diverted to other hosts.
The Xaccess file assumes that you are running a number of application servers, and a number of X
terminals. The key elements in the file are:
hosts machines which run a display manager
terminals machines which run X servers (which want to connect to display managers)
There are two types of request which may be received from a terminal. These are handled
differently in the Xaccess file.
A direct query (-query). For this, the hostss name must appear on a line in Xaccess, or the line *
must appear. In the example the terminals terry, fred and joe can access the display manager.
Usually, a * appears to indicate that any terminal may open up a login window.

t

`

An indirect query (-indirect or -broadcast). In the following example, terry, fred, pam or joe, on
connecting to the display manager, will be offered connections to the three application servers
fasthost, slowhost and officehost.
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The most common patterns in the Xaccess files allow access for any host to open a login session, or
get a window. The special name BROADCAST below means that the list of hosts is obtained by
broadcasting on the network for other display managers.
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As the comments in the file suggest, Xaccess can allow access for only specific hosts. The file is
(at its simplest) a list of machines that can connect to the display manager. Additional lines can be
given to allow access to the host chooser.
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%47@8 H0
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192
Here we allow access to the chooser.

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7@8 3 @8 3
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This particular configuration in the above will allow only the machines host-a and host-b to connect
to the chooser.
32.7 Review
Quiz questions
1. Why do remote terminals use a display manager, and not just run applications with export
DISPLAY=myname:0?
2. What are the configuration files for the display managers discussed?
3. How does /etc/inittab get used for starting a display manager?
4. How do you change the display manager greeting for xdm?
5. What are bitplanes, and how do they relate to the display manager?
Assignment
1. Change your display manager to xdm, and set up a custom greeting and a custom background
colour.
2. Set up xdm to serve direct and indirect remote sessions. Test whether this works. Once you have
done this, set up the display manager to serve direct and indirect remote sessions for only one
host. Test whether it works, and test that it only works for the one host.
3. Repeat the previous assignment using either kdm or gdm.
4. If you have a second machine available, set it up as a display manager and get the chooser on
both display managers to show the other. Log on to one of the display managers, and then
connect to the other for a login session.
1. Changing the value of the DISPLAY environment variable assumes that you can log in to the
server that will be running the application. If you cant then you need the display manager to
send the application to you.
2. /etc/X11/xdm/*, /opt/kde3/share/config/kdm (or similar) and /etc/X11/gdm/gdm.conf
3. In some distributions, the runlevels either include or do not include xdm. In some distributions
xdm is started from /etc/inittab for a particular runlevel.
4. Modify the resources /etc/X11/xdm/Xresources
5. Bitplanes are the number of bits per pixel, and you will want to have configured your X server
with the correct values by the time you run xdm.
33 GUI environment
193
33 GUI environment
Hallo. I em ze Viper. I huf kome to vipe your vindows.
The Viper is Coming! (Unpublished work)
LPIC topic 1.110.4 Install & Customize a Window Manager

Environment [5]
Weight: 5
Objective
Candidate should be able to customize a system-wide desktop environment and/or window
manager, to demonstrate an understanding of customization procedures for window manager
menus and/or desktop panel menus. This objective includes selecting and configuring the desired
x-terminal (xterm, rxvt, aterm etc.), verifying and resolving library dependency issues for X
applications, and exporting X-display to a client workstation.
.xinitrc
Users configuration file for startx
.Xdefaults
X resources, for configuring X applications like xterm
xhost
Host based access control for the X server
DISPLAY environment variable Determines which X server receives output
33.1 Window managers

An X window manager is responsible for the following tasks:
Title bars and borders around windows, and the functions available on the title bar and border
(move, resize, minimise, close)
Controlling the focus of keyboard and mouse input
Icon management (associating icons with windows)
Determining the initial position and size of windows
Many window managers implement additional functions:
Desktop menus which can be activated by mouse clicks
Global keyboard and mouse shortcuts
Virtual desktops
Desktop decoration
Desktop configuration programs
Sound support (pops and whistles for desktop events)
Here are a few window which you may encounter under Linux.
twm the simple window manager that shipped with the X project
kwm KDEs window manager
enlightenment Gnomes default display manager
metacity A window manager with good Gnome integration.
sawfish An extensible window manager that uses a Lisp-based scripting language. Sawfish is
configured by Lisp code in a personal .sawfishrc file, or using a GTK+ interface.
WindowMaker A window manager which emulates the look and feel of the NeXTSTEP (TM)
graphical user interface.
blackbox A very small and fast window manager.
33 GUI environment
194
hackedbox The bastard son of blackbox, just in case blackbox wasnt small enough for you.
There is no universal configuration interface for configuring all Linux window managers, but most
window managers have their own dot configuration file or directory in the users home directory.
33.2 .xinitrc and the system-wide window manager

When the X server is started with startx, the following files determine which window manager to
load. (Actually, other applications can be loaded, in addition to the window manager.)
1. ~/.xinitrc if this file exists, it is run after the X server starts up. When it exits, the session is
over.
2. /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc if no ~/.xinitrc exists, this file is run. It determines which window
manager will run.
The usual change which is made to these files is to change the window manager which is run when
startx is selected. Many Linux distributions use a display manger such as xdm to control login. In
this case, the contents of .xinitrc are largely irrelevant. Changing /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc will change
the default behaviour for users that have no ~/.xinitrc. Creating /etc/skel/.xinitrc will change the
behaviour for new users.
33.3 X applications
In the original design the X windows system, it was intended that X applications should be
customised by editing X resources33. X resources are simply configuration settings that are loaded
into the X server, usually at startup (using xrdb, but you generally dont worry about that).
In ancient times34, when twm, mwm and olwm were the window managers of choice, window
managers were customised by editing the X resource files. In modern times, editing X resource
files is still the way to customise a number of useful applications using X, including xterm. X
resources make it possible to change these values on the fly as well, without editing the files.
When X starts, the X resources are loaded from the following files into the X server by xinitrc:
1. /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/Xresources system-wide X resources
2. ~/.Xdefaults default resource settings users dont usually edit (only in some distributions)
3. ~/.Xresources resource settings that users do edit
The format of X resource files is as follows:
The name of the resource, followed by a colon, followed by the value.
The name of the resource can be abbreviated with a *, in which case any number of characters
can match (actually, only a complete section name can match).
The name of each resource is in the form application.item, e.g. xterm*font.
You should have different values to these if you run the commands on your server.
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33 The xrdb man page says Most X clients use the RESOURCE_MANAGER and SCREEN_RESOURCES properties
to get user preferences about color, fonts, and so on for applications.
34 Ancient times i.e. before last year
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This library must be present for the application to work.
33.5 X application library dependencies

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If you run that same command after pressing Ctrl+Alt+F1, you will be on a different
(pseudo)terminal.
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A terminal emulator lets you run console based programs on a virtual console.
You can run a couple of terminal emulators at the same time.
You can set the font and the console size.
Some terminal emulators let you run multiple sessions in a single window.
An X terminal emulator usually has a large scroll-back buffer more than the Linux console.
Here are some of the terminal emulators available for X on Linux.
xterm the original X terminal. Other terminal emulators are based on this one. Some copy its
code.
rxvt a lightweight clone of xterm (based on xvt)
aterm aterm is a pseudo transparency terminal. It is supposed to be resource friendly and has
many features like fading (darkening/lightening of colors when aterm is losing focus) and tint
color (pseudo transparency background color).
konsole KDEs terminal
gterm Gnomes terminal
Each session gets a different virtual terminal. As a curiosity, the tty command can be used to
establish which particular console is active.
33.4 X terminal emulators

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195

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It is quite common for X applications to interface to the X11 system via a number of additional
libraries. So, for example, KDE applications require the qt libraries, which insulate the application
from the intricacies of talking to X directly.
The following libraries are quite popular for X applications:
qt this is the underlying display library used by KDE applications. Some applications are built
directly on qt.
gtk the gimp toolkit. This is the library originally written for the graphics program gimp, but
now used by a number of other applications.
gnome the gnome user interface has its own set of libraries.
kde the K Desktop Environment also comes with a set of libraries supplying functions to K
applications.
Here are more than just a few examples. You will notice that KDE and gnome are both heavy
interfaces consisting of many interrelated components, while GTK is a light interface.

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33 GUI environment
196
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33.6 Remote applications

When an X application start up, the X11 library reads the command line and examines environment
variables to decide what should be done with the output of the application. The X11 library does
not particularly care whether the display which is used is on the computer running the application or
not. All it needs to know is where that display is.
From the server side, the X server needs to trust the client application to connect35. There are two
methods of access control that are commonly used:
Host based access control, controlled by the xhost application.
MIT cookie access control, controlled by the xauth application.
33.6.1 DISPLAY environment variable

The DISPLAY environment variable sets the display which is to be used for X11 applications. The
format of this variable is
3
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If the host is localhost, it can be omitted. The screen part is used for X servers which have multiple
monitors attached. If the screen is .0, that part can be omitted as well. The most common value
for the DISPLAY environment variable is to point to the first local display:
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a
Instead of setting the DISPLAY environment variable, you can use the -display switch on
the command line.
U I U R f S i
dX82"h%7p W 2db `
e ca
33.6.2 Host based access control

Host based access control is the simplest form of access control available for X. The X server
maintains a list of hosts which may connect to it. This list is manipulated with xhost.
r v
uYq

86 @9 3 BB5H@8 3 #
# # # $

@H 3 HF8@8 3 7%5
#
# C

86 @9 3 B@"B4"@"DB
# $ $
@H 3 BB@8 3 3 B

@H 3 BB@8 3 3 B

wB0
wB0
wB0
wB0
w
B0
e 7E
f Q
i f Q
57E
7fE7R e 7E
Q R U V Q
f Q
W@87E'57E
U f Q i f Q
W U f Q
@87E e 7E
f Q
{
{
{
{
{
Using host based access control is recommended in the following circumstances:

You trust all users on the machine you add to the list (or there is only one user).
You need to get something done, which requires X.
You computer is not connected to a public network, and trust all computers on the local network
35 A security note if a malicious application connects to your X display, it can do strange things like monitor all
keystrokes, and take snapshots of the screen. Apart from this, one X application generally cannot subvert another.
33 GUI environment
198
(xhost +).
Only the controlling machine can use xhost. The controlling machine is usually the machine
running the X server, or in the case of an X terminal, the login host that supplied the login window.
33.6.3 MIT cookie access control

The file ~/.Xauthority contains a list of authentication secrets which are used for various displays.
The xauth application manipulates this database, and allows you to do the following things:
Generate an X authentication secret (a cookie).
List X authentication secrets (a jar of cookies)
Export the X authentication secret (a cookie)
Import X authentication secrets
Taken together, these functions allow you to provide authentication credentials to an application on
a remote host.
{ El m j hE hm hh h $
h
j j l l l m h e m h l j
s t # 1
% t B @s ! %w '! 7t a % 8b%'b `
!
# & X & $X
{ El m j hE hm hh h $ % t B @s ! %w '! 7t b `
s t # 1
h
j j l l l m h e m h l j
!
a
f R g U e ca
7@82db `
One can log into another server, and then add these credentials there.
7$"G'H 3 H9G 2@8G 0

# G
Q Q T U R f S i
dX@"h%7p W 2db@8 3 3
e ca

e e
f

` ` 2j e a yh a 8Bj e 7EP%va 8 H@8
&
$ # # $
f Q W Q f f e ca
7E 2hH2db `
i W W g U f Q W Q f f u b t i V U W g U e ca
B@8P7E 2h66@5 2@82db `
Similarly, as root, you can obtain access to another users display (this is the default
behaviour on some distributions).
W 2db `
e ca
i W W g U } u b t i V U W g U } V i W U W f g g f e ca
B@8x66@5 2@8y7@8 'BhH2db `
` u b Q W e ca
dD66P D2db `
X terminals automatically set up MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE authentication.
33.7 Review
Quiz questions
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
When is ~/.xinitrc used?

How do you change the window manager for users that log on using xdm?
Which library do all X applications use?
What program is used to set up MIT cookie based access control?
What must one do to change the display used by an X application.
How does one modify X resources?
How does one allow a specific host permission to open windows on an X display?
How does one allow two users to use the same X display?
Assignment
1. Change the system-wide window manager from KDE to Gnome or from Gnome to KDE.
2. Install icewm, FVWM2 or BlackBox and make this the system-wide window manager.
3. Log into a remote machine using telnet or ssh (without the -X option) and make an X application
such as xterm run on your local display. Do this using both the -display option and the
33 GUI environment
199
DISPLAY environment variable. You can use host based authentication for this exercise.
4. Set up MIT magic cookie access control and test it by repeating the previous assignment.
5. Change the foreground and background colours for xterm by editing your X resources file. You
can import changes to your X resources file with xrdb and then test whether they were
successful.
6. Modify your .xinitrc to run xlock before starting the window manager. (This can be quite useful
for users which are automatically logged in by kdm or gdm).
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
When X is started with startx.

create ~/.xsession for the user to start the window manager.
the X11 client library
xauth
modify the DISPLAY environment variable, or pass -display on the command line.
edit the resource file, and then load into the X server with xrdb
xhost +hostname (or use MIT cookies)
provide both users with MIT cookies
34 Glossary
200
34 Glossary
0x00c0ffee
1024
about
ASCII
argument
bash
BIOS
bleeding edge
boot
buffer
bus
cat
character
client
CLUE
CMOS
Hexadecimal numbers are frequently written with the prefix 0x, to indicate the
base of 16. This is the notation used by the C programming language. The digits 0
to 9 are used, and a to f represent digits for 10 to 15. Hexadecimal notation is
convenient for computer applications, because a hexadecimal digit corresponds
neatly to 4 bits.
1024, or 210 is the number of numbers you can represent with 10 binary digits, and
the number of bytes in a kilobyte (kb). A Megabyte (Mb) is similarly 1024 kbytes,
or 1048576 bytes. Hard disk sizes are sometimes quoted in millions of bytes,
rather than in true megabytes to achieve the marketing edge that 4.9% can give.
The first word in many glossaries.
The American standard code for information interchange, a standardised set of
meanings for the bytes 32 to 127. Included in this are the letters A to Z in upper
and lower case, the digits, and most common punctuation symbols. Text files in
Linux are usually encoded with ASCII.
Arguments appear after a command on the command line, and are sometimes
called parameters. If the command is ls -l -a /etc then the command is ls and
the command line arguments are -l, -a and /etc/.
An improved version of the Bourne Shell (sh), known as the Bourne Again Shell.
Basic Input Output System. This was originally intended to be some kind of
hardware independent layer providing kernel-like facilities. For most systems the
BIOS is usually used for loading the operating system which provides these
facilities.
If the leading edge software you choose doesn't work quite right, it might still need
a bit of debugging.
When you turn on your computer, it boots up. The origin of this is that the
computer pulls itself up by its own bootstraps and gets the operating system
running.
A place for storing data in transit. This is a technical term used by program which
occasionally escapes into regular usage. Linux write filesystem changes directly to
the disk, but writes them to buffers which are later written to the disk.
A set of parallel electrical conductors used in a PC for communication between
devices, such as between the CPU and memory and peripherals.
A Linux command that shows the contents of a file. This is the only Linux
command in the glossary, and it's only here because I like cats. All the other
commands are listed in the index.
A letter in the alphabet, a digit, a punctuation symbol anything that can be
represented by one or two bytes (in this sense, characters are rather onedimensional). The most commonly used representation of characters is ASCII.
UTF8 uses more than one byte to represent a single character.
In networking, the side that initiates the connection is the client. The client talks to
a server, which (hopefully) serves it.
A command line user environment, as opposed to a GUI, a graphical user interface.
Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor usually refers to something
managed by the BIOS. (CMOS is not that stuff you get at the bottom of the
ocean).
34 Glossary
comment
201
Comments are written by people in configuration files to explain what the meaning
of the rest of the file is. Configuration file comments usually start with a hash
character (#).
# /etc/hosts.deny
# See `man tcpd and `man 5 hosts_access as well as /etc/hosts.allow
# for a detailed description.
sshd: ALL
console
CPU
database
default
display
distribution
DMA
DNS
DOS
environment
execute
FAQ
Reading configuration file comments is often more instructive than reading other
documentation such as man pages.
A console is a terminal which is directly connected to a server.
Central Processing Unit. Linux originally ran on the Intel 80386 CPU.
A database is an ordered arrangement of computer data. The password file /
etc/passwd is correctly called a database (not all databases are relational databases
using SQL for queries.)
What it is if you don't change it. The default behaviour of cp is not to be verbose,
but telling cp -v overrides the default and makes cp print information about the
files it copies.
A display is strictly just a monitor for viewing computer output. In X windows a
display includes the facilities provided by an X windows server monitor,
keyboard and mouse. X Windows applications allow you to specify a display on
the command line or in the environment.
export DISPLAY=remoteserver:0.0 ; xterm
xterm -display remoteserver:0.0
Because the vast majority of software for Linux is free, it is possible for anyone
with the technical capability to distribute it. A number of distributions exist as a
result, varying primarily in the method of distribution (e.g. CDROM, download),
the method of software packaging (e.g. RPM, deb, tar.gz, cvs, other). Some
distributions are commercial (e.g. RedHat, Mandrake, SuSE), and others are
deliberately non-commercial (e.g. Debian).
Direct Memory Access where your peripherals talk directly to the memory, rather
than via the CPU.
Names on the Internet such as www.disney.com are turned into network addresses
using the DNS system. From the client point of view, you simply need to know
what DNS server to ask for questions of DNS names. On Linux, the DNS
configuration is mostly in /etc/resolv.conf.
Microsoft MS-DOS is an cut-down operating system for the Intel 8088 family of
processors. Microsoft Windows 3.1, 95 and 98 contain designs influenced by MSDOS. DOS is also an acronym for Denial of Service (deliberately making a service
fail).
The environment a program is provided with is a list of variables in the form
NAME=VALUE. When the shell starts a program it passes all the exported
environment variables in the environment. The program may choose to react to the
environment variables it receives.
To start or run a program. Programs start by being executed, and they end when
they are killed.
FAQs or Frequently Asked Questions are lists of questions that are frequently
asked, and sometimes answered. If you have a question about a particular product,
and it has an associated FAQ, you may find an answer in the FAQ.
34 Glossary
field
filesystem
202
A field is an area of space, or in a database, a record in which the same type of

information is regularly recorded. In text files, fields are separated by delimiters
such as colons, tabs or spaces. In the /etc/passwd file the fields are separated by
colons (the fields are user, password, user id, group id, name, home directory and
shell).
root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
A system for arranging files, either in a fixed space, like a partition or a CD ROM,
or referring to the entire Linux filesystem, consisting of a number of mounted
filesystems.
font
A font specifies the shape of each symbol in a script. Vector fonts describe
symbols in terms of the outline. Bitmap fonts specify the exact map of bits for
each letter. Bitmap fonts look rather blocky if they are enlarged.
foobar
A foobar is a widget that does something. Sometimes written as just foo or just
bar. When you can't think of a name for something, foobar is just fine.
fortune
A Chinese fortune cookie is a biscuit containing a text, presumably related to your
future. The fortune program prints out a message which is almost as random as
what you may find in a cookie. Some administrators configure their system to
print a fortune cookie when you log in.
geometry
For computer disks, geometry refers to the coordinate system of finding your data,
the coordinates being the cylinder, sector and head to use. The geometry of a disk
is the number of cylinders, sectors and heads (disk read and write heads). LBA
addressing is more common. This geometry is more like the Cartesian plane than
Euclidean geometry.
GPL
The GNU public licence a licence document which allows you to redistribute
computer software that is copyrighted with the proviso that you must distribute
the source code as well.
group
A group is defined by the contents of /etc/group. Every file on the filesystem and
every process has a group assigned. A user may belong to a number of groups (the
primary group, and a number of secondary groups).
home directory Each user has a directory which is allocated to them for their personal files. For a
user named joe, this will usually be /home/joe, but it is possible to change this.
The user's home directory is specified in /etc/passwd. In the shell, the abbreviation
for your own home directory is ~.
host
A machine connected to a network. Similarly, the term hostname refers to the
name of a host (of a machine).
HOWTO
A HOWTO is a long-ish document explaining how to do something. This
something is often a relatively complex task, such as setting up a firewall, or
configuring modem communications. Mini-HOWTO's are usually only a few
pages long, and not as extensive as a full HOWTO.
I/O
Input and output what the CPU does when it talks to devices. Devices are
generally identified by their I/O address, a number to which only the device
responds.
IDE
Integrated Drive Electronics IDE usually means a hard disk or a CD ROM drive,
which unlike archaic disks, has the electronics integrated into the drive unit.
interrupt
When a device wants to communicate some data to the CPU, it triggers an
interrupt. The CPU interrupts what it is doing, and makes sure that it gets the data
from the device.
34 Glossary
journal
203
For regular filesystems, changes are written immediately to the disk. In a

journalling filesystem, some or all changes are written to an intermediate buffer
called the journal, and then written to the disk. Using a journal makes it possible to
recover from errors if the process is interrupted, since the journal contains
information about what was happening.
Kernel
The lowest level of the operating system that does all the hard work.
LBA
Logical block addressing using a single number to represent a location on a disk,
rather than physical parameters.
library
A library is a repository for computer program code, particular code which is used
by a number of applications. Libraries are used for inclusion into code when it is
compiled. Linux supports dynamic loading of shared libraries, such as the GNU C
library /lib/libc.so.6. This library is loaded into memory once, and shared between
all programs that use it.
Linux
The kernel of the Linux operating system, by Linus Torvalds and others.
LPI
Linux Professionals Institute, see www.lpi.org
LPIC
LPI Certification, awarded by the LPI on passing the certification examinations.
Various levels of certification exist.
LUN
Logical Unit Number a SCSI host may provide a number of logical units, such as
a number of hard disks.
make
make is a program which automatically determines which part of a large program
need to be recompiled. It is configured by a Makefile.
man pages
Manual pages, stored on-line and accessed with the man command. To access the
crontab man page in section 5 of the manual, the command is man 5 crontab. The
commonly used abbreviation for this is crontab(5).
media
Something physical on which data is stored, e.g. magnetic media
metacharacter A character which takes on a special purpose. Regular expressions are composed
of regular characters and metacharacters such as *.[]^$()\.
modem
A device that converts digital signals to analogue signals, usually for transmission
over a telephone link.
mount
To permanently attach, for example to attach a filesystem on a device to the Linux
filesystem. You can also mount a shelf on a wall, a camera on a car.
network address Each machine on a network is uniquely identified by a network address. Since
most networks run IP (Internet protocol), this is usually an IP address. Data
directed to this network address arrive at the machine using it.
NIC
Network interface card (e.g. an Ethernet card such as a 3COM 3c509 adapter)
ownership
Every file and every process in a Linux system is owned by a user. For files and
directories, the user can set the group of the files, and configure the permissions
that are granted.
package
All the components of a program in an uninstalled form. Often .rpm, .deb or tar.gz.
parallel
Parallel communication involves sending a number of bits simultaneously, i.e. in
parallel. This is the method used by the parallel port for communication with
printers.
parameter
A parameter is anything that can be changed or chosen by a user. Examples
include command line parameters, file system format parameters, kernel tuning
parameters and configuration parameters. Often parameters have default values,
and these values sometimes work.
PCI
Peripheral Component interconnect a BUS architecture that is a little bit newer
than ISA.
34 Glossary
peripheral
permission
pipe
PnP
ppp
proc
process
protocol
rc
recursive
resources
root
rwx
script
SCSI
serial
server
setuid
204
A device on the periphery of a computer, such as a keyboard, printer, mouse or

display.
In general, the kernel does not allow users are to interact with processes and files
that they do not own. File permissions can be set for the owner, a group and for
everyone else. Permission to read a file means that the contents can be viewed.
Permission to write a file means that is contents can be altered. If execute
permissions are set, the kernel will load the file into memory and use it as a
program.
Programs can pass information using pipes. One side writes to the one side of the
pipe, while the other reads from the other. For the program, this is exactly the
same as using a file.
Plug and play the notion that no configuration is required to use a device. This
has been implemented with various degrees of success for the ISA bus, the PCI bus
and the USB bus.
Point to point protocol this is what is used when you dial from one modem to
another, such as connecting to an ISP.
The proc filesystem is mounted at /proc, and provides information generated by the
kernel about processes, and various other interesting things.
A program running on your computer. Linux, as a multi-tasking operating system,
runs many processes simultaneously.
An agreed method of communication between two parties. A computer protocol
may describe the method that one system sends mail to another, or the method that
a device notifies another device about an event.
A run control file (rc file) configures a program. Configuration files in /etc are
sometimes called rc files. The directory rc2.d contains rc scripts used to configure
the initialisation sequence of the system (rc2.d specifically controls runlevel 2).
The .d extension indicates a directory.
In Linux, recursive refers to acting on a directory and the files and directories it
contains. To understand recursion, you must first understand recursion.
Anything that is limited, such as memory, I/O addresses, DMA channels, file
descriptors, locked file space.
The administrator on a Linux system is named root. The base directory on the
file system is also called the root directory. The user root has a home directory
off the filesystem root named /root.
Read, write and execute permissions. This is often seen in the output of ls.
A script is a list of commands that the computer should perform. A shell script is
run by the shell interpreter (/bin/sh)
Small Computer System Interface
In serial communication, data is passed one piece at a time, and in order, i.e.
serially. PC's have a serial communications port which can send and receive data
in a serial fashion, using the RS232 protocol. Typically a RS232 serial port is used
for communication to a mouse or modem. USB, the Universal Serial Bus, uses
serial communication too.
In networking, the side that accepts an incoming the connection is the server. The
client talks to a server, which (hopefully) serves it.
A program which has permissions to change its user ID. This is indicated by a s
in the place of the x permission.
34 Glossary
shell
205
A shell is a program which allows you to run commands by typing in the

command's name. The Bourne shell will allow you to configure the input and
output for commands you enter, and run string multiple processes together by
joining their input and output.
source code
Source code is human readable instructions for what your computer should do with
its time. This is compiled into useful executable form by a compiler. The term
open source refers to the freedom of this source code.
ssh
Secure shell this is a network protocol which encrypts what you type in a shell
and the responses. There are two parts ssh, the client and sshd the server.
standard input,By default, a program's standard input and output is connected to the terminal.
outut and error When the program chooses to write or read something, it will go through the
terminal function calls. The shell can redirect standard input and output to files
and processes, so that commands operate on file contents rather than typed
contents. Programs that want to print error messages print them to standard error
which is usually the terminal. The shell allows you to redirect the errors as well.
swapfile
Disk space which is used as memory space. As more memory is required for
applications, idle memory may be swapped out (exchange with disk space). When
the memory on the disk is required again, it is swapped in. Swap is American for
swop.
switch
A command line option of a single character. In the command ls -la the -l switch
and the -a switch are selected.
syntax
Syntax is the way in which language is structured. Computer languages are rather
pedantic about their grammar. You need to use the expression in pretty much the
way that it is expected by the computer. When syntax is explained in written text,
optional items are written in [ square brackets ], e.g. ls [options], meaning that the
options are optional; and ... indicates that you can add more items, e.g. ls [file] ...
means list the file, and you can specify more files.
tab space
A special character (ASCII code 09) which is meant to work something like the tab
key on a typewriter to fill up with space up to the next tab stop. Tabs are used in
some files to separated between fields.
terminal
A terminal consists of a keyboard and a screen. In the original days of Unix, many
consoles were connected to a single Unix server via serial cables. Linux provides a
number of terminals that can be used simultaneously, accessible by pressing
Alt+F1 up to Alt+F7 (usually). Since these terminals only exist in the mind of the
user and the operating system they are called virtual terminals.
text
Data that a human has a reasonable chance of being able to read, as opposed to
something exclusively for machine consumption.
timeout
A timeout occurs when a program stops waiting for something to happen, simply
because it has waited too long.
tree
The wiser computer science people seem to think that a tree, like the type that
grows in soil, is a useful analogy for explaining the hierarchical organisation of
filesystems (and DNS, and some database structures). Like a filesystem a tree has
a root, and where trees have branches with leaves and more branches, filesystems
have directories with files and more directories. Unfortunately the analogy breaks
down too easily, for example if a bird flies in through your serial port and perches
on your filesystem tree.
34 Glossary
variable
verbose
wildcard
zzz
206
Something that varies. In programming, variables have names, and the value of the
variable is substituted where the name is used. In the shell, environment variables
are set using VARIABLE=something. After this statement, the shell substitutes
something in the place of $VARIABLE.
A program which is being verbose will print out extra information. For example,
cp file1 file2 will quietly copy the files, while cp -v file1 file2 will print out the
names of the files as they are copied.
A special character which matches any character. For file names, the wildcards
* and ? match anything or a single character. For regular expressions, the only
wildcard is . (matching any character), while .* matches any number of
characters. In card games, the joker card is a wild card.
After reading an entire glossary, you will notice a tendency towards sleepiness.
The other option for this last entry was zebra, but that's not only an animal, but an
implementation of BGP and RIP.
35 Index
207
35 Index
An index is an alphabetical list of words and the places they occur in the text. The list at the front
of the notes was a table of contents.
`...` command substitution, 85 comm, 90
E
command line, 81
/usr/local, 174
e2fsck, 145
options, switches, 83
$(...) command substitution, 85
echo, 84
parameters, 83
1024 cylinders, 56
editing files with vi, 135
command substitution, 115
32 bit transfer, 22
edquota, 155
compiling, 65
A
env command, 84
configure script, 66
environment variables, 83
ADSL, 46
--bindir, 67
etc, 173
apt, 74
--prefix, 67
expand, 97
apt-cache, 74
cp, 106
export, 84
apt-get, 74
cp,
extended partition, 55
aquota.user, 155
recursive, 86
F
B
csplit, 90
fdisk, 55, 139
background processes, 118
Ctrl+A start of line, 85
FDISK for MS-DOS, 59
bash_history, 87
Ctrl+Alt+F1, 195
fg foreground, 119
bg background, 119
Ctrl+C interrupt, 81
file type, 159
bin directory, 174
Ctrl+E end of line, 85
filesystem, 54
BIOS, 19, 20
Ctrl+R history search, 85
Filesystem hierarchy standard
block mode, 23
Ctrl+Z suspend, 81
(FHS), 173
boot directory, 34
cut, 92
find, 107, 175
boot floppy, 62, 63
cut and paste in vi, 137
find,
boot loader, 60
D
recursive, 86
boot partition, 55
dd, 63
floppy, 152
bus, 38
deb packages, 73
fmt, 98
C
Debian, 73
fold, 90
C programming language, 65
debugfs, 146
fonts.alias, 186
cat, 91
depmod, 39
fonts.dir, 186
cc, 65
DESTDIR, 68
fonts.scale, 186
cdrom, 152
dexconf, 180
fortune, 54
cfdisk, 55
df, 143
fsck, 145
chattr, 164
dirname, 115
25.2 fstab, 56, 150
chgrp, 166, 167
disk usage quotas, 154
quotas, 154
chmod, 160
DISPLAY environment
G
chmod,
variable, 197
gdm, 190
recursive, 86
DMA, 22-24, 30, 39
gdmconfig, 190
chown, 166
dpkg, 74
geometry of disks, 20
chown,
drwxr-xr-x permissions, 162
gnome, 196
recursive, 86
DSL, 46
grep, 131
CHS mode, 21
du, 144
grep,
cksum, 90
dual boot, 63
recursive, 86
CLUE, 81
dual booting, 56
grpquota option, 154
CMOS, 19
dumpe2fs, 146
grub, 63
COM1, 23
35 Index
grub.conf, 34, 63
gtk, 196
hard link, 169

hard links, 169
hda, 55, 139
head, 91
hisax chipset, 48
hotplug, 53
hsync, 182
IDE, 20
ifconfig, 48
ifup, 47
index, 207
initdefault, 189
initrd, 62, 63
insmod, 41
brute force, 41
Install rpm packages, 78
integrated peripherals, 23
interrupts, 24, 30
ioports, 24, 30
IRQ, 23, 29, 39
conflict resolution, 39
isa-pnp, 42
isapnp, 30
isapnp.conf, 30, 42
ISDN, 48
iso9660, 152
Isochronous transfers, 51
ISP, Internet service provider,
46
jobs, 118
join, 95
kdm, 190
kill, 123
killall, 123
kppp, 47
Large mode, 21
LBA mode, 21
LD_LIBRARY_PATH, 71
LD_PRELOAD, 71
ld.so.cache, 71
ld.so.conf, 71
ldconfig, 71
ldd, 70
lib directory, 174
lilo, 60
lilo.conf, 34, 60, 61
linear, 61
29.1 links, 169
hard, 169
soft, 170
ln, 169
locate, 175
logical partition, 54
LPT1, 23
lrwxrwxrwx, 163
ls, 102
permissions, ownership, 159
lsattr, 164
lspci, 25, 40, 51
lsusb, 51
LVM (Logical volume
management), 57
208
nice, 126
nl, 96
nohup, 119
od, 99
partitions,
sizing, 56
paste, 98
PATH environment variable, 85
3.8.1 PCI, 24
card configuration, 39
ping, 48
PIO (Programmed I/O), 22
Plug and Play, 41
pnpdump, 30, 42
Point to point connections, 46
power management, 24
PPP, 47
pppd, 47
chap-secrets, 47
chat, 47
M
messages, 48
make, 66
pap-secrets, 47
Makefile, 66
peers, 47
man pages, 87
pppoe, 48
MBR (Master boot record), 59 pr, 99
md5sum, 90
proc,
messages, 26
bus/usb, 51
mkdir, 104
cmdline, 62
mke2fs, 141
dma, 44
mkfontdir, 186
interrupts, 42
mkfs, 56, 140
iomem, 43
mkinitrd, 34
ioports, 43
mkreiserfs, 141
isapnp, 42
modem, 28
pci, 41
external, 28
scsi, 34
internal, 29
profile, 87
modprobe, 31, 39
prompt, bash, 82
modules.conf, 34, 39
19.3.1 ps, 120
mount, 150
niceness, 127
options, 151
PS1, 84
removable media, 152
ptx, 90
multiboot-compliant kernels,
pwd (print working directory),
63
82
mv, 107
newgrp, 167
qt, 196
35 Index
quota,
command, 156
configuration, 154
editing, 155
grace time, 157
quota_v2 module, 155
quota.user, 155
quotacheck, 155
rdev, 63
Recursive commands, 85
18.1 redirection, 90, 110
command pipelines, 114
standard error , 112
standard input, 111
standard output, 112
tee, 114
refresh rate, 182
regular expressions , 130
reiserfs, 147
reiserfsck, 147
renice, 127
repquota, 157
rm, 105
rmdir, 104
root directory, 173
root partition, 55
route, 48
rpm,
--checksig, 79
-e erase package, 79
-F freshen, 78
-i install, 78
-q query, 77
-U upgrade, 78
-V verify, 79
database, 77
functions, 77
modes of operation, 77
Redhat Package Manager,
76
RS232, 28
rw-r--r-- permissions, 162
sax, sax2, 180

sbin directory, 174
scd0, 35
scsi, 33
booting, 36
ide-scsi, 37
SCSI ID, 33
scsi_hostadapter alias, 34
sda, 35, 55
sed, 96, 132
server configuration,
X Window System, 180
set, 84
set-gid for directories, 167
setserial, 29
setsid, 119
sg0, 36
sha1sum, 90
shared libraries, 70
symbol versions, 71
Shift+PgUp scrolling, 81
SIGCONT, 122
SIGHUP, 119
SIGINT, 119
Signals, 122
SIGSTOP, 119, 122
SIGTERM, 122
slocate, 176
sndconfig, 30
sort, 94
Sound cards, 30
spd_vhi, 29
split, 93
st0, 35
startx, 188
swap,
partition, 55
space, 54
swap space, 56
symbolic links , 170
Tab completion, 81
tac, 94
tail, 92
tar, 65
tar,
tar.gz, 65
text filters, 89
textutils, 90
19.3.2 top, 121
niceness, 128
renice, 128
touch, 105
tr, 95
ttmkfdir, 186
ttyS0, 28
tune2fs, 147
umask, 163
unexpand, 98
uniq, 94
unset, 84
updatedb, 176
urandom, 119
USB, 50
usb-ohci.o, 51
usb-uhci.o, 51
usbcore.o, 51
usbmgr, 52
usr directory, 174
usrquota option, 154
uucp, 28
vgchange, 57
vgscan, 57
vi, 135
vmlinuz, 63
vsync, 182
wc, 100
whereis, 176
which, 115, 177
wildcards, 103
window manager, 193
Winmodems, 29
wvdial, 47
X resources, 194
X terminal, 191
X Window System,
access control, 197
client, 179
font server, 186
fonts, 185
graphics card, 181
Keyboard, 180
Mouse / pointer, 180
protocol, 179
server, 179
209
35 Index
X11 library, 195

Xaccess, 191
xauth, 198
Xconfigurator, 180
xdm, 189
xdm-config, 189
XDMCP, 189
XF86Config, 180, 182

XF86Setup, 180
xhost, 197
xinitrc, 188, 194
xlsfonts, 186
xmkmf, 68
xrdb, 194
Xresources, 189
xset +fp, 186
XSetup, 190
xterm, 195
xvidtune, 185
zero, 141
210

LPI 101 Linux Training Course Notes: Leading Edge Business Solutions

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LPI 101

Linux Training Course Notes

Leading Edge Business Solutions

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

3.3 IDE disks..................................................................................................................................20

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

7.2.1 PPP on analogue modems

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

17.4 Copying and moving............................................................................................................106

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

this page unintentionally left blank

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

This course is aimed at ...

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

Prerequisites for taking this course

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

101 Part B Installation and Configuration

1.103.1 - Work on the command line

1.101.1 - Configure Fundamental BIOS Settings

You will need the following in order to complete this course.

You will need the following in order to complete this course.

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

2.2 Copyright notice

2.3 GNU Free Documentation License

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

1. APPLICABILITY AND DEFINITIONS

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

verbatim copying of that document.

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

LPIC topic 1.101.1 Configure Fundamental BIOS Settings [1]

3.1 BIOS architecture

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

Providing basic I/O (keyboard, floppy, hard disk, CDROM).

3.2 Changing BIOS configuration

3.3 IDE disks

3.3.1 Disk geometry and addressing

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

BIOS Int 13h

Normal mode compromise

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

3.3.2 Logical Block Addressing (LBA)

Disk size limit

Normal mode (CHS addressing)

Large mode (ECHS addressing)

Interrupt 13h extended

9.4 x 1021 bytes

9.4 x 1021 bytes

3.3.3 Data transfer

LPI 101 course notes 2004 www.ledge.co.za

interface. Enabling this causes a small performance improvement.

3.4 Integrated peripherals

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