IT 62

SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION AND MAINTENANCE

1. Title of the Module

Chapter 1: Introduction to System Administration and Maintenance

2. Introduction

This course covers the administration of a system, and its components. It also
contains a system administrator's basic skill traits, and what his task is. The course will
also explain to the students about the basic aspects of the computer system and its
components.

Computer system basic knowledge, its life cycle and components are required.

3. Learning Outcome

It contains the list of competencies that students should acquire during the
learning process.

1. Explore the world of the Sysadmin.

2. List the duties of the Sysadmin.

3. List the skill set required of the Sysadmin.

4. List a few personality traits of a typical Sysadmin.

4. Learning Content

Topics for module 1: Introduction to System Administration and Maintenance

Topic 1: System Administration

Topic 2: Principles of System Administration

Mr. Erick Abuzo, Subject Instructor | 1st Semester, SY 2020 - 2021 1|P age
Topic 1: System Administration

System

What is system?

“A group of interacting, interrelated, or interdependent elements that

together form a complex whole.”

In the context of this class, we generally consider computer-human systems

consisting of the computer(s) the network the user(s) the organization’s goals and
policies.

Administration

Merriam Webster:

administer, v: to manage or supervise the execution, use, or conduct of

System administration

• is a branch of engineering that concerns the operational management of human-

computer systems. It's about hardware, software, user- support, diagnosis, repair
and prevention.
• System administrators need to know a bit of everything: the skills are technical,
administrative and socio-psychological.

• In a “small company” the Sysadmin may be the entire information technology staff.
• The Sysadmin may do everything from telephone, to fax, to computer
management.
• Sysadmin may have to order supplies, deal with users, develop software, repair
hardware
• In a large company the Sysadmin may be one member of a large group.

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 Responsible for one aspect of the data center operation.
• Programmers
• Database Administrators
• Network Administrators
• Operators

Common System administrator (Sysadmin) Traits

• A Sysadmin is a customer service agent!

• The Sysadmin must be able to communicate with technical and non-technical
users.
• The Sysadmin should be patient, and have a sense of humor.
• The Sysadmin must be able to solve difficult technical problems.
• The Sysadmin must be able to work in a group setting.
• The Sysadmin must document activities in order to reproduce the results.

System administrator also known as:

What exactly does a System Administrator do?

• no precise job description

• often learned by experience

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 • “makes things run”
• work behind the scenes
• often known as Operator, Network Administrator, System
• Programmer, System Manager, Service Engineer, Site Reliability
• Engineer etc.

What Does a System Administrator really Do?

• Plan and manage the machine room environment

• design machine room; specify cooling, cabling, power connections, and
environmental controls (fire alarm, security)
• Install and maintain operating system software, application software, and patches.
• Determine hardware and software pre-requisites, which patches to install, which
services to provide, and which services to disable.
• Schedule downtime to perform upgrades/patches, and test devices and schedule
downtime to manage devices.
• Install and maintain user accounts; develop acceptable use policy and login-name
policy; determine password change policies; install/configure/manage name
services; and manage licenses.
• Determine disk quota, police/manage disk space, and monitor log files.
• Train users on software and security.
• Ensure that users have access to documentation.
• Help users and provide help-desk support and problem tracking system to answer
user questions.
• Configure network services:
• printing, file sharing, name service.
• determine file sharing needs and printing policies.
• manage security for shared resources.
• Install/maintain system devices, hardware/drivers; specify supported devices;
determine spares practices.
• Install/configure/manage web servers, configure web access agents
• Configure and maintain business applications

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 • web agents
• e-mail
• calendar software
• order/problem tracking software
• Install/configure/manage e-mail software
• mail transfer agents.
• mail readers.
• Configure and manage system security
• security for business applications,
• read security mailing lists and CERT notifications,
• install/configure "firewall" software to limit intruder access,
• collect evidence in case of successful intrusion and clean up after
intrusion
• Configure and maintain connectivity between hosts
• monitor connectivity
• troubleshoot connectivity problems
• investigate complaints of poor response
• Configure and maintain system backups,
• determine backup strategy and policies, and
• configure backup software
• perform backups
• monitor backup logs
• check backup integrity
• determine disaster survival plans
• perform restores
• Troubleshoot and repair system problems; and determine, locate, and
repair/replace problem components

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 • Document the system, and develop and maintain documentation on local setup
and local policies

Skills Required

• Delegation and Time Management

• Ethics
• Ability to create/follow Policies and Procedures
• Desire to learn
• Customer Service Attitude
• Knowledge of technical aspects

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 • Hardware- Mechanical, electrical, electronic, or other physical equipment
and machinery associated with a computer system or necessary for the
playback or projection of non-print media.
• Input Devices - allow the user to enter information into the system,
or control its operation.

Example:

▪ Keyboard
▪ Mouse
▪ Camera/web cam
▪ Scanner
▪ Joystick
▪ Biometrics reader/recognition
▪ Light pen
▪ Barcode reader
▪ QR code reader

• Output Devices - is a piece of hardware that is used to display or

output data which has been processed or has been stored on the
computer.

Example:

▪ Monitor
▪ Printer
▪ Speaker
▪ Projector
▪ Plotter

• Central Processing Unit (CPU) - is the heart and brain of a computer.

▪ It receives data as input.

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 ▪ Follows instruction, and processes data accordingly.
▪ Presents the information as output to the user.
▪ Its primary function is to execute programs.
▪ It controls & coordinates all components such as memory,
input and output devices.
▪ consists of two units

o Control Unit (CU)

o Arithmetic & Logic Unit (ALU)

• Primary Storage (Memory) - also called Main Memory

▪ On board memory (located on the motherboard)

▪ Very fast, but expensive
▪ Two types

▪ RAM – Random Access Memory

o Read/write capability
o Contents lost when computer is turned off
(volatile)
o A program must be in RAM for it to execute
o Types

o Static
o Dynamic
▪ ROM – Read Only Memory

o Read but not write capability

o Permanent (non-volatile)
o Stores the preliminary instructions to be
executed when the computer is turned on,

Example:

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 • To check RAM
• To check communications with
peripheral devices
• Bootstrap loader program
• Types
o ROM
o PROM
o EPROM
o EEPROM

• Secondary Storage (Mass Storage)

▪ external devices (not on the motherboard); either inside or

outside the computer
▪ Store programs and data permanently
▪ Slower, but cheaper
▪ Different sizes/styles

o Floppy Disk - 1.4MB (portable)

o Zip Drive - 100-750MB (portable)
o CD - 650MB (portable)
o Hard Disk Drive >=20GB (not portable)
o Tape - 50GB (portable, very slow)
o Flash drives (portable)

Software
• Programs written in a special language with a series of instructions
to a computer or its peripherals that cause the computer to solve a
problem or perform a task to achieve a specific set of results.
• Simply a set of instruction necessary for a computer to accomplish
required tasks.

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 • A computer program is a series of instructions

▪ each instruction is expressed in a format consistent with a

predefined set of rules
▪ a computer processes data under the direction of the
instructions in a program
▪ are instructions to input, process, store and output data
▪ the user of a program (as distinct from its creator) has no need
to be aware of the details of its construction
▪ the user is only interested in the services that the program is
able to provide

TYPES OF SOFTWARE

Operating System

• controls all machine activities

• provides the user interface to the computer
• manages resources such as the CPU and memory
• DOS, Windows XP, Unix, Linux, Mac OS

Application program

• generic term for any other kind of software (custom made)

• e.g.: MS Word, MS Excel, Game

Problem Solving
• Most of the work that administrators of systems do in one day is one
type of problem solving, or another. Being an effective system
administrator requires a problem-solving capability which is almost
instinctive. For instance:
• To figure out why systems don't work together,

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 • Determine which way to migrate or upgrade systems best,
and
• Develop the best method for identifying problems before they
become crises.

• Having a better understanding of the technologies you are using

and their underlying operation can help the process of
troubleshooting. Consider at the same time the following heuristic
approach for unknown or new problems
• Collect data.
• Assess behavior and specification.
• Rule out common problems.
▪ Permissions
▪ Dependencies
▪ Hardware.
▪ Networking.
▪ Known bugs
▪ Global limitations
• in addition to file descriptors other limitations
include:
o inodes, the file system structure that
stores file system metadata, on ext3/ext4
file systems the number of available
inodes is a function of your disk size and
the file systems block size.
o Addressable/actual memory. The
hardware is the limit on RAM, but in
virtualized environments, the amount of
memory may be a boot-time option.
• Look for correlations
• Develop tests to confirm behavior.

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Topic 2: Principles of System Administration

Pillars of system administration

• Scalability
• Security
• simplicity

Principles

1- Policy is the foundation

2- Predictability (is the goal)
3- Scalability (is often important)
4- Minimum privilege (restriction of unnecessary privilege protects a system
from accidental and malicious damage)
5- Corollary: don't work as Administrator/root
6- Communities (each member needs to consider ramifications of actions)
7- Uniformity (increases predictability - may decrease costs)
8- Variety (used as needed for risk management and flexibility
• may increase costs)
9- Delegation, aka 'Specialization' (develop experts who can do tasks more
efficiently and more cost effectively)
10- Resource map: Mapping our hardware and software resources increases
the predictability, and removes ambiguity, of the complete system
• displays parts of the system and their inter-relationships so
contingencies can be made for expected problem areas

System Admin responsibilities can be summarized as – SUM CRUD

o Software
o Users
o Machines
o Create

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 o Read
o Update
o Delete

The human role in systems

• System administration is a balancing act

o it requires patience, understanding, knowledge and experience.
• Working with a limited resources, be incentive in crisis, know the way computers
works.
• Need to recognize answer are not always written down for us to copy.
• Must be ready for the unexpected, resigned to the uncertain and need able to
plan for the future.
• Installing an OS(window, Dos, GNU/Linux) does not mean we know a lot about
system administration, it is the beginning .
• Today no computer examined in isolation from the network.
• Networking = cooperation + sharing with many users.

Goals of system administration

• System administration is
o Putting together a network of computer (workstations, pc’s, supercomput)
o Getting them running
o Keeping them running – in spite of the activities of users who tend to cause
the system to fail.
• System administrator works for the users
• System administrator should not furnish for the benefit of selfish
o but for the benefit of a whole community.
• The person who is responsible for setting up and maintaining the system is called
as the system administrator.

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 • Supervise system functionality. Every system must work and be connected to the
network.
o Create backups on media, better if automatic backup.
• Create and install desktop and servers.
o Create users and assign to them customizable Graphical User Interface.
• Update systems for the maximum performance
• Share system resources for the maximum network flow
• share disks between heterogenous systems in the better position
o share printers to save superfluous investment.
5. Teaching and Learning Activities
Note: Activities are included in the documents

6. Recommended learning materials and resources for supplementary reading.

• https://www.netmeister.org/book/01-introduction.pdf
• https://www.academia.edu/9661210/Problem_and_solution_System_administration
• https://victorops.com/blog/definitive-guide-for-being-a-system-administrator
• https://www.imperial.ac.uk/school-public-health/infectious-disease-
epidemiology/it-support/basic-troubleshooting-guide/

7. Flexible Teaching Learning Modality (FTLM) adopted

Online (synchronous)
• Schoology application. Instructions can be viewed at
www.erickabuzo.com/class

Remote (asynchronous)
• Printed Module

8. Assessment Task

Login to your Schoology app in your computer or phone and take the online quiz,
or contact me if you have problem taking the online activity.

Mr. Erick Abuzo, Subject Instructor | 1st Semester, SY 2020 - 2021 14 | P a g e

9. References

Mike Ryan, Federico Lucifredi.2018. AWS System Administration: Best

Practices for Sysadmins in the Amazon Cloud 1st Edition. Publisher: O'Reilly
Media

Eleen Frisch, 2002. Essential System Administration, 3rd Edition. Publisher(s):

O'Reilly Media, Inc.

Jan Bergstra Mark Burgess, 2007. Handbook of Network and System

Administration 1st Edition. Publish: Elsevier Science

Thomas A. Limonceli, Christina J. Hogan, Strata R. Chalup,2007 The Practice

of System and Network Administration 2nd Edition. Addison- Wesley

PMI 2017. A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge: PMBOK®

Guide (Sixth Edition), Project Management Institute, Inc. Newton Square
Pennsylvania USA

Gregory Horine, 2017, Project Management Absolute Beginner’s Guide fourth

edition, Que Publishing

Mr. Erick Abuzo, Subject Instructor | 1st Semester, SY 2020 - 2021 15 | P a g e