Video Tutorials for SysAdmins

Download Video (last update 2008-09-05) (1.18 MB)

In this video I will install Gentoo from Minimal Installation CD. The steps described below is for making a Gentoo install on a server from stage3 with manual kernel compilation.

Installation steps:

1. Boot from the Gentoo Minimal Installation CD. You will be presented with a the prompt boot:. Boot with following options:

gentoo-nofb acpi=off noapic nodhcp nofirewire nogpm nokeymap docache

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This video describes how to create a private Gentoo Linux mirror of Portage Tree and source files on your server. Also, the tutorial shows how to update mirror using cron and rsync, how to serve the mirror via HTTP (with apache), via FTP (with vsftpd) and via RSYNC (with rsyncd) and how to set up the clients to use the mirror.

Video tutorial consists from 5 parts:
Part 1. Sync portage tree and Gentoo source files (distfiles, releases, snapshots etc.) with one of the official Gentoo rsync servers (03:40 min)
Part 2. Make mirror accesible via RSYNC (05:30 min)
Part 3. Make Gentoo source files accesible via HTTP (04:38 min)
Part 4. Make Gentoo source files accesible via FTP (03:17 min)
Part 5. Clients setup (02:07 min)

Installation steps.
Part 1. Sync portage tree and Gentoo source files (distfiles, releases, snapshots etc.) with one of the official Gentoo rsync servers

1. First, check if installed rsync has latest version. If itsn't upgrade it:

   emerge --sync
   emerge -av rsync

2. Create a new user with no login privileges that will be used for sync operations, and as the user to serve the files via HTTP, FTP and RSYNC:

   useradd -m -s /sbin/nologin mirror

3. Make dirs for our Gentoo mirror:

   sudo -u mirror mkdir /home/mirror/gentoo-portage
   sudo -u mirror mkdir /home/mirror/gentoo

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A VPN (virtual private network) is a private, encrypted network that traverses a public network (such Internet). This is a way of giving remote users access to local network resources as if they were themselves local.

X.509 is an industry-standard format for SSL certificates.

In this video I will show how to setup a VPN server with X.509 certificate-based authentication using OpenVPN which secure authentication and encryption functions relies on OpenSSL. Also, in tutorial will be shown how to connect to this VPN server from Linux and Windows machines.

Video tutorial consists from 6 parts:
Part 1. Configure OpenSSL (11:09 min)
Part 2. Generate certificates and keys for VPN server, Linux and Windows clients (10:24 min)
Part 3. Install and configure VPN (10:44 min)
Part 4. Connecting to VPN server from Linux host (08:30 min)
Part 5. Connecting to VPN server from Windows host (07:56 min)
Part 6. Testing VPN Connectivity (01:25 min)

Installation steps.
Part 1. Configure OpenSSL
SSL is based on public-key cryptography where each party has two key: one public and one private. Private key is used to sign data digitally then you send it, and to decrypt data that have been sent to you. Public key is used to verify data that have been signed and sent to you, and to encrypt data that you will send.
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Squid is a proxy server and web cache daemon.
Rejik is a squid redirector, used to block advertising, banners, mp3 and so on.
Squint is used to periodically analyze squid logs, and produce linked HTML reports
SqStat is a php script which allows to look through active squid users connections. It use cachemgr protocol to get information from squid proxy server.

Video is about how to setup a squid proxy-server with web-content filtering (using rejik redirector) with browsable proxy usage statistics (squint for HTML reports and sqstat for realtime statistics).

This video tutorial, as previous, consists from 4 parts:
Part 1. Install and configure squid (13:51 min)
Part 2. Setup rejik for web-content filtering (09:30 min)
Part 3. Setup squint to convert a squid logs into a browsable HTML reports (03:02 min)
Part 4. Install and configure SqStat - to view active squid user connections (02:49 min)

Installation steps.
Part 1. Install and configure squid:

1. Use logrotate for rotating squid logs:

echo net-proxy/squid logrotate >> /etc/portage/package.use

2. squid installation:

emerge -av squid

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SNMP is a communication specification that defines how management information is exchanged between network management applications and management agents.

Cacti is a resource monitoring software. It uses RRDtool to store data and the data is used create graphs. It also comes with fast poller to collect data from different resources simultaneously and has many user management features. The interface and management is very userfriendly that even a layman can get it working with less effort.

This video is about how to monitor Linux and Windows hosts with SNMP (2c version)  Cacti. Video tutorial consists from 4 parts:

Part 1. Setup snmpd on Linux host (3:00 min)
Part 2. Setup snmp service on Windows host (3:01 min)
Part 3. Setup Cacti (5:29 min)
Part 4. Graphing Linux and Windows hosts (5:14 min)

Installation steps.
Part 1. Setup snmpd on Linux host:

1. Enable diskio MIB module for net-analyzer/net-snmp to enable to graph I/O statistics:

echo net-analyzer/net-snmp diskio > /etc/portage/package.use

2. Install snmpd:

emerge -av net-snmp

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