AIX Administration for Absolute Beginners: Better than Linux

Create a free tier IBM Cloud account by entering your email, setting a password, and verifying with a seven-digit code to access the IBM Cloud dashboard.

Upgrade your IBM Cloud account to pay as you go to access 190 services, including 40 free plans and a $200 credit, then set up billing to build your machine.

Learn to estimate IBM power systems costs for a server with the $200 cloud credit, so first month is free, using defaults like 2 GB memory and 10 GB storage.

Create a power systems virtual server in IBM cloud, select region, use pay as you go pricing with a $200 credit, and monitor provisioning until active to deploy 7.2 machine.

Build an AIX logical partition on IBM Power Systems Virtual Server by selecting the IX7.2 image, configuring 0.25 cores and 2 GB RAM, and enabling a public IP.

Access the AIX LPAR via the console, log in as root, reset the root password, and confirm the system runs 7.2.

Mac users learn to access an AIX server from the terminal by SSH to the external IP, log in as root, and verify the OS with uname -a.

Windows users learn to download Putty and connect to an AIX server remotely using the external IP. Verify access with uname -a and oslevel -s as root.

Customize putty to suit your preferences by adjusting font size and colors, saving and loading sessions, and logging into a remote machine using root credentials.

Explore the unix file system from the root to key directories such as home, Etsy for configs, bin and sbin for commands, and proc (virtual), dev, var, log, and tmp.

Learn how to check server uptime and the current date with uptime and date commands, including uptime duration, logged-in users, date, time, and time zone.

Use pwd to print the current directory and cd to change directories. Practice navigating to /temp or /var/temp with dot and dot dot to reference current directory.

Create a directory with mkdir and a file with touch, verify with ls -l and grep, then remove the directory with rmdir and the file with rm, confirming deletions.

Learn listing directory contents with the RLS command and the long ls -l, identify files vs. directories by the first character, and use the man page for flags and syntax.

Master the pipe and the grip command to filter command output. Apply a practical example using ls -l on the root directory to show only the opt directory.

Learn to copy and move files with cp and mv, including creating test files, renaming, and relocating to /tmp, with verification using ls and grep.

Master the VI editor to create and edit files, enter insert mode, press escape to exit insert mode, and save or quit with :wq! or :q!.

Run the topas command to monitor system health in real time, viewing cpu, memory, network, disk, file system, and top processes with a live two-second refresh, and exit with ctrl-c.

List all services with ls -A, then start and stop Auto Mount D, and verify with lssrc -a | grep auto mount d.

Use the uname command to display the operating system name, and use the oslevel command to check the OS version, as shown for AIX 7.2.

Learn how the df command shows file system sizes and the free and used space, using -g for gigabytes and -m for megabytes, with examples of / and /user.

Restart an AIX system by opening the console, logging in as route, and issuing a forceful reboot with shutdown -Fr. Log in as root and verify uptime after reboot.

Discover SMIT, the system management interface tool for AI systems, and learn to administer users, volume groups, logical volumes, file systems, and software via Smith and related commands.

Learn to create a new user in AIX using smitty, set a password, and verify access by logging in as John, switching users, and confirming identity.

Create a group in AIX by selecting add a group, naming it Smith, and pressing enter; then verify with LHS group Smith to confirm Smith exists with ID 203.

Learn Unix file permissions across owner, group, and all users, with read, write, and execute rights, and how the mod command changes them.

Create a file named test file, review its initial owner and permissions, then change ownership to John:Smith and set permissions to 750 so John has rwx, Smith r-x, others none.

Virtualizing a physical volume with lvm forms volume groups and creates logical volumes. Use mount points to access the created file systems within the volume group.

Map three ten-GB disks to the server via cloud or ibm.com, then rescan with the config mgr and verify with ls pv to display hard disk one, two, and three.

Explore how partition size and logical partition size determine the number of file systems you can create within AIX volume groups on a 10 GB disk.

Learn to create an AIX volume group with SMIT VG, name it data, assign a 1024 MB partition, select a physical disk, and verify with ls pv.

Create a 1 GB logical volume named Test LV in the data vg using SMIT, selecting the jffs2 type, then verify its presence.

Create a gfs2 enhanced journal file system on a previously defined logical volume using smitty, set mount point /test fs, enable auto mount, and verify with df and mount.

Learn to create a volume group from the command line in Aix, using mkvg with a 1024 size on disk two, and verify with lpv.

Create a jffs2 file system on the my test LV, mount at /my test FS with auto-mount and read-write permissions, then verify the 2 GB volume is accessible.

Unmount and delete the file systems, then remove their logical volumes from the volume group, confirming both test vg and test lv are cleared.

Remove the data and test volume groups from their disks using forceful deletion options. Verify with ls pv that only the root volume group hosting the os remains.

Remove the physical volumes mapped to the server, deleting disks one to three, verify with pv, and detach them from the IBM cloud so only the boot disk remains.