Linux for Absolute Beginners

Learn virtualization using a hypervisor to run systems as virtual machines on hardware, covering type one and type two, with benefits like cost savings and scalability on Google Cloud platform.

Create your first virtual machine on Google Cloud by configuring compute engine options, region, disk, image, and firewall basics, guided by €313 free credits for 91 days.

Connect to the virtual machine via SSH in a browser window, then use uptime to check the server's uptime and monitor CPU, I/O, and network activity.

Learn how to create and use aliases to map commands like ls and ls -l, view and remove aliases, and understand how aliases take precedence over built-in commands.

Explore bash history, view the last 1000 commands, search with Ctrl-r, and rerun via exclamation marks, then clear history with history -c.

Differentiate internal (shell builtin) and external commands in Linux. Learn how the shell uses type and which to identify command type and locate executables via the path variable.

Learn how to get help in Linux using command options like ls -a to reveal hidden files. Open man pages for command syntax and examples, and quit with Q.

Explain how variables are fixed names for dynamic values. Demonstrate environment variables, path, and per user differences in Linux using env, echo, and export.

Explore the Linux filesystem from the terminal by understanding the filesystem hierarchy standard, navigating root and key directories, and learning basic commands safely.

Learn how to copy and move files and folders in Linux using the cp command, explore its options and man pages, and understand when to use recursive copies with directories.

Learn to back up files with tar in Linux: create and name archives, verify them, list contents, and extract to a directory, using sudo when needed.

Learn how inodes store file metadata like size, permissions, owner, and timestamps, while the file name is separate; view inode numbers with ls -li.

Create and manage symbolic links (symlinks) in Linux, comparing soft links to hard links, using full paths and tilde shorthand, and verify links by reading contents.

Read Linux file contents with cat, use the tag command to view the first lines, and explore long files with less or more; search with / in less and vim.

Use the cut command to filter the first field of a delimited file, selecting user names by specifying option F for the field and option D for the colon delimiter.

Learn how piping connects commands to pass outputs as inputs, using head, tail, nl, wc, cat, and sort to streamline Linux workflows.

Learn to use grep with regular expressions to search text in files, perform case-insensitive and word searches, and filter lines using anchors like ^ and $ via pipes and escaping.

Learn Linux redirection, covering standard input, standard output, and standard error with file descriptors 0, 1, and 2; use >, >>, and 2> to files or /dev/null, and pipes.

Explore Linux users and access control by examining system vs regular users, permissions and groups, viewing current users with cat, and distinguishing privileged root from unprivileged accounts.

Learn how Linux handles primary and secondary groups, view them in /etc/group, and manage them with groupadd and useradd, attaching users to secondary groups using A and G options.

Explore file ownership in Linux, including user and group ownership, permissions overview, and how to view and change ownership with ls -l, chown, and chgrp.

Explain Linux basic permissions, including read, write, and execute, their numeric representations like 644, 755, and 737, and how these permissions affect files and directories.

Learn to manage Linux file and directory permissions using chmod, including symbolic and numeric modes, owner/root requirements, and safe recursive techniques like uppercase X to preserve file executability.

Understand how a repository stores software packages, metadata, and optional GPG verification. Learn how the package manager installs from repositories on CentOS.

Install nginx from the local repository by disabling nonlocal repos, resolve dependencies with rpm packages, then start nginx and verify it is running.

Discover how top and htop monitor real-time system resources like CPU, memory, and processes, compare their interfaces, and learn quick sorting by memory or CPU, plus usage tips.