In this chapter, we started to use some advanced Linux commands that we explored in Chapter 2, Troubleshooting Commands and Sources of Useful Information such as iostat and vmstat. We also became very familiar with a fundamental utility within Linux, the ps command, while troubleshooting a vague performance issue.
While in Chapter 3, Troubleshooting a Web Application we were able to follow the full troubleshooting process from Data Collection to Trial and Error, in this chapter, our actions were primarily focused on the Data Collection and Establishing a Hypothesis stages. It is quite common to find yourself only troubleshooting an issue and not performing corrective actions. There are many issues that should be resolved by a user of the system and not the systems administrator, but it is still the administrator's role to identify the source of the issue.
In Chapter 5, Network Troubleshooting we will be troubleshooting some very interesting network issues. Networking is critical to...