Book Image

Mastering Ubuntu Server - Second Edition

By : Jay LaCroix
Book Image

Mastering Ubuntu Server - Second Edition

By: Jay LaCroix

Overview of this book

Ubuntu Server has taken the data centers by storm. Whether you're deploying Ubuntu for a large-scale project or for a small office, it is a stable, customizable, and powerful Linux distribution that leads the way with innovative and cutting-edge features. For both simple and complex server deployments, Ubuntu's flexible nature can be easily adapted to meet to the needs of your organization. With this book as your guide, you will learn all about Ubuntu Server, from initial deployment to creating production-ready resources for your network. The book begins with the concept of user management, group management, and filesystem permissions. Continuing into managing storage volumes, you will learn how to format storage devices, utilize logical volume management, and monitor disk usage. Later, you will learn how to virtualize hosts and applications, which will cover setting up KVM/QEMU, as well as containerization with both Docker and LXD. As the book continues, you will learn how to automate configuration with Ansible, as well as take a look at writing scripts. Lastly, you will explore best practices and troubleshooting techniques when working with Ubuntu Server that are applicable to real-world scenarios. By the end of the book, you will be an expert Ubuntu Server administrator who is well-versed in its advanced concepts.
Table of Contents (21 chapters)

Understanding the Linux filesystem

Before we get into the subject of managing storage volumes, we'll first need to have a better understanding of how the filesystem is laid out. The term filesystem itself can be somewhat confusing in the Linux world because it can refer to two different things, the default directory structure, as well as the actual filesystem we choose when formatting a volume (ext4, XFS, and so on). In this section, we're going to take a quick look at the default directory structure.

In Linux (Ubuntu uses the Linux kernel and related utilities) the filesystem begins with a single forward slash, /. This is considered the beginning of the filesystem, and directories and sub-directories branch out from there. For example, consider the /home directory. This directory exists at the root level of the filesystem, which you can see from the fact that it begins...