Labs¶
Hands-on tasks for each module, written as exercises with collapsed solutions. Work through a lab on a disposable machine, then check the result with the verification commands before opening the solution.
Environments¶
| Environment | Use for | Notes |
|---|---|---|
iximiuz Labs rockylinux playground | RHEL-family tasks | Rocky Linux 10.2; no SELinux tooling |
iximiuz Labs ubuntu-24-04 playground | Debian-family tasks | Ubuntu 24.04 LTS |
iximiuz Labs flexbox | Multi-host tasks (NFS, routing, firewalls) | Up to five VMs on one or more networks; the Networking and Security labs use three VMs on two networks |
| Local VM (VirtualBox or UTM) | Boot, GRUB, SELinux, nested virtualization | Full control over the boot process |
| Loop devices on any VM | Partitioning, LVM, RAID, quotas | No extra disks needed |
Start playgrounds from the browser or with labctl:
labctl playground start rockylinux
labctl playground start ubuntu-24-04
Local VM Checks¶
A local VM that fails to start is usually missing hardware virtualization or conflicts with another hypervisor.
| Symptom | Check |
|---|---|
| "VT-x is disabled in the BIOS" | Enable Intel VT-x or AMD-V in the firmware settings |
| Kernel panic or freeze at VM start on Windows | Disable Memory Integrity (Core Isolation) or run bcdedit /set hypervisorlaunchtype off, then reboot |
| VM is slow or panics on one vCPU | Assign at least 2 vCPUs |
Lab Index¶
| Lab | Modules |
|---|---|
| Users and Permissions | 04 Users and Access, 05 Permissions |
| Processes and Services | 07 Processes, 08 Systemd and Services |
| Storage and LVM | 12 Storage |
| Networking | 13 Networking |
| Security | 14 SSH and Remote Access, 15 Security |
| Containers by Hand | 19 Containers |
| RHCSA-Style Tasks | RHCSA objectives across modules 04 to 16 |
| Break-Fix Lab | Diagnosis across storage, services, networking and processes |