{"id":8849,"date":"2024-12-07T11:02:25","date_gmt":"2024-12-07T16:02:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.both.org\/?page_id=8849"},"modified":"2026-03-16T21:07:52","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T01:07:52","slug":"errata-for-using-and-administering-linux-2nd-edition","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.both.org\/?page_id=8849","title":{"rendered":"Errata for Using and Administering Linux — 2nd Edition"},"content":{"rendered":"
\r\n
\r\n \r\n <\/i>\r\n <\/a>\r\n <\/span>\r\n<\/div><\/div>\n

This page contains errata for the 2nd Edition of my Using and Administering Linux<\/em> three-volume set of books. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’m sure there are more errors than have been reported so far. If you encounter an error, please email me at LinuxGeek46@both.org. I’ll keep this as up to date as possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fedora 43 installation breaks my books<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Well, it really only breaks the some of the experiments the 2nd Edition of my \u201cUsing and Administering Linux<\/a>\u201c<\/em> series. This includes ones in all three volumes of this series that deal with filesystems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The problem <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Except for Fedora 43 Server, Fedora 43 only installs the BtrFS filesystem<\/a> and provides no options for others such as the Logical Volume Management (LVM) and EXT4 configurations I specify in the books. I\u2019m currently working with my editors at Apress to determine how best to handle this problem for the long term. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The best solution<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Use the instructions in my article, The Fedora \u201cEverything\u201d 43 Image Changes Everything<\/a>, to use the Fedora Everything ISO image. In the section, “Software Selection,” just choose the Xfce desktop<\/strong> in the left column and make no changes to the right column. This gives the same results as using the Xfce ISO but allows you to create the proper EXT4 filesystems on an LVM base.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just be sure to use the filesystem structure and sizes shown in Table 5-1 on Page 138 of Volume 1. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mount Point<\/th>Partition<\/th>Filesystem Type<\/th>Size (GiB)<\/th>Label<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
\/boot<\/td>Standard<\/td>EXT4<\/td>1.0<\/td>boot<\/td><\/tr>
\/boot\/efi<\/td>
<\/td>
<\/td>
<\/td>
<\/td><\/tr>
\/ (root)<\/td>LVM<\/td>EXT4<\/td>2.0<\/td>root<\/td><\/tr>
\/usr<\/td>LVM<\/td>EXT4<\/td>15.0<\/td>usr<\/td><\/tr>
\/home<\/td>LVM<\/td>EXT4<\/td>2.0<\/td>home<\/td><\/tr>
\/var<\/td>LVM<\/td>EXT4<\/td>10.0<\/td>var<\/td><\/tr>
\/tmp<\/td>LVM<\/td>EXT4<\/td>5.0<\/td>tmp<\/td><\/tr>
Total<\/strong><\/td>
<\/td>
<\/td>		35.00<\/strong><\/td>
<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

An alternate solution<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

As an alternate solution, I suggest that, rather than using Fedora 43, you install Fedora 42 on the VMs you create for the experiments in the course and work with that. Be sure to use the LVM and EXT4 filesystem combination specified in the partitioning instructions of Chapter 5. This should work perfectly for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Upgrade to Fedora 43 (Optional)<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The good thing about upgrades, such as from Fedora 42 to Fedora 43, is that they don\u2019t change the filesystem structure. Therefore, you can upgrade your VM from Fedora 42 to Fedora 43 and all of the experiments should work properly. You can read about performing version upgrades here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Downloading Fedora 42 Xfce<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Fedora 42 is no longer directly downloadable from the Fedora downloads website. But you can download the Fedora 42 Xfce ISO image needed for this course from Both.org<\/a>, or from the Fedora mirror service<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I hope this solution works for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Errata Affecting All Volumes<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Some commands that previously worked for non-root users no longer do. This has been changed because the results of running those commands as a regular user could be used in attempts to crack into the system. This is a definite improvement in security, but some of the experiments need to be modified a bit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

dmesg Errors<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Changes to the dmesg<\/strong> command so make it more secure mean that only the root user can access that data. All non-root users see is an error message.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

dboth@essex:~$ dmesg<\/strong>\ndmesg: read kernel buffer failed: Operation not permitted<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n
The objective with the use of dmesg is usually to create a large data stream that can be saved as content of a file used for testing. The actual data doesn’t matter. Use the following command instead to create a file with a large amount of data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
$ dd if=\/dev\/urandom bs=2048 count=500 | od > test.file<\/strong><\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n
This command extracts 1 MegaByte of data from the the urandom device special file and redirects the data stream into the specified file. Just change the name of the target file to the one in the experiment.  There will be more on all of this later in the course.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Volume 1<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
    \n
  • Page 99-100: Although I suggest using an external USB storage device for your experiments, you can also use an internal device that has at least 300GB of storage available and which can be partitioned and allocated for use by the virtual machines. Depending upon the current partitioning of your storage device, and the choices you make when creating space for the VMs, the device may be different than shown in the book. You’ll need to make adjustments for that as you perform the experiments pertaining to creation of the VMs.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Page 341, Experiment 12-12, “Keeping Old Kernels.” The dnf.conf file has changed and all entries removed except the comment that refers you to the man page for dnf.conf. So there’s no content to change as stated in the experiment. Just add the line as it appears in the experiment.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Page 472: Experiment 16-1, the file \/boot\/grub2\/i386-pc\/boot.img no longer exists due to changes in how GRUB uses the configuration files. Use the file \/usr\/lib\/grub\/i386-pc\/boot.img here and in other places where the file \/boot\/grub2\/i386-pc\/boot.img is specified. This is the case on Page 473 also.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
    Volume 2<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
      \n
    • Chapter 24 Special Filesystems<\/em>, page 125, section Thrashing, second paragraph, “If you can manage to issue a command like free that shows CPU load and memory usage, \u2026” The command free does not show CPU load. Thanks to Ivan Kraj\u010der for letting me know about this error.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Chapter 30, Automation with Ansible<\/em>, Page 327, in Experiment 30-3, The ssh-keygen command now creates a public\/private ed25519 key pair instead of the RSA pair that it previously did. This does not  affect the results of  this experiment or any of the following ones. Thanks to Ivan Kraj\u010der for informing me of this change.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
      root@f42vm:~# ssh-keygen -b 2048<\/strong>\nGenerating public\/private ed25519 key pair.\nEnter file in which to save the key (\/root\/.ssh\/id_ed25519):\nEnter passphrase for \"\/root\/.ssh\/id_ed25519\" (empty for no passphrase):\nEnter same passphrase again:\nYour identification has been saved in \/root\/.ssh\/id_ed25519\nYour public key has been saved in \/root\/.ssh\/id_ed25519.pub\nThe key fingerprint is:\nSHA256:F8AyZp5aTiocdwe7KDKN2NO9HTmUZyyGK1Rnktz1otI root@f42vm.both.org\nThe key's randomart image is:\n+--[ED25519 256]--+\n|     . +...      |\n|      @ =. .     |\n|     = @ oo .    |\n|  . o O.*.+o     |\n|.= = X.*E=.      |\n|= B * =.+.       |\n| o + . o o       |\n|      . .        |\n|                 |\n+----[SHA256]-----+\nroot@f42vm:~#<\/code><\/pre>\n\n\n\n
      <\/p>\n\n\n\n
      Volume 3<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
      None at this time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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