Casual linux user != linux administrator

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Lifer
Feb 8, 2001
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I was asked to take a test on brainbench and :Q I am still in shock

15 questions and 14 of them RoXoReD my BoXeRs
 

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Lifer
Feb 8, 2001
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Originally posted by: dighn
example?

LIL during boot up means LILO is fubarred and bootloader got moved... No?

as86 command not found means?

How to check the default runlevel

How to configure install and configure samba

lrwxrwxrwx mouse /dev/rtc means what?

traceroute: icmp socket: Operation not permitted means: icmp is blocked or not logged in as root?

fork() command breaks something off to a child process right?

ifconfig ppp0 0.0.0.0 means yes you can't get on the internet but why?

when you log into x you do it throgh a graphical manager no?

All I can remember for now....
 

Reel

Diamond Member
Jul 14, 2001
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It was an open-ended test like that? It seems that some of those answers might be rather long.
 

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Lifer
Feb 8, 2001
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Originally posted by: Reel
It was an open-ended test like that? It seems that some of those answers might be rather long.

Each line was an example of a Question


It was all multiple choice...which would have been the only reason I passed it.
 

nd

Golden Member
Oct 9, 1999
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LIL during boot up means LILO is fubarred and bootloader got moved... No?
This is a silly question. There's little reason to memorize this. I know that LILO will print a new character after doing certain things so you can determine how far it gets based on this, but I would always look it up. Plus, LILO isn't even used for lots of modern distributions. Anyway, the answer is explained here: http://www.preggers.easynet.be/lilo.html

as86 command not found means?
The as86 assembler isn't installed or isn't in your path. Maybe you're not on an x86 system? Stupid question.

How to check the default runlevel
Look in /etc/inittab

How to configure install and configure samba
Depends on the distro. In gentoo, I would just do "emerge samba" and then edit /etc/samba/smb.conf. Of course, you can always download the source, ./configure ; make ; make install. Hopefully the question on the test wasn't as broadly phrased as this.

lrwxrwxrwx mouse /dev/rtc means what?
Doesn't mean anything to me. Looks similar to "ls -l" output for a symlink in the /dev directory, but not quite right (rtc and mouse? those devices shouldn't have any connection)

traceroute: icmp socket: Operation not permitted means: icmp is blocked or not logged in as root?
Correct, need root privileges for ICMP (normally the 'ping' binary is setuid root). Or it could be a firewall rule.

fork() command breaks something off to a child process right?
Right, fork() spawns a child process.

ifconfig ppp0 0.0.0.0 means yes you can't get on the internet but why?
The interface hasn't been configured yet if it says 0.0.0.0 (at least not properly to use it, not having a valid IP address and all).

when you log into x you do it throgh a graphical manager no?
Several login managers exist for X (xdm, gdm, kdm, etc.), or you could do 'startx' to go right into it as the current user.

If the questions on that test were phrased the same way as you posted them (rather ambiguously), then it's a really crappy test. Hopefully they were more specific and meaningful.
 

Reel

Diamond Member
Jul 14, 2001
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Originally posted by: nd
If the questions on that test were phrased the same way as you posted them (rather ambiguously), then it's a really crappy test. Hopefully they were more specific and meaningful.

He did them from memory so they were probably more specific though I agree there is a lot of ambiguity especially by distro. For example the samba one. If you got a user-friendly distro, you could just install it off the cd when you start. I bet it would be quite hard to make one of those tests.
 

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Lifer
Feb 8, 2001
35,461
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Originally posted by: nd
LIL during boot up means LILO is fubarred and bootloader got moved... No?
This is a silly question. There's little reason to memorize this. I know that LILO will print a new character after doing certain things so you can determine how far it gets based on this, but I would always look it up. Plus, LILO isn't even used for lots of modern distributions. Anyway, the answer is explained here: http://www.preggers.easynet.be/lilo.html

as86 command not found means?
The as86 assembler isn't installed or isn't in your path. Maybe you're not on an x86 system? Stupid question.

How to check the default runlevel
Look in /etc/inittab

How to configure install and configure samba
Depends on the distro. In gentoo, I would just do "emerge samba" and then edit /etc/samba/smb.conf. Of course, you can always download the source, ./configure ; make ; make install. Hopefully the question on the test wasn't as broadly phrased as this.

lrwxrwxrwx mouse /dev/rtc means what?
Doesn't mean anything to me. Looks similar to "ls -l" output for a symlink in the /dev directory, but not quite right (rtc and mouse? those devices shouldn't have any connection)

traceroute: icmp socket: Operation not permitted means: icmp is blocked or not logged in as root?
Correct, need root privileges for ICMP (normally the 'ping' binary is setuid root). Or it could be a firewall rule.

fork() command breaks something off to a child process right?
Right, fork() spawns a child process.

ifconfig ppp0 0.0.0.0 means yes you can't get on the internet but why?
The interface hasn't been configured yet if it says 0.0.0.0 (at least not properly to use it, not having a valid IP address and all).

when you log into x you do it throgh a graphical manager no?
Several login managers exist for X (xdm, gdm, kdm, etc.), or you could do 'startx' to go right into it as the current user.

If the questions on that test were phrased the same way as you posted them (rather ambiguously), then it's a really crappy test. Hopefully they were more specific and meaningful.

I still use LILO.. :(

missed the as86 question

default runlevel, that wasn't one of the choices

samba was basically a choice of 5 filenames that you use to install it

mouse...like you said it who cares? choices were: serial, parallel, unsupported mouse, not a mouse and something else...i think I opted for serial mouse

think I got ifconfig, options were ip not setup, problem getting it from dhcp & some other answers

x login, I was looking for gnome or kde...but they weren't listed, neither were gdm or kdm, had 4 that started with x and I blindly picked one.

What I didn't like about it was that it was a most right test(several answers are right but pick the most right) or there are 4 ways to do what they asked about, but they only had one in their choices
 

labgeek

Platinum Member
Jan 20, 2002
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Originally posted by: Reel
I bet it would be quite hard to make one of those tests.

VERY! The money sounded good at first but when I worked out the pay/hours it wasn't worth it to do it again. And no, I didn't do the Linux test .... HP-UX. I don't know if they still use the questions I made or not. Questions come from a pool, and several different people work on the pool. I think 3 or 4 other people had worked on the HP-UX pool as well.

 

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Lifer
Feb 8, 2001
35,461
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Wow, I spoke with the recruiter and the results came back and said I was proficient...:confused:

The vender, Lenovo, wants someone w/ 5 years exp as a Linux and AIX administrator who can get an expert score...


All I can say is good luck and hope you have $$$