010-160 Practice Test 14 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A script named deploy.sh must run only when the preceding build command finishes without error. Which shell operator should you place between the two commands to achieve this?

Accepted Answer

&&. Exit statuses drive shell control flow: zero means success, non-zero means failure. The && operator performs a logical AND on those statuses, executing its right operand only after a successful left operand. Chaining the build command with deploy.sh through && therefore guarantees deployment happens solely on a clean build, which is the standard idiom in shell scripts.

Answer

||

Answer

|

Answer

;

Question 2

A user runs `grep -E '^[A-Z][a-z]+ [0-9]{3}$' file.txt` and gets no output, even though file.txt contains lines like `Alpha 123` and `Beta 456`. What is the most likely explanation?

Accepted Answer

The pattern requires exactly one uppercase letter followed by one or more lowercase letters, then a space, then exactly three digits, and the end of line; the lines may contain trailing spaces or other characters.. The regex anchors to the full line with ^ and $. If the lines contain trailing whitespace, carriage returns, or other invisible characters, the pattern will not match despite the visible text appearing correct. This is the most common cause of such a failure when the regex itself is syntactically valid.

Answer

The pattern requires the first letter to be uppercase and the rest lowercase, but the lines start with uppercase and have digits, which is not allowed by [a-z]+.

Answer

The pattern uses {3} which is not supported by grep without the -P option.

Answer

The -E option is invalid for grep and causes it to ignore the pattern.

Question 3

A shared project directory `/srv/team` is owned by user `lead` and group `team`. Team members must be able to create, edit, and delete each other's files, and every new file must automatically belong to the `team` group even when created by a user whose primary group is something else. The directory already has permissions `drwxrwx---`. Which single action accomplishes the group inheritance requirement?

Accepted Answer

chmod g+s /srv/team. The setgid bit on a directory is the standard mechanism for group inheritance. Once set, the kernel assigns the directory's group to every new file and subdirectory created within it, regardless of the creator's primary group. The sticky bit addresses deletion rights, and plain permission or ownership changes do not affect inheritance, so only the setgid approach meets the requirement.

Answer

chmod g+rwx /srv/team

Answer

chmod +t /srv/team

Answer

chown :team /srv/team

Question 4

While exploring a Linux system, a new administrator runs `ls -l /etc/shadow` and sees that the file is owned by root and group shadow, with permissions `rw-r-----`. They want to understand which user accounts on the system are currently configured with a valid password hash versus those that are locked. Which command best lists only the accounts that have a real password hash set in `/etc/shadow`?

Accepted Answer

sudo awk -F: 'length($2) > 1 && $2 !~ /^[!*]/ {print $1}' /etc/shadow. The shadow file stores the password hash in the second colon-separated field. Accounts with a real hash have a string that is neither empty nor beginning with ! or *. The awk expression tests the length and the first character of that field, so it returns only usernames whose password hash is actually set. Reading /etc/shadow directly is also the authoritative method, since /etc/passwd no longer holds the hash on modern systems.

Answer

sudo cut -d: -f1,2 /etc/shadow | grep -v '^root'

Answer

sudo passwd -S -a | grep ' P '

Answer

sudo grep -v '^#' /etc/passwd | cut -d: -f1

Question 5

A junior administrator needs to change the ownership of the file `/var/www/html/index.html` from user `deploy` to user `www-data`, while leaving the group ownership and all permission bits exactly as they are. Which command should be used?

Accepted Answer

chown www-data /var/www/html/index.html. The chown command changes file ownership, and when only a user name is supplied, the group is preserved. Using the colon form would change both owner and group, violating the requirement. The chmod and chgrp commands address permissions and group ownership respectively, so neither can fulfill the stated ownership change.

Answer

chgrp www-data /var/www/html/index.html

Answer

chown www-data:www-data /var/www/html/index.html

Answer

chmod www-data /var/www/html/index.html

Question 6

A user named alice has a primary group alice and is also a member of the group developers. She creates a new file named report.txt in her home directory. The umask is set to 022. What are the permissions of the newly created file?

Accepted Answer

-rw-r--r--. When a regular file is created, the kernel starts with a base mode of 666 (rw-rw-rw-) and applies the umask by clearing the bits specified. Umask 022 clears the write bits for group and others, leaving 644 (rw-r--r--). Thus the new file report.txt will have read and write for the owner, and read-only for group and others.

Answer

-rw-------

Answer

-rw-rw-r--

Answer

-rwxr-xr-x

Question 7

A user wants to display the current working directory in the shell. Which command should they use?

Accepted Answer

pwd. The pwd command is specifically designed to print the absolute path of the current working directory. Other commands like cd change directories, ls lists contents, and dir is an alternative listing command. Only pwd directly answers the question of where the user currently is in the filesystem hierarchy.

Answer

dir

Answer

cd

Answer

ls

Question 8

A teammate wants to search a large text file for lines containing the word 'error', ignoring case, and display the matching line numbers. Which command accomplishes this?

Accepted Answer

grep -in error filename.txt. grep options compose to refine output: -i removes case sensitivity so Error and ERROR match, while -n annotates each result with its line number in the file. Supplying both flags in a single invocation produces exactly the requested listing. Other flags such as -c, -v, and -l change the output in ways that do not satisfy this scenario.

Answer

grep -l error filename.txt

Answer

grep -v error filename.txt

Answer

grep -c error filename.txt

Question 9

A user wants to find all files in the /var/log directory that have been modified in the last 24 hours and display their names. Which command accomplishes this?

Accepted Answer

find /var/log -type f -mtime -1. The find command is the standard tool for searching files based on metadata such as modification time. Using -mtime -1 correctly selects files modified within the last 24 hours, and -type f restricts to regular files. Other commands like ls with grep, find with -newer, or grep -r do not accurately or completely fulfill the task.

Answer

ls -l /var/log | grep '24'

Answer

find /var/log -name '*.log' -newer /tmp/timestamp

Answer

grep -r '24' /var/log

Question 10

A user wants to create a compressed archive of the directory /home/user/project, including all its subdirectories, and name the archive project.tar.gz. Which command should be used?

Accepted Answer

tar -czf project.tar.gz /home/user/project. To create a gzip-compressed tar archive, the tar command with -c, -z, and -f options is used. The -c flag creates a new archive, -z applies gzip compression, and -f specifies the output filename. Providing the directory path archives the entire directory tree. Other commands either extract, compress individual files, or create a different archive format.

Answer

zip -r project.tar.gz /home/user/project

Answer

gzip -r /home/user/project

Answer

tar -xzf project.tar.gz /home/user/project

Question 11

A user named bob has a primary group of users and is also a member of the group auditors. He creates a new file called notes.txt in his home directory. The system's default umask is 022. Which command would change the group ownership of notes.txt to auditors without altering its permissions?

Accepted Answer

chgrp auditors notes.txt. To change only the group ownership of a file, the correct tool is chgrp. Because bob is a member of the auditors group, he has the necessary privilege to assign that group to his own file. The chgrp command leaves all permission bits untouched, satisfying the requirement to change group ownership without altering permissions.

Answer

chmod g+auditors notes.txt

Answer

usermod -g auditors notes.txt

Answer

chown auditors notes.txt

Question 12

A small design studio wants to deploy a Linux desktop for graphic work but must keep every application they install free to modify and redistribute internally. Which characteristic of a Linux distribution best supports this requirement?

Accepted Answer

The distribution ships only with open source licenses that permit source code modification and redistribution.. The studio needs the legal freedom to modify and redistribute the applications they install. Only a distribution composed of open source licensed software grants those rights through licenses like GPL and MIT. Support contracts, release models, and proprietary EULAs affect other aspects but do not provide the required freedoms.

Answer

The distribution uses a rolling release model with frequent updates.

Answer

The distribution includes a commercial support contract from the vendor.

Answer

The distribution is released under a proprietary end-user license agreement.

Question 13

A Linux administrator needs to add a new user account named 'tester' with a home directory and a default shell of /bin/bash. Which command should be used?

Accepted Answer

useradd -m -s /bin/bash tester. The useradd command with -m and -s options creates a new user with a home directory and specified shell. This is the standard method for adding users in a non-interactive script or command line. Other commands like adduser may be distribution-specific or interactive, while usermod and passwd serve different purposes.

Answer

passwd -a tester -s /bin/bash -d /home/tester

Answer

adduser tester --shell /bin/bash --home /home/tester

Answer

usermod -m -s /bin/bash tester

Question 14

A technician has just unpacked a new server and needs to confirm which physical architecture the CPU reports so they can request the matching RPM package. Which command will display the machine's hardware architecture, such as x86_64?

Accepted Answer

uname -m. The uname utility reports kernel and system information, and its -m option specifically returns the machine hardware architecture, such as x86_64 or aarch64. That string is what package tools use to select an architecture-appropriate build, so it is the direct and reliable answer when a technician must match a package to the server's CPU.

Answer

hostnamectl status

Answer

lsb_release -a

Answer

uname -r

Question 15

A help desk technician receives a call from a user who complains that their Linux workstation feels sluggish. The technician wants to see a dynamic, real-time list of processes sorted by CPU usage. Which command should the technician run?

Accepted Answer

top. The technician needs an interactive, continuously refreshing view of processes ranked by CPU consumption. The top utility provides exactly that, updating at a configurable interval and allowing sorting and process management. Snapshot commands like ps aux and summary commands like free and uptime do not deliver a live, sorted process list.

Answer

ps aux

Answer

free -h

Answer

uptime