010-160 Practice Exam 2 — 20 Questions

Question 1

A Linux administrator needs to grant a contractor temporary read and write access to a project directory without adding the contractor's account to a shared group or changing ownership of existing files. Which approach best meets this requirement while following standard Linux permission practice?

Choose an answer to begin — your selection is scored in the full session.

Accepted Answer

Use setfacl to add an access ACL entry granting the contractor rw on the directory and its contents.. POSIX access control lists allow permissions to be assigned to specific named users and groups beyond the three traditional classes. Using setfacl to add an entry for the contractor grants exactly the needed read and write rights on the project directory without disturbing group membership or ownership, and the entry can later be revoked with setfacl -x to end access.

Answer

Set the directory permissions to 777 so the contractor can read and write regardless of ownership.

Answer

Change the directory's group to the contractor's primary group and set permissions to 770.

Answer

Create a hard link to the directory inside the contractor's home directory.

Question 2

A new administrator wants to see the manual page for the `cp` command to check its options. Which command should they run?

Accepted Answer

man cp. The man command is the standard interface to the system's manual pages. Running `man cp` displays the cp manual, covering syntax, options, and examples. Other tools like help are limited to shell built-ins, and info or custom doc commands are not universally available or standard for this purpose.

Answer

info cp

Answer

doc cp

Answer

help cp

Question 3

A Linux administrator is working in a directory with many files and wants to identify files by their type and permissions without opening them. Which TWO commands can provide this information? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

ls -l. To identify file type and permissions without opening files, ls -l provides permissions and type indicators, while file determines the content type. Together they cover both needs. cat and less open file contents, which is not desired, and stat focuses on metadata like permissions but does not classify content type as file does. Thus, ls -l and file are the two appropriate commands.

Answer

stat

Answer

cat

Answer

less

Question 4

A developer is looking for a career that involves 'DevOps' in a Linux environment. Which skill set is most relevant for this role?

Accepted Answer

Automating infrastructure deployment and managing CI/CD pipelines.. DevOps in a Linux environment centers on automating infrastructure provisioning and managing continuous integration/continuous delivery pipelines, typically using tools like Ansible, Terraform, Jenkins, GitLab CI, and Kubernetes. This skill set directly maps to the cultural and technical goals of DevOps: faster, repeatable, and reliable software delivery. The other options describe unrelated career tracks.

Answer

Writing only proprietary firmware for microcontrollers.

Answer

Selling commercial hardware to enterprise customers.

Answer

Creating graphic design assets for software GUIs.

Question 5

A technician is examining files in /var/tmp and needs to identify which entries are directories rather than regular files. Which two commands can provide this information? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

ls -l /var/tmp. Both ls -l and file reveal the nature of each entry: the long listing encodes the type in its first character, and the file utility prints a descriptive type for every argument. The remaining commands either print raw contents, summarize total disk usage, or count bytes, none of which separates directories from regular files in /var/tmp.

Answer

wc -c /var/tmp

Answer

cat /var/tmp/*

Answer

du -sh /var/tmp

Question 6

Which TWO statements regarding the 'umask' command are correct?

Accepted Answer

It sets default permissions for new files.. Option B is correct because umask defines the default permission bits that are removed when a new file or directory is created, so it directly sets the default permissions for new files (e.g., a umask of 022 yields 644 for files and 755 for directories). Option E is correct because umask works by masking, or clearing, permission bits from the base creation mode (666 for files, 777 for directories) so those bits are not set on newly created files. Option A is wrong because any user can set their own umask, not just root. Option C is wrong because umask is a shell/process attribute typically set in shell profiles like /etc/profile or ~/.bashrc, not stored in /etc/shadow, which holds password hashes. Option D is wrong because umask only affects files created after it is set; it does not retroactively change permissions on existing files.

Answer

It can only be set by root.

Answer

It is stored in /etc/shadow.

Answer

It applies to existing files immediately.

Question 7

To sort the lines of a text file numerically instead of alphabetically, which flag do you use?

Accepted Answer

sort -n. The -n flag tells sort to perform a numeric sort, comparing lines by their numeric value rather than lexicographically. This is essential when sorting numbers like 2, 10, 100, which would otherwise sort as 10, 100, 2 alphabetically.

Answer

sort -f

Answer

sort -u

Answer

sort -r

Question 8

You need to ensure that a server's time is synchronized with an external time source to prevent authentication errors. Which daemon is responsible for this?

Accepted Answer

chronyd. chronyd is the NTP daemon on modern RHEL/CentOS/Fedora and many other distributions, responsible for synchronizing the system clock with external time sources. Accurate time is critical for Kerberos authentication, TLS certificate validation, and log correlation. The other daemons handle scheduling, remote access, and logging, not time synchronization.

Answer

cron

Answer

sshd

Answer

rsyslogd

Question 9

Which THREE of the following represent ways to manipulate command output in a pipe?

Accepted Answer

grep. grep is correct because it filters piped input line-by-line using pattern matching and emits only matching lines to stdout, which is a classic way to manipulate command output in a pipe. wc is correct because it consumes piped input and produces counts of lines, words, and bytes (with -l, -w, -c), transforming the stream into summary output. sed is correct because it is a stream editor that reads piped input and performs non-interactive text transformations such as substitution (s/old/new/g), deletion, and printing, directly manipulating the output stream. cd is not correct because it is a shell builtin that changes the current working directory and does not read stdin or transform piped data. pwd is not correct because it simply prints the current working directory name and does not accept or manipulate piped input.

Answer

cd

Answer

pwd

Question 10

What does the command 'history' do?

Accepted Answer

It prints the command history list.. The 'history' command in Bash and other POSIX shells prints the numbered list of previously executed commands stored in the shell's history buffer (typically ~/.bash_history). It is a shell builtin, not an external binary, and it reads from the in-memory history list maintained per session. This is the standard way to review and recall prior commands for reuse or auditing.

Answer

It shows the date and time of file creation.

Answer

It displays the system log history.

Answer

It deletes all previous command history.

Question 11

A junior admin is confused about the difference between software RAID and hardware RAID. Which of the following is a primary characteristic of software RAID?

Accepted Answer

It is managed by the OS and kernel.. Software RAID is implemented in the operating system kernel, which manages the RAID arrays and disk operations. This is its primary characteristic, as opposed to hardware RAID which uses a dedicated controller.

Answer

It is always faster than hardware RAID.

Answer

It is configured in the BIOS.

Answer

It requires a dedicated controller card.

Question 12

What is the result of 'echo $USER'?

Accepted Answer

It prints the current username.. $USER is a shell environment variable that holds the login name of the current user, so 'echo $USER' prints that username (e.g., 'alice'). The shell expands the variable before passing the argument to echo, so the literal string '$USER' is never printed.

Answer

It prints the path to the user home.

Answer

It returns an error.

Answer

It prints '$USER'.

Question 13

A user's account has been compromised. Which command is the most effective way to lock the user account immediately while preserving their files?

Accepted Answer

usermod -L jdoe. `usermod -L jdoe` locks the account by prepending an exclamation mark (!) to the password hash in /etc/shadow, immediately preventing password-based logins while leaving the user's home directory, files, UID, and group memberships fully intact. This is the standard, reversible administrative action for a compromised account because it disables authentication without destroying data or ownership.

Answer

userdel jdoe

Answer

killall -u jdoe

Answer

chsh -s /bin/false jdoe

Question 14

Which TWO of the following help manage compressed archive contents?

Accepted Answer

gzip. Option C, gzip, is correct because it is the standard GNU/Linux compression utility that compresses and decompresses files (creating .gz archives) and can also list compression information with gzip -l, directly managing compressed archive contents. Option E, tar, is correct because it is the archiving utility that bundles multiple files and directories into a single archive and, when combined with compression options such as -z (gzip), -j (bzip2), or -J (xz), creates and extracts compressed archives like .tar.gz, making it a primary tool for managing compressed archive contents. Option A, find, is incorrect because it searches the filesystem for files matching criteria such as name, size, or permissions; it does not compress, decompress, or manipulate archive contents. Option B, cat, is incorrect because it concatenates and displays file contents to standard output and has no archive or compression management capability. Option D, grep, is incorrect because it searches text patterns within files and, while it can search inside uncompressed streams, it does not create, extract, or otherwise manage compressed archives.

Answer

find

Answer

cat

Answer

grep

Question 15

You have created a script but it is not executable. Which command should you use to give the owner execute permissions?

Accepted Answer

chmod u+x. The 'chmod u+x' command adds execute permission for the user (owner) of the file. 'chmod' is the correct command to change file mode bits, and 'u+x' specifies adding execute permission for the user category. This is the standard way to make a script executable for its owner.

Answer

chown u+x

Answer

chgrp u+x

Answer

chperm u+x

Question 16

A file is owned by root and has permissions 600. What happens if a regular user tries to read this file?

Accepted Answer

Access is denied.. With permissions 600 (rw-------), only the file owner (root) has read and write access; group and other have no permissions at all. A regular user falls into the 'other' category, so the kernel denies the read attempt with EACCES (Permission denied). This is standard POSIX discretionary access control behavior — the owner bits apply only to UID 0 in this case, and no ACL or capability overrides the denial.

Answer

The user is prompted for a password.

Answer

The user can only read but not write.

Answer

Access is granted.

Question 17

A technician is preparing a presentation on how Linux organizes its filesystem and wants to describe the role of the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard. Which two statements accurately describe the FHS as it applies to mainstream Linux distributions? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

It defines a common directory layout so that software and administrators can rely on predictable locations for files.. The Filesystem Hierarchy Standard exists to make file locations predictable across distributions, covering both core system directories and conventions for mounts such as /media and /mnt. It deliberately does not dictate storage formats or kernel versions, and configuration files are not forced into one universal directory. The two accurate statements reflect its real scope: consistent layout and defined mount conventions.

Answer

It guarantees that all configuration files are stored in a single directory regardless of the software package.

Answer

It specifies the exact kernel version that a conforming distribution must ship.

Answer

It mandates that every distribution use the ext4 filesystem for the root partition.

Question 18

Which of the following describes the core philosophy of 'Open Source' as defined by the Open Source Initiative?

Accepted Answer

The source code must be available for modification and redistribution.. The Open Source Initiative's Open Source Definition centers on the freedom to use, modify, and redistribute source code, including derivative works, without discrimination against persons, groups, or fields of endeavor. Option A captures this core requirement that source code must be available and modifiable. Free-of-charge distribution is explicitly not required — OSI-approved licenses may permit commercial sale.

Answer

The software must be provided for free without any charge.

Answer

The code must be written in C or C++.

Answer

The software must only be used for non-profit purposes.

Question 19

You are managing a Linux server and need to confirm the IP address assigned to the eth0 interface. Which command is most appropriate on modern distributions?

Accepted Answer

ip addr. The `ip addr` command is part of the iproute2 suite, which has replaced the legacy net-tools package on modern Linux distributions. It queries the kernel's network stack directly via netlink sockets and displays all interfaces with their assigned IPv4/IPv6 addresses, MAC addresses, and link state. Running `ip addr` (or its shorthand `ip a`) shows the eth0 interface with its inet address, making it the correct modern tool for this task.

Answer

ifconfig

Answer

route -n

Answer

netstat -rn

Question 20

A Linux administrator needs to check how much free space remains on each mounted filesystem before deploying a large application. The administrator wants a quick, human-readable summary showing used and available space per mount point. Which command should be used?

Accepted Answer

df -h. df -h is the standard tool for reporting filesystem capacity and remaining space across all mount points, with sizes scaled to KiB, MiB, and GiB for readability. It reads superblock information, so it is nearly instantaneous even on large volumes. du, lsblk, and fdisk provide usage totals, device layout, or partition geometry instead of per-filesystem free space.

Answer

fdisk -l

Answer

lsblk -f

Answer

du -sh /