LPIC-1 Practice Test 26 — 15 Questions

Question 1

An administrator is configuring a new server with two SATA disks. The first disk (/dev/sda) holds the root filesystem. The second disk (/dev/sdb) is intended to provide additional storage for user home directories. The administrator partitions /dev/sdb using 'fdisk' to create a single partition /dev/sdb1, formats it with 'mkfs.ext4' and adds the following line to /etc/fstab: '/dev/sdb1 /home ext4 defaults 0 2'. After rebooting, the /home directory is empty and the command 'df -h' does not show /dev/sdb1. However, running 'mount /dev/sdb1 /home' manually works perfectly. The disk is not listed in 'cat /proc/mounts' before the manual mount. What is the most likely cause of this issue?

Accepted Answer

The filesystem on /dev/sdb1 has errors and needs to be checked with fsck before mounting.. The fstab entry uses the device file /dev/sdb1 rather than a UUID or filesystem label. While this can work, it is fragile if device ordering changes. However, the most common cause of a device not mounting at boot when the device file is correct is that the filesystem has errors requiring fsck. Option B is incorrect because the device file is correct (manual mount works). Option C is incorrect because an empty /home directory does not prevent mounting. Option D is incorrect because _netdev is for network filesystems. Option A is correct because if the filesystem has errors, the system may skip the mount at boot to avoid data loss, but manual mount with 'mount' bypasses fsck checks.

Answer

The fstab entry is missing the _netdev option, which is required for local SATA disks.

Answer

The /home directory is not empty and contains files that conflict with the mount.

Answer

The fstab entry uses the device file /dev/sdb1 instead of the UUID.

Question 2

Which TWO of the following commands output the total number of lines in a file?

Accepted Answer

sed -n '$='. Option A (wc -l) and D (sed -n '$=') correctly count lines. Option B counts non-empty lines only. Option C prints the first line. Option E numbers lines but does not count them.

Answer

grep -c '.'

Answer

nl

Answer

head -n 1

Question 3

Refer to the exhibit. What will be the default permissions of a newly created file using the touch command?

Accepted Answer

-rw-r--r--. Default base permissions for a file are 666 (rw-rw-rw-). Subtracting the umask 022 gives 644 (rw-r--r--), which corresponds to option B.

Answer

-rw-rw-rw-

Answer

-rwxr-xr-x

Answer

-rw-rw-r--

Question 4

Refer to the exhibit. A user gets this error when running a script. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The script has Windows-style line endings (CRLF).. The error indicates that the shell encountered a carriage return character interpreted as a command, which happens when the script uses Windows line endings (CRLF). Options B, C, and D are less likely.

Answer

The script is missing a shebang line.

Answer

The script does not have execute permission.

Answer

The script contains a syntax error in line 3.

Question 5

Which TWO of the following are valid ways to capture the output of a command into a variable in Bash?

Accepted Answer

var=`command`. The correct answers are A and B. $(...) and backticks are both valid command substitution syntax. Options C, D, and E are not valid.

Answer

var={command}

Answer

var|command

Answer

var=command

Question 6

Which TWO statements about GRUB 2 are correct?

Accepted Answer

After modifying /etc/default/grub, the command update-grub must be run to regenerate grub.cfg.. Option A is correct because GRUB 2 reads the configuration file /boot/grub/grub.cfg at boot. Option C is correct because after editing /etc/default/grub, the update-grub command must be run to regenerate grub.cfg. Option B is incorrect because /etc/default/grub is not read by GRUB at boot; it is used by update-grub. Option D is incorrect because menu.lst is used by GRUB Legacy, not GRUB 2. Option E is incorrect because pressing 'e' at the GRUB menu edits the boot entry, but the GRUB prompt is accessed by pressing 'c'.

Answer

GRUB 2 uses a configuration file named menu.lst.

Answer

The GRUB prompt can be accessed by pressing the 'e' key during boot.

Answer

The /etc/default/grub file is directly read by GRUB during boot.

Question 7

Refer to the exhibit. The system has multiple SAS drives attached to this controller, but one of them is not detected during boot. Which command is most likely to provide information about the device detection order?

Accepted Answer

dmesg | grep -i scsi. Option B is correct because dmesg shows kernel ring buffer messages with timestamps, allowing you to see the order in which devices were detected. Option A (lsblk) shows block devices but not detection order. Option C (lsscsi) lists SCSI devices currently present but not their order. Option D (cat /proc/scsi/scsi) shows attached SCSI devices but not detection order.

Answer

cat /proc/scsi/scsi

Answer

lsblk

Answer

lsscsi

Question 8

Which TWO commands can be used to display the current routing table on a Linux system?

Accepted Answer

route -n. The 'route -n' and 'ip route show' commands both display the kernel routing table. 'ifconfig -r' is invalid (ifconfig does not have a -r option). 'netstat -r' also displays routing tables, but it is deprecated and not listed as an option (here we used it as a distractor). 'ss -r' does not show routing; it shows socket statistics. 'iptables -L' shows firewall rules.

Answer

ss -r

Answer

iptables -L

Answer

ifconfig -r

Question 9

Refer to the exhibit. A system administrator notices that remote SSH connections are being blocked from all IP addresses except 10.0.0.5. Which configuration change would allow SSH from any IP?

Accepted Answer

Add a new rule to accept SSH from any source to the beginning of the chain.. The exhibit shows an iptables INPUT chain with a default policy of DROP. Rule 1 accepts SSH from 10.0.0.5 only. Rule 2 drops all SSH traffic. To allow SSH from any IP, a new rule must be added before the DROP rule to ACCEPT SSH from any source. Changing the default policy to ACCEPT would still be overridden by the explicit DROP rule. Moving the second rule to first would drop all SSH. Deleting the first rule would remove the only ACCEPT, leaving only the DROP rule, so still blocked.

Answer

Change the INPUT chain policy to ACCEPT.

Answer

Delete the first rule.

Answer

Move the second rule to be the first rule.

Question 10

Which TWO of the following are required for a bash script to be executed by the shell (assuming the script is in the current directory)?

Accepted Answer

The script must have a shebang (#!) as the first line.. Option A is correct because the shebang (#!) as the first line of a bash script tells the kernel which interpreter to use (e.g., #!/bin/bash). Without it, the shell may attempt to execute the script using the default shell (often /bin/sh), which can lead to syntax errors or unexpected behavior. The shebang is essential for explicitly specifying the interpreter, especially when the script uses bash-specific features.

Answer

The script must not contain any comments.

Answer

The script must have a .sh extension.

Answer

The script must be in the PATH environment variable.

Question 11

Which two commands can be used to display the amount of free and used memory in the system?

Accepted Answer

free. The `free` command displays the total amount of free and used physical memory and swap space in the system, along with buffers and cache. The `top` command provides a real-time, dynamic view of running processes and includes a summary of memory usage (both physical and swap) at the top of its output. Both commands are standard Linux utilities for monitoring memory consumption.

Answer

uptime

Answer

ps

Answer

vmstat

Question 12

Refer to the exhibit. The system administrator sees that /var/log is 93% full and the syslog file is nearly 2 GB. What is the most appropriate immediate action to free up disk space without losing any critical log data?

Accepted Answer

Run 'logrotate -f /etc/logrotate.conf' to force log rotation.. Option A is correct because 'logrotate -f' forces an immediate rotation of all log files as defined in /etc/logrotate.conf, which compresses or archives the current syslog file (e.g., syslog becomes syslog.1) and creates a fresh empty log file. This frees disk space without deleting any data, as the rotated logs remain on disk until the configured retention policy removes them. It is the standard, safe immediate action for a nearly full /var/log partition.

Answer

Increase the size of the /var/log partition using lvextend.

Answer

Delete /var/log/syslog and restart the syslog daemon.

Answer

Move /var/log/syslog to /tmp and create a symbolic link.

Question 13

A system administrator wants to ensure that the syslog service starts automatically on boot and is running immediately without a reboot. Which command sequence should be used?

Accepted Answer

systemctl enable --now syslog. Option D is correct because `systemctl enable --now syslog` combines enabling the service to start automatically on boot and starting it immediately in a single command. The `--now` flag triggers an immediate start after enabling, fulfilling both requirements without needing a reboot.

Answer

systemctl start syslog && systemctl enable syslog

Answer

systemctl start --enable syslog

Answer

systemctl enable syslog && systemctl start syslog

Question 14

An administrator notices that /var/log/syslog is 3 GB in size, despite logrotate being configured to rotate logs weekly and keep 4 weeks. The logrotate configuration file /etc/logrotate.d/syslog contains: /var/log/syslog { weekly rotate 4 compress missingok notifempty } The administrator checks that logrotate is scheduled via cron and sees that the cron job exists. However, the administrator suspects that logrotate might not have been running. Which of the following commands should the administrator run first to force log rotation and diagnose the issue?

Accepted Answer

logrotate -f /etc/logrotate.d/syslog. Option C is correct because the `-f` (force) flag tells logrotate to rotate the log file immediately, regardless of whether the configured time interval has elapsed. This allows the administrator to trigger a rotation on demand and observe any errors or misconfigurations that might explain why the file grew to 3 GB despite the weekly rotation policy.

Answer

logrotate -d /etc/logrotate.d/syslog

Answer

systemctl restart crond

Answer

cat /var/lib/logrotate/status

Question 15

A database server with high I/O requirements needs a filesystem layout optimized for performance. The server has four identical 500GB SSDs. Which design best balances performance and reliability, considering the need to separate transaction logs from data files?

Accepted Answer

Use one SSD for transaction logs and the other three in RAID 0 for data files.. Option D is correct because it isolates transaction logs on a dedicated SSD to eliminate write contention with data files, while the remaining three SSDs in RAID 0 maximize sequential throughput for data. This design prioritizes performance for high-I/O workloads, accepting the reliability trade-off of RAID 0 for data, which is acceptable when logs (critical for recovery) are on a separate, non-striped device.

Answer

Use all four SSDs in RAID 10.

Answer

Use two SSDs in RAID 1 for logs and two in RAID 1 for data.

Answer

Combine all four SSDs into a single RAID 0 volume, then partition for data and logs.