Red Hat Certified System Administrator & Engineer Guide, Exams EX200 & EX300

I’ve had a few weeks to go through the book and I like. I like the step by step instructions, the format how everything is laid out. There are practice exercises, labs and review questions with answers at the end of the chapters. This way I can verify that I’m on the right track of learning and understanding that which I need to know. I have an earlier addition and version of a Red Hat book that hasn’t been as helpful. I’d give this book five stars, however, knowing this is the best that I’ve read so far, there is still something better. Besides, all instructional books or manuals can be improved upon. This fits the bill for me now…

I bought this book on December 29, 2013 (Kindle version) and started reading it on the same day, and found the book “unputdownable” for one month until I was done reading the first 13 chapters of the book to prepare for the RHCSA. What can I say?…

Ghori follows a systematic approach with a concise, coherent, and complete writing style that leaves me the reader without a doubt that I have met an exam objective for RHCSA. Which is why I was able to read the first 13 chapters, practice all the labs in those 13 chapters, complete the RHCSA practice exam at the end of the book. Basically I took the month of January to read the first 13 chapters; the month of February to practice the labs and the month of March (March 14, 2014) to take the RHCSA. Did I pass or not? Read on…

May I state that I didn’t attend a RedHat class; I clung to the merriness and merriment of every word of Ghori’s book, like a bird on a high bough, high swaying in the winds of RHCSA, and sored my way to success when I took the RHCSA on March 14 2014 — after two months 14 days of study — and passed it.

One thing I like about the organization of Ghori’s book is the fact that I was certain I was done reading for the RHCSA after chapter 13. I resume chapter 14 tomorrow (March 18, 2014) to start preparing for RHCE.

Thank you, Ghori, for writing this book, and within the confines and comfort of my study, I can proudly thank you that I am now RHCSA certified.

It’s an excellent book that covers all the official objectives for both RHCSA and RHCE exams in detail. Each exam objective is explained at a decent level, and the concepts are strengthened by step by step exercises. This book is well organized and is separated into CSA and CSE sections. There are labs presented at the end of each chapter. There are hundreds of review questions throughout the book. Those who are preparing to take these exams, I suggest that they should have two virtual machines loaded with RHEL 6 or any of its clones: CentOS or Scientific Linux, available to them, and run each exercise and command as they come up while reading the book.
This book can be used as an on-the-job guide also. It covers many common administration topics in detail.”

I bought this title after having toted Jang’s RHCSA/RHCE Certification Study Guide around for a couple of years. Jang’s book is regarded as the standard when it comes to exam preparation, but for RHEL 5 I found Ghori’s previous edition to be more helpful in a number of ways, specifically in its straightforward presentation of material and almost cookbook how-to of different topics. This latest edition, recrafted for RHEL 6, is another good title for reference and exam preparation.

Ghori’s approach when assembling this book is clear – present the material in a very direct, understandable and sometimes exhaustive way. Every topic is presented very methodically and has no shortage of explanation attached, whether it’s setting up an ftp server or running the ls command. Cases where there isn’t enough information are few.

The material is broken down in logical chapters in two groups – RHCSA-specific topics and RHCE-specific topics. In the RHCSA section there are: Local Installation, Basic Linux Commands, Files and Directories, Package Management, Virtualization and Network Installation, Linux Boot Process & Kernel Management, Disk Partitioning, File Systems & Swap, Users & Groups, Firewall & SELinux, and finally Networking/Network Interfaces & DNS/DHCP/LDAP Clients. In the RHCE section there are: Shell Scripting/Building an RPM Package/iSCSI, Advanced Firewall/TCP Wrappers/Usage Reporting & Remote Logging, Routing/Kerberos/DNS Server, Internet Services/Kernel Parameters/NTP, Electronic Mail, Network File System (NFS), Samba & FTP, and finally Apache Web Server (HTTP) & Secure Shell Server (ssh). Every chapter (including chapter one) has a small set of labs and a large number of review questions for practice and exam preparation.

Some of the labs are exceptionally simple – run ls command, change directories, do a basic installation and so forth. Other labs are a lot more interesting, such as one where the bash shell is forcibly removed and the box rebooted, after which recovery steps take place. If there is a weakness with this book it is in the labs that are presented – there is a sufficient number of trivial labs that might otherwise have been displaced by more interesting and challenging exercises. And, unlike Jang, Ghori does not include lab solutions.

At the back of the book are two complete exams, one for the RHCSA and one for the RHCE.

Though suitable for exam preparation, Ghori’s book is even better suited as a reference guide and how-to for day-to-day use. The presentation of material is clear and detailed and leaves little to the imagination for the reader. This is the book that will live at my desk and in my book bag.

Ghori’s Red Hat Certified System Administrator & Engineer is a fine book, well suited for test preparation but excelling even more so as a reference manual and how-to. Regardless of the intended use, this is a very good book to have on hand if you’re working with Red Hat Linux.

The re-seller is very bad.
The book purchased was damaged and had dog-years, the book seems to have been dropped by the courier service on the corner.

The overall product, the book content and author is excellent however. (5 out of 5) for the book.