Instructor: Todd Dole
Semester: Fall 2025
Meeting Times: Tues 2:45-4:00.
First Day of Class: August 26
Location: AH 204
Holidays / Breaks:September 1 (Labor Day), September 19, October 17 (Fall Break), November 26-28 (Thanksgiving)
Contact: todd.dole@hsutx.edu, Phone 325-670-1502, Office AH100
Monday: 1:00-4:30
Tuesday: 12:45-2:45
Wednesday: 2:00-4:30
Friday: 1:00-3:00
Other times by appointment.
Students will learn server administration skills with emphasis on security-oriented, command-line management of a server running web and database services. Students will manage their own cloud server instance and will gain exposure to topics such as security measures, working with the DNS, deploying and securing web applications, shell scripting, and various security tools. Although not a strict requirement, background in database and web programming is helpful.
Note that because this is a three credit hour course, but only 1.25 hours per week of lecture, additional readings, videos and labs will be assigned.
Students who satisfactorily complete this course will (hopefully) be able to:
Required Textbook:Linux Administration: A Beginner's Guide (Eighth Edition) by Wale Soyinka
Weekly readings will be assigned from this textbook. We will cover some of the book material in lectures, but not all. You will be responsible to know material from all assigned chapters.
Exercises in the book are optional.
Required Textbook:The Linux Command Line (Sixth Internet Edition) by William Shots
This book is available online here.
| Week | Date | Topic | Reading/Assignment |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Week of August 25 | Introduction to the Course. SSH. Linux Command Line. | Read LCL pp. 1-70 |
| 2 | Week of September 1 | Linux and the Command Line (Cont.) | Read LCL pp. 71-169 |
| 3 | Week of September 8 | Bash Scripting | Read LCL pp. 379-473 |
| 4 | Week of September 15 | Bash Scripting (Cont.) Crontab. Log Files. Backups and Automation. Updating Linux. | Read LCL pp. 474-555 |
| 5 | Week of September 22 | Docker and Virtualization. Linux Distros. Installing Ubuntu. | |
| 6 | Week of September 29 | Users and Groups. Crontab. Apt. | Read LA chapters 5,6,7,12,13 |
| 7 | Week of October 6 | Networking and DNS. | Read LA chapters 12,13,14,17 |
| 8 | Week of October 13 | Review Week | Midterm Exam on Tuesday |
| 9 | Week of October 20 | LAMP Introduction. Installing and configuring Apache. | Read LA chapters 19, 20, 21, 23 |
| 10 | Week of October 27 | Installing and configuring MySql, PHP, Virtual Hosting. | |
| 11 | Week of November 3 | SSL. Wordpress. | |
| 12 | Week of November 10 | Nginx. Reverse Proxy. NodeJS. Intro to AWS EC2. | |
| 13 | Week of November 17 | AWS EC2 Continued. | |
| 14 | Week of November 24 | REST API, curl | |
| 15 | Week of Dec 1 | NGINX, Reverse Proxy, Final Project Review | |
| 16 | Week of Dec 8 | Final Exam |
Your grade in the course will be earned / calculated as follows:
A: 90-100
B: 80-89
C: 70-79
D: 60-69
F: 0-59
All exams are comprehensive. The final exam will take place on a designated day during finals week. Exams will never be collaborative in nature, so receiving any form of assistance from anyone other than the instructor is a violation of the academic integrity policy. You may only use study aids during the exam if they are expressly allowed by the instructor for that particular exam.
You will be required to set up and maintain a server with Amazon Web Services for the final project. This will require a credit/debit card to set up. You will also be required to reserve a domain name. I expect expenses for the entire semester to be less than $30.
An individual with a disability is defined by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) as a “person who has a physical or maaental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities.” Any student with a documented disability may choose to seek accommodations. Eligible students seeking accommodation should contact the Director of Undergraduate Advising and Disabilities as soon as possible in the academic term (preferably during the first two weeks of a long semester) for which they are seeking accommodations. The director will prepare letters to appropriate faculty members concerning specific, reasonable academic adjustments for the student. The student is responsible for delivering accommodation letters and conferring with faculty members. Please refer to the most recent version of the Undergraduate Catalog for the complete policy. (Carol Krueger, Director of Undergraduate Advising and Disabilities, Office: Sandefer Memorial, 1st floor Academic Advising Center, Phone: 670-5867, Email: disabilityservices@hsutx.edu)
Peer-to-peer academic support (tutoring) is available for all undergraduate HSU students. The Academic Center for Enrichment (ACE) is open for virtual tutoring sessions via Zoom. To access instructions or make an appointment, open the ACE course on your Canvas dashboard. For additional information regarding academic support, contact the Advising Center at 325-670-1480 or tutoring@hsutx.edu.
In addition, all full or part-time students are eligible to receive free, confidential, and voluntary counseling services at HSU. Services include consultation, evaluation, counseling, and crisis support services for students facing issues impacting their overall well-being. To obtain any of these services, students may call The Office of Counseling Services at (325) 671-2272, email counseling@hsutx.edu, or begin the intake process by completing our online forms at https://www.hsutx.edu/intake.
Violations of academic integrity have been described to some degree in other sections of this syllabus. Cases of suspected academic dishonesty will be handled in accordance with university policies outlined in the Undergraduate Catalog and in the Student Handbook. The current catalog prescribes that “no student who has violated the Academic Integrity Policy will be allowed to graduate from Hardin-Simmons University with honors.” Penalties will be assigned at the discretion of the instructor and typically range from failure on the assignment to failure of the course. A general rule-of-thumb is that a first offense (if not too major) will result in a zero on the assignment and a second offense will result in an F for the course. The current catalog states that an F earned in this way cannot be replaced by retaking the course.
There is an acceptable time and place to use large language models such as ChatGPT or Microsoft Copilot. These tools may be used to help you learn, to answer questions you have about the algorithms or data structures we will cover, or to give you very broad help on lab assignments. However, it is never acceptable in this course to turn in work generated by AI, except for specific assignments which will be clearly designated by the instructor. This course is foundational to a career in the world of computer science. The goal of all lab assignments is for you to learn the material and skill necessary to succeed in the field. These are skills that in many cases you may have to demonstrate from memory in job interviews. Do not cut take shortcuts by having AI do the work for you. Students deemed to have turned in work generated by AI will be in violation of the Academic Integrity provisions listed above, with the same penalties.
The instructor may occasionally use email to communicate with the class as a whole or with individuals. When contacting you for this course the instructor will use your HSU email account. You are expected to check your HSU email account at least once per day and you will be held responsible for any content distributed in this way.