101-500 LPIC-1 Exam 101, Part 1 of 2, version 5.0 Free Practice Exam Questions (2025 Updated)

The signal that is missing from the following command that is commonly used to instruct a daemon to reinitialize itself, including reading configuration files, is SIGHUP. The command should be:

kill -HUP pid

The option -HUP specifies the signal to be sent to the process, which is the hangup signal (SIGHUP). This signal is traditionally used to notify a process that the controlling terminal has been closed, but it is also commonly used to instruct a daemon to reinitialize itself, such as reloading its configuration files or reopening its log files. The argument pid is the process ID of the daemon to be reinitialized. For example, to reinitialize the nginx web server daemon with the PID 1234, the command would be:

kill -HUP 1234

This will cause the nginx daemon to reload its configuration files and gracefully restart its worker processes1. The other signals are not commonly used for this purpose, as they have different meanings and effects. For example, SIGTERM requests the process to terminate gracefully, SIGKILL forces the process to terminate immediately, SIGSTOP suspends the process, and SIGCONT resumes the process2. References:

Controlling nginx — nginx 1.21.3 documentation

Linux Signals - GeeksforGeeks

 The command foo 1> bar redirects the standard output (stdout) from the command foo to the file bar, overwriting the existing contents of the file. The number 1 before the redirection operator > indicates the file descriptor of the stdout stream, which is 1 by default. The redirection operator > means that the output of the command is written to the file, replacing any previous data in the file. The file name after the redirection operator is the destination of the output. For example, if the command foo prints “Hello world” to the stdout, and the file bar contains “Goodbye world”, the command foo 1> bar will write “Hello world” to the file bar, erasing “Goodbye world”. The other options are not correct because:

A. The stdout from the command foo is appended to the file bar: This is not what 1> does, because it overwrites the file, not appends to it. To append the output to the file, the operator >> should be used instead of >.

C. The command foo receives its stdin from the file bar: This is not what 1> does, because it redirects the output, not the input. To redirect the input from the file, the operator < should be used instead of >.

D. The command foo receives its stdin from the stdout of the command bar: This is not what 1> does, because it redirects the output to a file, not to another command. To redirect the output to another command, the operator | (pipe) should be used instead of >.

E. The stderr from the command foo is saved to the file bar: This is not what 1> does, because it redirects the stdout, not the stderr. To redirect the stderr, the file descriptor 2 should be used instead of 1.

The vi command is a text editor that operates in two modes: command mode and insert mode. Command mode is used to enter commands to manipulate the text, such as saving, quitting, copying, pasting, etc. Insert mode is used to enter text into the file. When the vi command is invoked without any additional parameters, it starts in command mode and opens a new empty file. To enter text, the user has to press i to switch to insert mode. To return to command mode, the user has to press Esc. To save and quit, the user has to enter :wq in command mode. The other options are either incorrect or not applicable. The vi command does not load the last file used or the content of the vi buffer by default. It also does not require the user to explicitly create or load a file. It does not exit with an error message unless there is a problem with the terminal or the system. References:

LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, Topic 103: GNU and Unix Commands, 103.7 Use and edit text files

LPIC-1 Linux Administrator 101-500 Exam FAQ, LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, GNU and Unix Commands (Total Weight: 25)

A hard link is a directory entry that refers to the same inode as another file. An inode is a data structure that stores the metadata and the location of the data blocks of a file. A hard link allows multiple names to refer to the same file content, as long as they are on the same filesystem. However, if the source and the target of the hard link are on different filesystems, the ln command will return an error, because the inode numbers are not consistent across different filesystems. Therefore, the ln command cannot create a hard link that crosses filesystem boundaries. The other options are either incorrect or not applicable. The source file being hidden, read-only, a shell script, or not owned by the user does not prevent the creation of a hard link, as long as the user has the permission to write to the target directory and the source and the target are on the same filesystem. References:

LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, Topic 103: GNU and Unix Commands, 103.3 Perform basic file management

LPIC-1 Linux Administrator 101-500 Exam FAQ, LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, GNU and Unix Commands (Total Weight: 25)

 The find command is used to search for files and directories that match certain criteria. The -uid option specifies the numeric user ID of the owner of the file or directory, while the -user option specifies the name of the owner. The -print option prints the full file name of the matching file or directory to the standard output. Therefore, both find /tmp -uid root -print and find /tmp -user root -print will print all files and directories within the /tmp directory or its subdirectories which are also owned by the user root. The other options are either invalid or do not perform the desired task. The -path option matches the whole path name, not just the starting directory. The -print option is implied if no other action is specified, but it is good practice to include it for clarity. References:

LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, Topic 103: GNU and Unix Commands, 103.4 Use streams, pipes and redirects

LPIC-1 Linux Administrator 101-500 Exam FAQ, LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, GNU and Unix Commands (Total Weight: 25)

The :e command in vi is used to edit a file. If the file name is not specified, it will edit the current file. If the file has been changed by another process, the :e command will reload the file with the new content, discarding any unsaved changes made in vi. Therefore, the :e command can be used to reopen the file for editing with the new content without exiting vi. The other options are either invalid or do not perform the desired task. The :r command is used to read the content of another file or command and insert it into the current file. The :n command is used to edit the next file in the argument list, if any. The :w command is used to write the current file to disk, optionally with a new name. References:

LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, Topic 103: GNU and Unix Commands, 103.7 Use and edit text files

LPIC-1 Linux Administrator 101-500 Exam FAQ, LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, GNU and Unix Commands (Total Weight: 25)

According to the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS), the directory /usr/share/man contains manual pages for user commands, system calls, library functions, and other documentation1. The other directories are either non-standard, deprecated, or used for different purposes. For example, /opt/man is used for manual pages for add-on application software packages1, /usr/doc/ is an old location for documentation files that is no longer used2, /var/pkg/man and /var/man are not defined by the FHS. References:

[LPI Linux Essentials - 1.6 Basic File Editing]

[LPI Linux Essentials - 1.7 Personalize and/or Localize Your Linux System]

[LPI Linux Essentials - 1.8 Basic Security and File Permissions]

The shell redirection that will write standard output and standard error output to a file named filename is >filename 2>&1. This command uses the following syntax:

filename: Redirects standard output (file descriptor 1) to a file named filename. If the file does not exist, it will be created. If the file exists, it will be overwritten.

2>&1: Redirects standard error (file descriptor 2) to the same destination as standard output. The & symbol indicates that the following number is a file descriptor, not a filename.

The order of the redirections is important, as they are processed from left to right. If the order was reversed, as in 2>&1 >filename, the command would not work as expected, because it would first redirect standard error to the current standard output (which is the terminal by default), and then redirect standard output to the file, leaving standard error unchanged.

The other commands are incorrect for the following reasons:

A. 2>&1 >filename: This command will redirect standard error to the current standard output, and then redirect standard output to the file, leaving standard error unchanged.

C. 1>&2>filename: This command will redirect standard output to the current standard error, and then redirect standard error to the file, leaving standard output unchanged.

D. >>filename: This command will only redirect standard output to the file in append mode, without affecting standard error.

E. 1&2>filename: This command is not valid, as it is missing the > symbol before the first file descriptor, and it will produce an error message.

The .bash_history file, located in the user home directory, is used to store the Bash history. The Bash history is a list of commands that the user has entered in the Bash shell. The .bash_history file is created when the user first starts a Bash session, and is updated when the user exits the session or runs the history command with the -a or -w option. The user can view the contents of the .bash_history file with the cat command, or use the history command to see the numbered list of commands. The user can also edit, delete, or clear the .bash_history file with various commands and options. The location and name of the history file can be changed by setting the HISTFILE environment variable to a different value. References:

[LPI Exam 101 Detailed Objectives], Topic 103: GNU and Unix Commands, Objective 103.1: Work on the command line, Weight: 4, Key Knowledge Areas: Use of history and HISTFILE.

Where is bash’s history stored?, Topic: Bash maintains the list of commands internally in memory while it’s running.

QUESTIONNO: 26

Which Bash environment variable defines in which file the user history is stored when exiting a Bash process? (Specify ONLY the variable name.)

Answer: HISTFILE

The HISTFILE environment variable defines in which file the user history is stored when exiting a Bash process. The user history is a list of commands that the user has entered in the Bash shell. By default, the HISTFILE variable is set to ~/.bash_history, which means that the history is stored in a hidden file called .bash_history in the user’s home directory. The user can change the value of the HISTFILE variable to store the history in a different file or location. For example, the following command will set the HISTFILE variable to ~/my_history:

export HISTFILE=~/my_history

This will cause the history to be stored in a file called my_history in the user’s home directory. The user can also unset the HISTFILE variable to disable the history saving feature. For example, the following command will unset the HISTFILE variable:

unset HISTFILE

This will prevent the history from being written to any file when the Bash process exits. The user can view the value of the HISTFILE variable by using the echo command. For example, the following command will display the value of the HISTFILE variable:

echo $HISTFILE

The output will be something like:

/home/user/.bash_history

The <, > and %> are valid stream redirection operators within Bash. The < operator redirects the standard input of a command from a file or another command. For example, sort < names.txt will sort the lines of the file names.txt and print them to the standard output. The > operator redirects the standard output of a command to a file or another command, overwriting the file if it exists. For example, echo "Hello World" > greeting.txt will write the string “Hello World” to the file greeting.txt. The %> operator redirects the standard error of a command to a file or another command, overwriting the file if it exists. For example, ls foo %> errors.log will list the contents of the directory foo and write any error messages to the file errors.log. The other options are either invalid or do not perform the desired task. The <<< operator is not a valid Bash operator, but it is used in some other shells like Zsh to redirect a string literal as the standard input of a command. The >>> operator is not a valid Bash operator, but it is used in some programming languages like Python to denote a bitwise right shift operation. References:

LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, Topic 103: GNU and Unix Commands, 103.4 Use streams, pipes and redirects

LPIC-1 Linux Administrator 101-500 Exam FAQ, LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, GNU and Unix Commands (Total Weight: 25)

The tee command reads from standard input and writes to both standard output and one or more files1. Therefore, the command myapp | tee file1.log will send the output of the program myapp to both the terminal and the file file1.log. The other commands will either fail to write to both standard output and file, or write the wrong output. For example, the command cat < myapp | cat > file1.log will try to read the file myapp as input and write it to the file file1.log, but it will not display anything on the terminal. The command myapp 0>&1 | cat > file1.log will redirect the standard input of myapp to its standard output, and then pipe it to the file file1.log, but it will not display anything on the terminal. The command myapp | cat > file1.log will pipe the output of myapp to the file file1.log, but it will not display anything on the terminal. The command tee myapp file1.log will try to read from standard input and write to both the file myapp and the file file1.log, but it will not execute the program myapp. References:

[LPI Linux Essentials - 1.3 Basic Editing]

[LPI Linux Essentials - 1.4 I/O Redirection]

[LPI Linux Essentials - 1.5 Manage Simple Partitions and Filesystems]

The correct way to set a Bash variable is to use the syntax variable=value without any spaces around the equal sign. The value can be enclosed in double quotes if it contains spaces or special characters, but it is not mandatory. Therefore, TEST="FOO" will set the Bash variable named TEST with the content FOO. The other options are either invalid or do not perform the desired task. The set command is used to set or unset shell options and positional parameters, not variables. The var command is not a valid Bash command. The TEST = "FOO" syntax will cause a syntax error because of the spaces around the equal sign. References:

LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, Topic 103: GNU and Unix Commands, 103.1 Work on the command line

LPIC-1 Linux Administrator 101-500 Exam FAQ, LPIC-1 Exam 101 Objectives, GNU and Unix Commands (Total Weight: 25)

 The command dmesg will display messages from the kernel that were output during the normal boot sequence. The dmesg command reads the kernel ring buffer, which is a data structure that stores the most recent messages generated by the kernel. The dmesg command can also be used to display messages from the kernel that were output after the boot sequence, such as hardware events, driver messages, or system errors. The dmesg command has various options to filter, format, or save the output. For example, dmesg -T will display human-readable timestamps for each message, and dmesg -w will display the messages in real time as they occur. References:

1: How to view all boot messages in Linux after booting? - Super User

2: dmesg(1) - Linux manual page

3: Kernel ring buffer - Wikipedia

The GRUB boot process consists of three stages1:

Stage 1: This stage is located in the Master Boot Record (MBR) of the first hard disk or the boot sector of a partition. Its main function is to load either Stage 1.5 or Stage 22.

Stage 1.5: This stage is located in the first 30 KB of hard disk immediately following the MBR or in the boot sector of a partition. It contains the code to access the file system that contains the GRUB configuration file. Its main function is to load Stage 22.

Stage 2: This stage is located in an ordinary file system, usually in the /boot/grub directory. It contains the code to display the GRUB menu and to load the kernel and initrd images. It can also load additional modules to support other file systems or features2.

The message “Hard Disk Error” is displayed on the screen during Stage 1 of the GRUB boot process. This indicates that the next Stage (either Stage 1.5 or Stage 2) cannot be read from the hard disk because GRUB was unable to determine the size and geometry of the disk3. This could occur because the BIOS translated geometry has been changed by the user or the disk is moved to another machine or controller after installation, or GRUB was not installed using itself (if it was, the Stage 2 version of this error would have been seen during that process and it would not have completed the install)3.

The other options in the question are not correct because:

A. The kernel was unable to execute /bin/init: This error would occur in Stage 2, after the kernel and initrd images are loaded, not in Stage 14.

C. One or more of the filesystems on the hard disk has errors and a filesystem check should be run: This error would also occur in Stage 2, when GRUB tries to access the file system that contains the GRUB configuration file, not in Stage 15.

D. The BIOS was unable to read the necessary data from the Master Boot Record to begin the boot process: This error would prevent GRUB from starting at all, not in Stage 16.

The /etc/inittab file is used by the SysV init system to configure the behavior of different runlevels and the actions to be taken when certain events occur. One of the events that can be configured is the ctrl-alt-delete key combination, which by default triggers a system reboot. To disable this feature, the /etc/inittab file should be modified to comment out or remove the line that starts with ca::ctrlaltdel:. References: LPI Linux Essentials - 1.101.2, LPI Linux Administrator - 101.1

 The BIOS (Basic Input/Output System) is a firmware that is stored in a ROM chip on the motherboard and is responsible for initializing the hardware and loading the bootloader. The BIOS has a setup utility that allows the user to configure various settings, such as the boot device order, the hardware configuration, the system date and time, the security options, etc. The BIOS does not store information about the Linux kernel version, the time zone, or the system’s hostname, as these are part of the operating system and are not relevant for the BIOS. References: LPI Linux Essentials - 1.101.1, LPI Linux Administrator - 102.1

The /proc/ directory is a virtual filesystem that provides a view of the kernel’s data structures and parameters. It contains information about processes, hardware, memory, modules, and other aspects of the system. The files in /proc/ are not stored on disk, but are generated on the fly by the kernel when they are accessed. Therefore, any changes to files in /proc/ are immediately recognized by the kernel and affect its behavior. For example, writing a value to /proc/sys/kernel/hostname will change the system’s hostname without rebooting. The files in /proc/ are not all read-only; some of them can be modified by the root user or by processes with the appropriate permissions. The files in /proc/ are readable by any user, unless restricted by the kernel or by the mount options. References: LPI Linux Essentials - 1.101.2, LPI Linux Administrator - 102.3