do admins really use some features like chattr, autofs and so on?

[Robert P. J. Day]

  looking for some general feedback here.  i'm prepping to teach a
basic linux admin course next week and the courseware i have covers a
number of topics that i'm free to replace with what i think is more
useful or practical info.  so i'm curious as to whether people
actually use some of these features on an actual, regular basis.

  file attributes?  there's a decently-written section on
chattr/lsattr in this manual and, yes, i'm well aware of what those
attributes mean, but i've yet to meet anyone who *uses* them on a
regular basis as a normal part of their administration routine.
anyone?  (and is there an equivalent to "find"ing files/dirs with
particular attribute settings?  the man page for find doesn't mention
anything about that.)

  ACLs?  again, it's a great idea and i can see the theoretical value,
but, again, i've yet to meet anyone who uses them *regularly* as part
of their admin.

  autofs?  man, it's been *years* since i've seen anyone using autofs.

  NIS for network authentication?  it's covered briefly in this
manual, but i would be tempted to replace that section with something
on LDAP, which isn't there.

  anyway, you get the idea.  given that i've seen my share of training
material over the years, i'm always curious as to how valuable some of
this material really is.  thanks.

rday

-- 

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Robert P. J. Day                               Waterloo, Ontario, CANADA

        Top-notch, inexpensive online Linux/OSS/kernel courses
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