Class Description:
Troubleshooting is where the rubber meets the road for system administrators. Our employers need us to identify and fix the root cause of our problems with a minimum of disruption and cost. Our technical chops are important, but we also need to work collaboratively with our coworkers and customers to resolve the problem for once and for all. This course covers several techniques and tools for organizing a successful, collaborative troubleshooting process.
But this is not just a touchy-feely class! Solaris 10 includes a raft of tools for getting to the bottom of performance, hardware and software environments. We'll review several key tools for looking at different aspects of system and application functioning. Some of the tools and techniques we'll look at include:
* Error messages--how to collect and interpret them
* Fault profiles--handy rules of thumb
* Getting at the system's guts with DTrace
* Examining a crash dump
* Using the p-tools and the /proc pseudo-filesystem
* Cool free tools from the Web
Scott Cromar
Scott Cromar has been a fan of Solaris since using a Sun workstation to investigate the sex life of sea grasses while an undergraduate. He is currently a Unix Technical Lead with more than a dozen years of experience supporting Solaris and Linux systems in academic and financial services production environments. Along the way, he created Princeton University's Solaris Troubleshooting web site and the companion Solaris Troubleshooting Blog. Besides technical articles exposing the seamy side of life on the seabed, he has published articles for SANS and SysAdmin Magazine.
