This is a tutorial on how to make backup on a Linux system. Please read and understand how Linux backup works before attempting to create the real backup job. This tutorial is a step by step guide, so it starts with a simple example and finish with a complete example.

Linux file backup software and backup programs

There are several backup tools in Linux.

The mcrypt is a Linux tool that allows user to use a wide range of encryption functions in Linux system. It replaces the previous crypt package and crypt command which is a well known command for encrypt and decrypt file. This tutorial is a guide on how to create Slackware package and install mcrypt and libmcrypt package in Slackware Linux. You need to install libmcrypt package before installing mrypt package. Otherwise, you'll get an error of missing mcrypt library.The easiest way to create a Slackware package is to get libmcrypt and mcrypt's slackbuild script from SlackBuild website.

Manage software and packages in Linux is one of the important part in Linux administration. Every Linux user has to keep software applications and programs in order, secure and safe. If we need to install software which is not included in official distribution packages (which means it does not officially support), we have to build the package ourselves. You can find some tutorials that might help you create and manage Linux software and packages here.

Ubuntu team with the support of community and Canonical Ltd. has released the new version, Ubuntu Desktop and Ubuntu server 9.04, the Jaunty Jackalope a few weeks ago. Although, the Ubuntu 8.10 still has supports until 2010, Ubuntu recommends users to upgrade their operating system to the latest version available. Here is a step by step guide on how to upgrade Ubuntu Desktop 8.10 to the latest version 9.04 with screenshots.

You can always use Slackware package management tool such as slackpkg to upgrade software or install security patches for your Slackware system. However, the ftp server mirrors took sometimes to update the latest software or security patches to their server. So the best way is to upgrade them yourself. This is an example on how to upgrade software or install security patches for Slackware Linux. First thing you need to do is to subscribe the Slackware security mailing list from Slackware website.

You need to check your hard disk partitions from time to time to keep your eyes on hard disk usage and to make sure your hard disk is not out of space. Normally, the /home partition always running out of space if you setup Linux as a desktop. It's because you are using a normal user account to do your job and keep all data in /home/ directory. If you setup your Linux as a server, then give most of your hard disk space to the main partition (the mount point).

As a Linux user, you must be able to manage user account in the Linux system. You need to know how to edit or modify a Linux user account information, such as change user password, assign groups to user account, remove group from the user account, change user login name, change password and many more. There is one command in Linux that can do all those stuff. That command is usermod command.

What is Linux administration? I didn't find any exact phrase for it. Linux administration always described as job that Linux system administrator does. If that so, then Linux administration means everything about Linux such as Linux installation, create and manage user accounts, permissions, ownerships, hardware, software and data management, Linux networking system, Linux system and network security, software installation, system upgrade, backup and so on. That's basically true. To do administration on Linux system, a user needs to know everything about Linux.

Ubuntu which is based on Debian Linux, share the same great package management system as Debian such as dpkg, apt, aptitude and synaptic for x-window. In Ubuntu, apt is more like the official package management system at the moment. However, users still have a choice and can freely use whatever package management system they are comfortable with.

In this tutorial, we are going to look closely into the popular apt package management system.

Slackware has an automated tool for managing its software packages in its official package. The one we are talking here is slackpkg. Although it's not included in default installation, slackpkg can be install later after you finish the standard installation. Slackpkg can be found in /extra directory in the official dvd installer.