Linux Server Administration: Managing Services & Security Assignment

This assignment details the setup and configuration of two virtual machines, Ubuntu Server and Fedora Server, to provide various services. The Ubuntu Server is configured as a DNS and SSH server, including the installation and configuration of BIND DNS service with forwarding and reverse zones. The assignment also covers the installation and configuration of an Apache web server with PHP support, along with a MySQL database server. Furthermore, it explains the setup of an FTP server for remote file access, including securing FTP with SSH. The configurations and commands used for each service are provided, offering a comprehensive guide to Linux server administration.

In this assignment, the following configurations applies,
Ubuntu Server IP: 192.168.16.83
Fedora Server IP: 192.168.181.118
Qualified domain name khan.net.au
Part 1: Virtual Machine One (Ubuntu) – DNS & SSH Server (5 marks)
To configure the DNS on the Ubuntu Server, we sep the DNS server service on the Ubuntu VM
using the BIND DNS service as use it to configure both the forwading zones and the reverse
zone for the server
Installing Bind and DNS Server Service
To install the BIND DNS server service, the following steps was followed;
Step 1: Update the software packages on ubuntu using command;
sudo apt-get update
Step 2: install BIND
The following command was used to install BIND;
sudo apt-get install bind9 bind9utils bind9-doc

It was important to set BIND to IPV4 mode since the IP address used for the server was IPv4.
The following file was edited as shown below;
sudo nano /etc/default/bind9

Save changes and restart bind service
DNS configuration
Step 1: Configure the options file
sudo nano /etc/bind/named.conf.options
We added the following ACL for the trusted server
We configured the options paramters as shown below;

Configure forward and reverse zones
Steps1:Declare forwading and reverse zones
sudo nano /etc/bind/named.conf.local
Step 2: Create the forwading and reverse zones
sudo mkdir /etc/bind/zones
We copy the sample forwading zone template to our zone declared previously
sudo cp /etc/bind/db.local /etc/bind/zones/forwading
Step 2: Edit forwading zone
Use sudo nano /etc/bind/zones/forwading

Step 3: edit the reverse zone
Copy the template for reverse zone configuration to the reverse zone file as shown below
Edit it as shown below

Check for any syntax error as shown below
Check if reverse zone is OK as shown below
Restart the BIND server service with sudo systemctl restart bind9
Install SSH server service
Update the packages
Install openssh-server service as shown below

Proceedure Experiences and Challenges

Part 2;
Web server Installation
To install the web the following steps was followed;
Start the apache service then edit the apache config and edit the server name as shown below

Restart the server
Step 2: Install php
The follwoing command was used to install php server side scripting language

phpinfo() is as shown below
Database server
Mysql open source database management system was used. The steps to installation and
configuration as shown below
Install mysql community server edition as shown below

Part 3
Remote File Acces
Here we install ftp server services for remote file access.
Install the vsftpd as shown below