Exam briefing, rules and marking sheet

About this exam

This is a practice exam written for Linux Roads. It follows the EX200 objectives for RHEL 10 and the kinds of task that candidates commonly report (users and sudo, LVM and swap, SELinux for a web server, autofs home directories, rich firewall rules, key-based SSH, recovering the root password, scripts that take arguments, tuned profiles, and more). It is not Red Hat’s exam, does not contain real exam questions, and the time, number of tasks and scoring below are this practice’s own design. Check Red Hat’s exam page for the official format when you book.

Rules

Item	Rule
Time	3 hours (180 minutes) from the moment you read the first task
Score	300 points: Part A 100, Part B 100, Part C 100
Pass mark	210 points (70 %)
Scoring	A task earns its points only if every check in its list passes. No partial credit inside a task
Machines	node1 (main), node2 (peer). Task text says where to work
Internet	None. No browser, no search, no AI assistant, no notes
Allowed help	man, --help, info, /usr/share/doc, and the commands on the machine
Persistence	Every change must survive a reboot. You will reboot at the end and the checks are run after it
Starting state	The clean snapshot plus the preparation below

The suggested minutes of each task add up to about 160, leaving 20 minutes for reading, the final reboot and your own verification. If you are short of time, drop to tasks with higher points per minute first.

Fixed facts used by the tasks

Item	Value
Domain	lab.example
node1	node1.lab.example, 192.168.122.50/24, IPv6 fd00:122::50/64, gateway 192.168.122.1
node2	node2.lab.example, 192.168.122.51/24, IPv6 fd00:122::51/64
Password for every new account	Ex200!Lab
Disks on node1	/dev/vdb 2 GiB, /dev/vdc 1 GiB (both unused)
Installation media	Mounted at /mnt/dvd with BaseOS and AppStream (your lab’s repository)
Flatpak remote	URL and application ID are given in task B1; use your lab’s equivalent

If your addresses differ, substitute them consistently.

Preparation on node2

Before the clock starts, make node2 able to play its roles. This is part of building the exam, not part of the exam.

# Time server for node1
printf 'allow 192.168.122.0/24\nlocal stratum 10\n' >> /etc/chrony.conf
systemctl enable --now chronyd && firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service=ntp && firewall-cmd --reload

# NFS export for home directories and for a shared directory
dnf install -y nfs-utils
mkdir -p /home/remoteusers/remoteuser1 /srv/share
echo 'hello from node2' > /srv/share/readme.txt
echo 'remote home' > /home/remoteusers/remoteuser1/notes.txt
useradd -d /home/remoteusers/remoteuser1 -u 4001 -M remoteuser1
chown -R remoteuser1:remoteuser1 /home/remoteusers/remoteuser1
printf '/srv/share 192.168.122.0/24(rw,sync)\n/home/remoteusers 192.168.122.0/24(rw,sync)\n' >> /etc/exports
systemctl enable --now nfs-server && exportfs -ra
firewall-cmd --permanent --add-service=nfs && firewall-cmd --reload

# Account for the SSH key task C4
useradd natasha && echo 'natasha:Ex200!Lab' | chpasswd

# Forgotten root password for task B5 (set to something you do not remember)
echo "root:$(head -c12 /dev/urandom | base64)" | chpasswd

On node1, create the matching user: useradd -u 4001 -M -d /rhome/remoteuser1 remoteuser1 (task C2 mounts that directory). Then run lab-check.sh again and take a new snapshot called exam-start. Revert to exam-start for every attempt.

The marking sheet

Print it or copy it into a file outside the lab. After the exam, mark each task Y only if all of its checks passed, add up the points, and compare.

Part	Task	Topic	Pts	Min	Done
A	A1	Users, groups, sudo	18	10
A	A2	Password policy and umask	12	6
A	A3	Shared directory	12	6
A	A4	Cron job and systemd timer	16	8
A	A5	Shell script	18	10
A	A6	Archives, find, grep	14	8
A	A7	Time client	10	5
B	B1	Repositories, packages, Flatpak	14	8
B	B2	Target, services, journal	12	6
B	B3	tuned and priority	10	5
B	B4	Runaway process and boot loader	10	6
B	B5	Reset root password on node2	14	8
B	B6	LVM and XFS	16	8
B	B7	Extend the volume	8	4
B	B8	Swap	8	4
B	B9	Labelled file systems	8	5
C	C1	Network and names	14	7
C	C2	NFS and autofs	16	8
C	C3	Firewall	14	7
C	C4	SSH keys and sshd	12	6
C	C5	SELinux web server	20	10
C	C6	Troubleshooting	14	8
C	C7	Persistence after reboot	10	8

How to read your result:

• 210 or more: you are in pass territory. Look at the missed tasks for gaps.
• 150 to 209: close. Almost always a few persistence mistakes (see the Exam Technique skill) and one or two areas that need drilling.
• Under 150: go back to the skill for each missed objective and repeat the matching exercises, then retake after a week.

How the checks work

Each task ends with a checks list in its “verify” box: commands and what they should print. Run them yourself, in a different order from how you configured, and after the final reboot. Task C7 deliberately grades persistence of earlier tasks, so a setting that vanishes at reboot costs you twice: once on its own task, and again in C7.

Dependency map

C1 names/network  -->  C2 NFS/autofs, C3 firewall, C4 SSH, A7 time (need node2 by name)
B1 repositories   -->  every task that installs a package (A4 timer needs none; B2, B3, C2, C5 do)
A1 users          -->  A2, A3, A4(natasha), A5(sudo), C2(autofs home), C4(SSH key), C6
B6 LVM            -->  B7 extend, C5 (web content on the new LV is optional)
B5 node2 reboot   -->  start early, ignore until it returns; C2 and C4 need node2 up again
C7                -->  last

Start the clock when you are ready to read Part A.