LFA study guide
LFA · Work through your exam, one topic at a time.
The Linux Foundation Certified IT Associate (LFCA) is an entry-level credential for people starting or formalizing a career in Linux-based IT. It suits help-desk staff, junior system administrators, cloud support engineers, and career changers who can already use a Linux desktop or server but want independent validation of the breadth expected in modern operations work. The LFA study guide has 6 sections and about 1,992 words.
01Linux Fundamentals
Linux Fundamentals tests how well you navigate and manipulate a Linux system: the filesystem hierarchy, permissions and ownership, the shell, processes, and basic package management. Questions are practical; you must read a command or permission string and predict the result.
376 words, about 2 min02System Administration Fundamentals
System Administration Fundamentals tests whether you can keep a Linux host healthy: manage users and groups, control services with systemd, handle storage and mounts, read logs, configure basic networking, and schedule recurring work. systemd uses unit files.
327 words, about 2 min03Cloud Computing Fundamentals
Cloud Computing Fundamentals tests the vocabulary and operating model of public and private cloud: service models, the shared responsibility model, regions and availability zones, elasticity, and storage and network primitives. IaaS supplies virtual machines, block storage, and networks; you manage the guest OS and above.
323 words, about 2 min04Security Fundamentals
Security Fundamentals tests whether you can reason about confidentiality, integrity, and availability, and apply controls such as least privilege, authentication, authorization, encryption, and secure network design. Confidentiality prevents unauthorized disclosure; integrity prevents unauthorized modification; availability keeps systems usable.
318 words, about 2 min05DevOps Fundamentals
DevOps Fundamentals tests the practices that shorten the path from commit to production while keeping it reliable: version control, continuous integration and delivery, infrastructure as code, containers, and observability. Version control is the source of truth; every change should be reviewable and traceable.
311 words, about 2 min06Supporting Applications and Developers
Supporting Applications and Developers tests the interface between operations and software teams: how applications are configured, observed, and debugged, and how to help developers without weakening production controls. Applications read configuration from files, command-line flags, or environment variables.
337 words, about 2 min