Getting Hands-on with Cockpit on CentOS 7

Install and Configure Cockpit on CentOS 7 (Duration: 20 minutes):

• Install and configure Cockpit on both instances of CentOS 7
• Configure the Cockpit installation on the first instance to manage the second instance

For more information on installing and configuring Cockpit, see: Running Cockpit — Cockpit Project

We will take a look at storage management (Duration: 10 minutes):

• Create a new RAID-1 volume (web_data) for website data:
  • Partition, format, and configure a mount point at /web_data
  • Use two disks
• Create a new volume group (web_vg):
  • Add the remaining disk to it
• Create and format a new logical volume for the logs (web_logs):
  • Create the web_logs logical volume in the web_vg volume group
  • Format the logical volume
  • Mount the new logical volume on the /web_logs directory

Configure the storage on both instances as described above.

We will take a look at network management (Duration: 10 minutes):

• Modify our firewall configuration to enable HTTP traffic
• Monitor network traffic
• Review network interfaces
• Review networking logs

Configure the firewall on both instances as described above.

We’re going to look at using Cockpit to manage systemd services (Duration: 10 minutes):

• Enable the nginx web server service
• Start the nginx web server service
• Confirm that the nginx service is enabled and running
• Connect to the nginx web server via your web browser (on port 80) to confirm the nginx service is working

Configure the nginx service on both instances as described above. Confirm that nginx is working on both instances.

Finally, we will use Cockpit to make sure the CentOS 7 installation on both instances is up-to-date, and if not, update them. We've allocated 10 minutes for this activity. Feel free to explore Cockpit once this is complete!