Datacenter¶
Portal | Tag Cloud | 53 assets across 19 topics
Server hardware, OOB management, RAID, firmware, rack ops, provisioning
Core Skills (Tier 1)¶
Start here — these are the topics a mid-level engineer uses weekly.
- Rack & Stack — Topic Pack, Drill, Scenario, Assessment, Case Study ×3
- Out-of-Band Management — Topic Pack ×5, Drill, Scenario ×2, Assessment, Case Study ×4
- RAID — Topic Pack ×4, Scenario, Assessment, Case Study ×3
- Firmware / BIOS / UEFI — Topic Pack ×4, Scenario ×2, Case Study ×6
- PXE / Provisioning — Topic Pack ×2, Case Study
- IPMI / ipmitool — Topic Pack
- BMC (Baseboard Management Controller) — Topic Pack ×2, Case Study ×2
- Redfish API — Topic Pack
- Hardware Security — Topic Pack ×2
- Server Hardware — Topic Pack ×7, Scenario ×4, Assessment, Case Study ×11
- Storage (SAN/NAS/DAS) — Topic Pack, Case Study ×3
- Power & UPS — Topic Pack, Case Study ×3
- Datacenter OOB & Provisioning (alias → oob_management)
- Datacenter RAID & Disk Failures (alias → disk_and_storage_ops) — Topic Pack
All Content¶
📘 Topic Packs¶
| Asset | Topics | Level | Time | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bare-Metal Provisioning | Out-of-Band Management, PXE / Provisioning, Server Hardware | L2 | 5h | solid |
| Datacenter & Server Hardware | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, Out-of-Band Management, PXE / Provisioning | L1 | 6h | solid |
| Dell PowerEdge Servers | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, Out-of-Band Management, RAID | L1 | 2h | solid |
| Disk & Storage Ops | Datacenter RAID & Disk Failures (alias → disk_and_storage_ops), RAID | L1 | 5h | solid |
| Edge & IoT Infrastructure | Edge & IoT Infrastructure | L2 | 4h | solid |
| Firmware | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI | L1 | 2h | solid |
| Homelab & Learning Infrastructure | Homelab | L0 | 5h | solid |
| IPMI and ipmitool | BMC (Baseboard Management Controller), Hardware Security, IPMI / ipmitool | L1 | 3h | solid |
| Power | Power & UPS | L1 | 2h | solid |
| Redfish API | BMC (Baseboard Management Controller), Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, Hardware Security | L1 | 2h | solid |
| Server Hardware | Server Hardware | L1 | 2h | solid |
| Storage Operations | RAID, Storage (SAN/NAS/DAS) | L2 | 5h | solid |
| VMware | Virtualization, VMware | L2 | 4h | solid |
| Virtualization | Server Hardware, Virtualization | L2 | 5h | solid |
⚡ Drills¶
| Asset | Topics | Level | Time | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Datacenter Drills | Out-of-Band Management, Rack & Stack | L1 | 30m | solid |
🎯 Scenarios¶
| Asset | Topics | Level | Time | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Interview: Server Won't POST | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, Server Hardware | L2 | 15m | solid |
| Scenario: NIC Flapping / LACP Mismatch | Server Hardware | L2 | 20m | solid |
| Scenario: OOB Unreachable but Host Responds | Out-of-Band Management | L2 | 20m | solid |
| Scenario: RAID Array Degraded | RAID, Server Hardware | L1 | 20m | solid |
| Scenario: Server Won't Boot After Update | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, Out-of-Band Management | L1 | 20m | solid |
| Scenario: Thermal Throttling | Rack & Stack, Server Hardware | L1 | 20m | solid |
📝 Assessments¶
| Asset | Topics | Level | Time | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Skillcheck: Datacenter | Out-of-Band Management, Rack & Stack, RAID | L1 | 30m | solid |
🔍 Case Studys¶
| Asset | Topics | Level | Time | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Case Study: BIOS Settings Reset After CMOS | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, Server Hardware | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: BMC Clock Skew Cert Failure | BMC (Baseboard Management Controller), Out-of-Band Management | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Backup Job Failing — iSCSI Target Unreachable, VLAN Misconfigured | Storage (SAN/NAS/DAS) | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Cable Management Wrong Port | Rack & Stack, Server Hardware | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Database Replication Lag — Root Cause Is RAID Degradation | RAID, Server Hardware | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Firmware Update Boot Loop | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, Server Hardware | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: HBA Firmware Mismatch | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, Storage (SAN/NAS/DAS) | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Link Flaps Bad Optic | Rack & Stack, Server Hardware | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Memory ECC Errors Increasing | Server Hardware | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: NVMe Drive Disappeared | Storage (SAN/NAS/DAS) | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Node NotReady — NIC Firmware Bug, Fix Is Ansible Playbook | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: OS Install Fails RAID Controller | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, RAID | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: PXE Boot Fails UEFI Mismatch | Firmware / BIOS / UEFI, PXE / Provisioning | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Power Supply Redundancy Lost | Power & UPS, Server Hardware | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: RAID Degraded Rebuild Latency | RAID | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Rack PDU Overload Alert | Power & UPS, Rack & Stack | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Serial Console Garbled | Out-of-Band Management, Server Hardware | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Server Intermittent Reboot | Power & UPS, Server Hardware | L2 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Server Remote Console Lag | Out-of-Band Management, Server Hardware | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: Thermal Throttle Fan Failure | Server Hardware | L1 | 30m | solid |
| Case Study: iDRAC Unreachable OS Up | BMC (Baseboard Management Controller), Out-of-Band Management | L1 | 30m | solid |