Career Guidance for Linux System Administrator (RHCSA) – Scripting vs Coding

[adarshmane]

Hi Red Hat Community,

I am interested in pursuing a career as a Linux System Administrator and currently preparing for the RHCSA certification.

I understand that this role involves working with shell scripting and system configuration tasks but does NOT involve software development coding like Java or Python programming.

Could you please clarify:

1. What kind of scripting or configuration tasks are commonly required in a typical Linux sysadmin job in 2025?

2. Which non-coding skills are most in-demand right now in the Linux job market?

I want to focus only on relevant skills that help me get a good paying Linux job without going into heavy programming.

Thank you in advance for your valuable advice!

[Chetan_Tiwary_ · Accepted solution]

@adarshmane Very important question. 

You are right about scripting vs coding requirements in Linux sysadmin job. 

You will need to be efficient in bash scripting - to automate day to day recurring tasks like :

1. Taking backups

2. Log management/rotating

3. Monitoring

4. Disk cleanup

5. Regular system checks

6. System info gathering

7. Patching

8. User management

9. cron jobs   etc.

Regarding non coding skills requirement , you should know about :

1. Ansible 

2. Monitoring tools - splunk, datadog, zabbix, nagios, prometheus

3. K8s / Openshift

4. Cloud operations

5. Networking tools

6. Performance tuning

7. Troubleshooting

8. Version control like Git.