Mastering Python Scripting for System Administrators

Leverage the features and libraries of Python to administrate your environment efficiently.

Key Features

• Learn how to solve problems of system administrators and automate routine activities
• Learn to handle regular expressions, network administration
• Building GUI, web-scraping and database administration including data analytics

Book Description

Python has evolved over time and extended its features in relation to every possible IT operation. Python is simple to learn, yet has powerful libraries that can be used to build powerful Python scripts for solving real-world problems and automating administrators’ routine activities. The objective of this book is to walk through a series of projects that will teach readers Python scripting with each project.

This book will initially cover Python installation and quickly revise basic to advanced programming fundamentals. The book will then focus on the development process as a whole, from setup to planning to building different tools. It will include IT administrators’ routine activities (text processing, regular expressions, file archiving, and encryption), network administration (socket programming, email handling, the remote controlling of devices using telnet/ssh, and protocols such as SNMP/DHCP), building graphical user interface, working with websites (Apache log file processing, SOAP and REST APIs communication, and web scraping), and database administration (MySQL and similar database data administration, data analytics, and reporting).

By the end of this book, you will be able to use the latest features of Python and be able to build powerful tools that will solve challenging, real-world tasks

What you will learn

• Understand how to install Python and debug Python scripts
• Understand and write scripts for automating testing and routine administrative activities
• Understand how to write scripts for text processing, encryption, decryption, and archiving
• Handle files, such as pdf, excel, csv, and txt files, and generate reports
• Write scripts for remote network administration, including handling emails
• Build interactive tools using a graphical user interface
• Handle Apache log files, SOAP and REST APIs communication
• Automate database administration and perform statistical analysis

Who this book is for

This book would be ideal for users with some basic understanding of Python programming and who are interested in scaling their programming skills to command line scripting and system administration.

Prior knowledge of Python would be necessary.

Table of Contents

1. Python Scripting Overview
2. Debugging and Profiling Python Scripts
3. Unit Testing – Introduction to the Unit Testing Framework
4. Automating Regular Administrative Activities
5. Handling Files, Directories, and Data
6. File Archiving, Encrypting, and Decrypting
7. Text Processing and Regular Expressions
8. Documentation and Reporting
9. Working with Various Files
10. Basic Networking – Socket Programming
11. Handling Emails Using Python Scripting
12. Remote Monitoring of Hosts Over Telnet and SSH
13. Building Graphical User Interfaces
14. Working with Apache and Other Log Files
15. SOAP and REST API Communication
16. Web Scraping – Extracting Useful Data from Websites
17. Statistics Gathering and Reporting
18. MySQL and SQLite Database Administrations
19. Assessments