To get the most out of this book

We wrote this book to be as accessible as possible and to teach you many different approaches to programming with Python through several scripts. However, to get the most out of them, you need to do the following:

• Have a Linux system set up and configured for testing/debugging scripts
• Understand the created scripts
• Keep in mind what the components of each script are
• Check how the components could be reused or combined in new ways

This book assumes a certain level of Python knowledge to begin your journey; these basic skills will not be covered in this book. These skills include the following:

• How to set up and configure a Linux system
• How to install, access, and configure a specific Python IDE (although several are
  already included in most Linux distributions)
• Some basics about computing and programming (although we will do our best to
  provide a crash course)

Download the example code files

You can download the example code files for this book from your account at www.packt.com. If you purchased this book elsewhere, you can visit www.packt.com/support and register to have the files emailed directly to you.

You can download the code files by following these steps:

1. Log in or register at www.packt.com.
2. Select the SUPPORT tab.
3. Click on Code Downloads & Errata.
4. Enter the name of the book in the Search box and follow the onscreen instructions.

Once the file is downloaded, please make sure that you unzip or extract the folder using the latest version of:

• WinRAR/7-Zip for Windows
• Zipeg/iZip/UnRarX for Mac
• 7-Zip/PeaZip for Linux

The code bundle for the book is also hosted on GitHub https://github.com/PacktPublishing/Mastering-Python-Scripting-for-System-Administrators-/. In case there's an update to the code, it will be updated on the existing GitHub repository.

We also have other code bundles from our rich catalog of books and videos available at https://github.com/PacktPublishing/. Check them out!

Conventions used

There are a number of text conventions used throughout this book.

CodeInText: Indicates code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter handles. Here is an example: " To unpack the archives shutil module has unpack_archive() function."

A block of code is set as follows:

 >>> 3 * 'hi' + 'hello'
'hihihihello' 

Any command-line input or output is written as follows:

  sudo apt install python3-pip

Bold: Indicates a new term, an important word, or words that you see onscreen. Here is an example: " The CSV format, which stands for Comma Separated Values format."

Warnings or important notes appear like this.

Tips and tricks appear like this.