Consider server administration to have the same learning curve as picking up a new language: everything will feel unfamiliar at first, but once you get used to

Consider server administration to have the same learning curve as picking up a new language: everything will feel unfamiliar at first, but once you get used to it, you'll start recognizing patterns and similarities between each tool that you use. Let's say you're deploying a new Debian VM; at the bare minimum, you need to know: - Basic Linux commands (top, tail, cat, cp, mv, ls, cd, rm, mkdir, et cetera) - Casual vim/nano usage - Casual less usage (mainly Ctrl-B/F) - Knowing that `man [command]` and `[command] --h` are the easiest ways to decipher a tool - iptables/fail2ban (security) - Basic MySQL setup (almost everything can be done in a gui) - Basic Apache2 configuration (vhosts, enabling mods) - How to manage packages (apt-get update; apt-get upgrade; apt-get install [whatever]) At that point, you just need to read a few tutorials to fill in the gaps, and to figure out how to get Apache to serve files from your language of choice. The easiest way to go about all of this is to setup a VM locally, document each step you take while configuring it, then repeat that a few times until you feel comfortable. Then you can figure out how to automate everything!