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Set up a lab to teach shell scripting on Linux

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Important

Azure Lab Services will be retired on June 28, 2027. For more information, see the retirement guide.

Note

This article references features available in lab plans, which replaced lab accounts.

This article shows you how to set up a lab to teach shell scripting on Linux. Scripting is a useful part of system administration that allows administrators to avoid repetitive tasks. In this sample scenario, the class covers traditional bash scripts and enhanced scripts. Enhanced scripts are scripts that combine bash commands and Ruby. This approach lets Ruby pass the data around and bash commands to interact with the shell.

Students taking these scripting classes get a Linux virtual machine to learn the basics of Linux, and also get familiar with the bash shell scripting. The Linux virtual machine comes with remote desktop access enabled and with gedit and Visual Studio Code text editors installed.

Lab configuration

To set up the lab, you need access to an Azure subscription and a lab account. Discuss with your organization's admin to see if you can get access to an existing Azure subscription. If you don't have an Azure subscription, create a free account before you begin.

Lab plan settings

When you have an Azure subscription, you can create a new lab plan in Azure Lab Services. For more information about creating a new lab plan, see the tutorial on how to set up a lab plan. You can also use an existing lab plan.

Enable your lab plan settings as described in the following table. For more information about how to enable Azure Marketplace images, see Specify the Azure Marketplace images available to lab creators.

Lab plan setting Instructions
Marketplace images Enable the 'Ubuntu Server 18.04 LTS' image.

Lab settings

For instructions on how to create a lab, see Tutorial: Set up a lab. Use the following settings when creating the lab.

Lab settings Value/instructions
Virtual machine (VM) size Small
VM image Ubuntu Server 18.04 LTS
Enable remote desktop connection Enable. Enabling this setting will allow teachers and students to connect to their VMs using the remote desktop (RDP). For more information, see Enable remote desktop for Linux virtual machines in a lab in Azure Lab Services.

Template machine configuration

Install desktop and RDP

The Ubuntu Server 18.04 LTS image doesn't have the RDP remote desktop server installed by default. To install the packages that are needed on the template machine to connect via remote desktop protocol (RDP), follow instructions in the Install and configure Remote Desktop to connect to a Linux VM in Azure article.

Install Ruby

Ruby is an open-source dynamic language that can be combined with bash scripts. This section shows how to use apt-get to install the latest version of Ruby.

  1. Install updates by running the following commands:

    sudo apt-get update 
sudo apt-get upgrade

  2. Install Ruby. Ruby is an open-source dynamic language that can be combined with bash scripts.

    sudo apt-get install ruby-full

  3. When prompted, type Y and press Enter to confirm the installation.

Install development tools

This section shows you how to install a couple of text editors. Gedit is the default text editor for the gnome desktop environment. It's designed as a general-purpose text editor. Visual Studio Code is a text editor that includes support for debugging and source control integration.

Note

There are several different text editors available. Visual Studio Code and gedit are just two examples.

  1. Install gedit.

    sudo apt-get install gedit

  2. Install Visual Studio Code. Visual Studio code can be installed using the Snap Store. For alternate installation options, see Visual Studio Code alternate downloads.

    sudo snap install vscode --classic

    The template is now updated and has both the programming language and development tools needed to complete the lab. The template image can now be published to the lab. Select the Publish button on template page to publish the template to the lab.

Conclusion

This article walked you through the steps to create a lab for scripting classes. While this article focused on setting up Ruby scripting tools on Linux machine, same setup can be used for other scripting classes like Python on Linux.

Next steps

The template image can now be published to the lab. For more information, see Publish the template VM.

As you set up your lab, see the following articles: