Linux Admins AI Prompts
152 free, production-ready Linux Admins AI prompts — copy-paste ready for ChatGPT, Claude, or Cursor. Every prompt ships with fill-in placeholders, a worked example, and production-safety notes, so you get a usable answer on the first try.
- Linux Admins Advanced
Linux mdraid Software RAID Recovery Prompt
Recover from degraded or failed mdraid arrays — failed disk, missing member, resync stuck, replacing drives without losing data.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux OOM Kill & Memory Pressure Investigation Prompt
Diagnose OOM kills, memory pressure, swap thrashing, slab bloat, and cgroup memory limit failures on Linux servers from dmesg OOM banners and /proc data.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux `perf` & Flame Graph Profiling Prompt
Profile a Linux process with `perf record` and generate flame graphs to find CPU hotspots, off-CPU waits, and frequent stack patterns.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Server Troubleshooting Prompt
Help diagnose CPU, memory, disk, network, and service issues on Ubuntu or RHEL servers from raw command output.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
- Cursor
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
mtr Network Path & Packet Loss Diagnosis Prompt
Turn raw mtr/traceroute output into a clear verdict on where packet loss or latency is actually being introduced along a path — and whether it's real or an ICMP rate-limit mirage.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux bcache SSD Caching Setup Prompt
Design a bcache SSD-in-front-of-HDD caching tier with the right cache mode, write policy, and sequential-bypass tuning, and plan the attach/detach and failure behavior so a cache device loss never means data loss.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux fapolicyd Application Allowlisting Prompt
Design, test, and roll out fapolicyd application allowlisting so only trusted binaries and scripts execute, without locking yourself out or breaking legitimate app updates, package installs, and interpreters.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux fio Storage Benchmark Design Prompt
Design fio job files that model your real workload (block size, queue depth, read/write mix, fsync policy) and interpret IOPS, throughput, and latency percentiles without fooling yourself with cache or preconditioning artifacts.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux kexec Fast Reboot Setup Prompt
Design and validate a kexec-based fast-reboot workflow that skips firmware/POST to cut kernel-upgrade downtime, with safe fallback to a full reboot when hardware re-init is required.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux KSM / ksmtuned Memory Dedup Tuning Prompt
Decide whether Kernel Samepage Merging (KSM) helps your VM or container density workload, tune ksmtuned aggressiveness against CPU cost, and weigh the security and latency trade-offs before enabling it in production.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux macvlan and ipvlan Network Design Prompt
Choose between macvlan and ipvlan (and their modes) for containers, VMs, or multi-homed services, avoiding the host-to-container isolation trap, switch MAC-limit problems, and cloud environments that filter unknown MACs.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux nvme-cli SSD Health Management Prompt
Interpret nvme-cli smart-log, error-log, and self-test output to decide whether an NVMe drive is healthy, wearing out, thermally throttling, or in pre-failure, and plan namespace, firmware, and format actions safely.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux restic Backup Strategy Design Prompt
Design a restic backup strategy with the right repository layout, retention/prune policy, encryption and key handling, scheduling, and — most importantly — restore drills that prove the backups are actually recoverable.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux USBGuard Device Authorization Policy Prompt
Author and roll out a USBGuard policy that allowlists known USB devices and blocks rogue/BadUSB hardware, without cutting off the keyboard, KVM, or boot devices you need to stay logged in.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
cloud-init Debugging & Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose why a cloud instance came up wrong — user-data that never ran, SSH keys or hostname not applied, a module that failed silently, or first-boot vs re-run confusion — by reading cloud-init's logs, stages, and datasource correctly.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
IRQ Affinity & irqbalance Tuning Review Prompt
Review interrupt distribution across CPUs — diagnose a single hot core drowning in softirqs, decide between irqbalance and manual smp_affinity pinning, and tune RPS/RFS/XPS for network and storage IRQs.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
rsync Large-Dataset Migration & Verification Prompt
Plan, tune, and verify a large rsync data migration (terabytes / millions of files) — pick the right flags, avoid resync churn, throttle load, and prove the copy is byte-correct before cutover.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
ddrescue Disk Imaging and Recovery Runbook Prompt
Plan a safe GNU ddrescue recovery of a failing disk: choose the right pass strategy, use a mapfile for resumable multi-pass runs, and decide when to stop imaging and switch to filesystem repair.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
ipmitool BMC Sensor, SEL, and Power Management Prompt
Interpret ipmitool sensor readings, System Event Log entries, and chassis power state to triage failing hardware and drive safe out-of-band remediation on remote servers.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
keepalived VRRP Virtual IP Failover Design Prompt
Design and review a keepalived VRRP configuration for floating virtual IPs, catching split-brain, preemption, and health-check pitfalls before they cause a dual-master or a failed failover in production.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
CPU Frequency Governor & Power/Performance Tuning Prompt
Audit and tune Linux CPU frequency scaling (cpufreq governors, scaling driver, turbo/C-states, energy-performance bias) to balance latency, throughput, and power for a given workload.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Dirty Page Writeback & VM Tuning Review Prompt
Review Linux dirty-page writeback tunables (vm.dirty_ratio, dirty_background_ratio, dirty_expire/writeback centisecs, vfs_cache_pressure) against a workload and storage backend to smooth I/O stalls and fsync latency.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Block I/O Scheduler Selection & Tuning Review Prompt
Review the per-device block I/O scheduler (mq-deadline, bfq, kyber, none) and queue tunables against a workload and storage type, and recommend a persistent, verifiable configuration.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Policy Routing & Source-Based Routing Design Prompt
Design and validate Linux policy-based routing (multiple routing tables, ip rule, source routing) for multi-homed or multi-gateway hosts, with a dry-run-first plan that avoids cutting your own SSH session.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
mdadm Degraded Software RAID Recovery Planning Prompt
Diagnose a degraded or failed Linux software RAID array and produce a careful, ordered recovery plan (disk identification, replacement, resync, and verification) before touching any disk.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
OpenSSL TLS Certificate Renewal & Rotation Runbook Prompt
Produce a precise runbook to inspect, renew, and rotate a TLS certificate and private key on a Linux service (CSR, chain assembly, deployment, reload, and verification) without an outage.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
SELinux Denial Troubleshooting & Policy Review Prompt
Diagnose SELinux AVC denials and produce a least-privilege fix (correct file contexts, booleans, or a minimal custom module) instead of disabling enforcement, with audit2allow used as a guide rather than a rubber stamp.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
SSH Client Config, Jump Host & Multiplexing Review Prompt
Review and refactor an SSH client configuration (~/.ssh/config) for clean ProxyJump bastion chains, connection multiplexing, key/agent hygiene, and host-key safety across many target hosts.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Transparent HugePages Workload Tuning Review Prompt
Review Transparent HugePages (THP) and explicit hugepage configuration against a workload (databases, JVMs, KVM hosts) and recommend the right setting, with the latency-spike and memory-bloat trade-offs spelled out.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
XFS Filesystem Repair & Recovery Planning Prompt
Triage a corrupt or unmountable XFS filesystem and produce a safe, ordered recovery plan (log replay, xfs_repair, metadata dump) without destroying recoverable data.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Package Integrity Drift Audit (rpm -V / debsums) Prompt
Decode the output of rpm -Va or debsums and separate benign, expected file changes from tampering, corruption, or undocumented manual edits that could break the next patch.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Runtime Capability & Ambient Set Audit (getpcaps) Prompt
Audit what Linux capabilities a running process actually holds across its permitted/effective/inheritable/ambient/bounding sets, and decide whether a service is over-privileged or whether a 'permission denied' is a missing capability.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Kernel Keyring (keyctl) Inspection & Debug Prompt
Inspect and reason about the kernel keyrings (user, session, process, thread, persistent) behind Kerberos tickets, fscrypt keys, NFS/CIFS creds, and dm-crypt — and debug why a key is missing, expired, or not visible to a service.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Shared Library Loader (ld.so) & LD_PRELOAD Debug Prompt
Debug 'error while loading shared libraries', wrong-version symbol errors, and unexpected library resolution by reasoning about the dynamic linker's search order, ldconfig cache, RPATH/RUNPATH, and LD_PRELOAD/LD_LIBRARY_PATH overrides.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
nsswitch.conf Name Resolution Order Audit Prompt
Audit /etc/nsswitch.conf to explain why a user, group, hostname, or netgroup resolves (or fails to resolve) the way it does — across files, sss, ldap, systemd, and dns sources — and fix surprising precedence or NSS lookup hangs.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Arch pacman & AUR Recovery and Hygiene Prompt
Untangle a broken Arch Linux package state — partial upgrades, conflicting files, keyring failures, .pacnew config drift, and risky AUR builds — without resorting to a reinstall.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
ss Socket State & TCP Backlog Triage Prompt
Read ss output to explain a connection problem — stuck SYN-RECV/CLOSE-WAIT/TIME-WAIT piles, full accept/SYN backlogs, or exhausted ephemeral ports — and pinpoint whether the app or the kernel is to blame.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
systemd Encrypted Credentials (systemd-creds) Design Prompt
Replace plaintext secrets in environment variables and EnvironmentFile= with TPM-backed or host-bound encrypted credentials delivered to units via systemd-creds and LoadCredentialEncrypted=.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
autofs Automounter Map Design and Debug Prompt
Design and troubleshoot autofs on-demand mount maps so home directories and shares mount only when accessed, then unmount after idle timeout.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Clevis and Tang LUKS Network-Bound Unlock Design Prompt
Design network-bound disk encryption with Clevis and Tang so LUKS volumes auto-unlock at boot inside the trusted network without a typed passphrase or stored key.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
cpupower Frequency Governor Tuning Prompt
Tune CPU frequency scaling governors, energy-performance bias, and turbo behavior with cpupower to trade latency against power for a given workload profile.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
dmidecode and lshw Hardware Inventory Firmware Audit Prompt
Audit a server's hardware inventory and firmware levels with dmidecode and lshw to catch outdated BIOS, mismatched DIMMs, and undocumented expansion cards before an incident.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
fscrypt Per-Directory Filesystem Encryption Setup Prompt
Set up native ext4/f2fs per-directory encryption with fscrypt so individual home or data directories are encrypted with login-tied keys without full-disk encryption.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Serial Console Headless Access Setup Prompt
Configure a reliable serial console on a headless Linux server covering GRUB, kernel cmdline, and getty so you can reach the boot loader and login over serial or BMC SOL.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Magic SysRq Key Emergency Configuration Prompt
Configure the magic SysRq key safely so administrators can trigger a controlled emergency sync and reboot or capture diagnostics on a hung server without an unclean power cycle.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
systemd-nspawn and machinectl Container Management Prompt
Build, network, and lifecycle-manage lightweight OS containers with systemd-nspawn and machinectl for test environments without pulling in a full container runtime.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
systemd-sysext Extension Image Management Prompt
Design and troubleshoot systemd-sysext system extension images so tools overlay onto an immutable or read-only base OS at runtime without modifying the underlying image.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
blkid UUID and Label Duplicate Resolution Prompt
Resolve duplicate filesystem UUIDs and labels after disk cloning or snapshot restore that cause wrong-device mounts, fstab ambiguity, and boot failures on Linux.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
dracut initramfs Rebuild and Recovery Prompt
Diagnose an unbootable RHEL/Rocky host stuck in the initramfs emergency shell and rebuild a correct dracut image with the right drivers, modules, and kernel arguments.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
ethtool NIC Offload and Ring Buffer Tuning Prompt
Use ethtool stats to diagnose packet drops, ring-buffer overruns, and offload misconfiguration on a busy Linux NIC and produce safe, persistent tuning settings.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
PAM faillock Account Lockout Policy Review Prompt
Audit pam_faillock lockout thresholds, unlock timing, and root behavior across RHEL/Rocky and Debian hosts to balance brute-force defense against operational lockouts.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Hostname and machine-id Clone Fix Prompt
Detect and repair duplicate /etc/machine-id, D-Bus IDs, and hostname collisions on VMs cloned from a template that cause DHCP lease, journald, and SSH host-key conflicts.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
systemd-logind Session and Lingering Review Prompt
Review systemd-logind sessions, seats, and user lingering to fix leftover sessions, runaway user services, and processes that survive (or die on) logout on multi-user Linux hosts.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
resolv.conf DNS Resolver Order Audit Prompt
Untangle who actually owns /etc/resolv.conf on a host (NetworkManager, systemd-resolved, static, or DHCP) and fix wrong nameserver order, search domains, and stub-resolver confusion.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
smartctl Disk Health Pre-Failure Triage Prompt
Interpret SMART attributes and self-test logs from smartctl to decide whether a drive is in pre-failure, needs proactive replacement, or is a false alarm before data loss.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
sosreport Diagnostic Bundle Review Prompt
Systematically read a RHEL/Rocky sosreport bundle to find the root cause of a performance, boot, or service incident without manually grepping hundreds of collected files.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
AIDE File Integrity Monitoring Setup Prompt
Design an AIDE file-integrity baseline and check schedule that watches the right paths, suppresses expected churn, and stores the database offline so a compromised host cannot rewrite its own baseline.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Orphan Package Cleanup Audit Prompt
Audit a server for orphaned, unused, and held-back packages across apt or dnf, then produce a safe removal plan that reclaims space and reduces attack surface without breaking dependencies.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
etckeeper Config Drift Tracking Prompt
Set up etckeeper to version-control /etc with git, capture every package-manager and manual change, and produce readable drift reports so you can answer who changed what configuration and when.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
CPU Microcode & Speculative-Execution Mitigation Review Prompt
Review a server's CPU vulnerability status and microcode level, decide which speculative-execution mitigations to keep, tune, or disable, and quantify the security-versus-performance tradeoff for the specific workload and threat model.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
Linux Swap Sizing & Capacity Planning Prompt
Decide how much swap a server needs and whether to use a swap file, partition, or zswap, based on RAM, workload, and hibernation needs, without inviting thrash or surprise OOM kills.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
lsof Deleted-File Handle Leak Investigation Prompt
Diagnose a disk that shows free space in du but full in df by hunting down processes holding open handles to deleted files, then reclaim the space safely without killing critical services.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Needrestart Post-Patch Restart Audit Prompt
After a package update, interpret needrestart output to decide exactly which services to restart and whether a reboot is required, minimizing downtime while closing the gap where processes still run old, vulnerable libraries.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
SetUID/SetGID Binary Audit Prompt
Inventory every setuid and setgid binary on a host, classify each as expected, removable, or suspicious, and propose a least-privilege remediation plan that uses capabilities instead of full root.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
tuned Performance Profile Review Prompt
Review the active tuned profile on a Linux server, confirm it matches the workload, and design a safe custom profile that layers only the sysctl, CPU governor, and I/O scheduler tweaks the workload actually needs.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Account Aging & Password Policy Hardening Prompt
Audit and tune local account aging, password complexity, and login defaults (chage, login.defs, pwquality, faillock) to meet a hardening baseline without locking out service accounts.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
DNF / yum Package & Module Stream Management Prompt
Resolve dependency conflicts, manage module streams and version locks, and roll back transactions safely on RHEL/Fedora-family hosts.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
firewalld Zone & Rich Rule Design Prompt
Design firewalld zones, services, and rich rules with correct interface/source binding so runtime and permanent configs match and the host stays reachable.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
/etc/fstab Mount Options Tuning & Review Prompt
Review and tune fstab entries (options, ordering, fsck pass, nofail/x-systemd) so mounts are reliable, performant, and never block boot.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
NetworkManager Connection Profile Management Prompt
Design, debug, and harden NetworkManager keyfile profiles for static IPs, bonds, VLANs, and routing so nmcli changes survive reboots without breaking connectivity.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
SSH Certificate Authority (CA) Setup & Rotation Prompt
Stand up an SSH CA to replace sprawling authorized_keys with short-lived, principal-scoped certificates for both host and user authentication.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
sudoers Policy Authoring & Validation Prompt
Write least-privilege sudoers rules with command aliases, NOPASSWD scoping, and Defaults that pass visudo and resist privilege-escalation tricks.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
systemd Unit Dependency & Boot Ordering Graph Prompt
Untangle why a service starts too early, deadlocks at boot, or races a mount/network by reasoning over the After/Wants/Requires dependency graph.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
udev Persistent Device Naming & Rules Prompt
Author and debug udev rules so disks, NICs, and serial devices get stable, predictable names across reboots and hardware changes.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
ftrace & kprobe Dynamic Kernel Tracing Prompt
Drive a structured ftrace / kprobe investigation to trace kernel function latency, follow a syscall through the kernel, and answer 'why is this call slow inside the kernel' without recompiling or rebooting.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Capabilities Audit & Hardening Prompt
Audit POSIX file capabilities and per-process capability sets to find binaries and services that hold more privilege than they need, then drop them — replacing blunt setuid-root with least-privilege capabilities.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux CPU & Memory Hotplug Management Prompt
Safely online, offline, and troubleshoot CPU and memory hotplug on physical and virtual hosts — VM right-sizing, isolating a flaky core, balloon/memory-block operations, and the sysfs interfaces that make it deterministic.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Entropy & RNG Starvation Tuning Prompt
Diagnose and fix kernel random-number-generator stalls — boot-time blocking on getrandom(), slow TLS/SSH key generation, and VM/headless entropy starvation — using a correct understanding of the modern CRNG instead of cargo-culted haveged advice.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Mount Namespace & Bind-Mount Propagation Prompt
Untangle mount namespaces and bind-mount propagation — why a mount is or isn't visible inside a container, shared vs private vs slave propagation, and rbind surprises — using a precise mental model instead of trial-and-error.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
nftables Sets, Maps & Flowtable Design Prompt
Design high-performance nftables rulesets using named sets, verdict maps, intervals, and flowtable offload — replacing thousands of linear rules with O(1) lookups and hardware/software fast-path forwarding.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
OverlayFS Layered Filesystem Debugging Prompt
Debug OverlayFS mounts behind containers and live images — whiteouts, copy-up surprises, ENOSPC on the upper layer, inode duplication, and metacopy/redirect quirks — instead of blaming the container runtime.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
SSSD LDAP / Active Directory Integration Debugging Prompt
Systematically debug SSSD-backed LDAP or Active Directory authentication and identity lookups — failed logins, missing groups, cache staleness, and GPO/access-control surprises — instead of randomly bumping debug_level.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
systemd-coredump + eu-unstrip Crash Analysis
Capture and analyze userspace crashes with systemd-coredump and coredumpctl — find the faulting frame, match build-id debug symbols with eu-unstrip, and catch the recurring crasher.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Disk Quota Management Prompt
Design and troubleshoot per-user and per-group disk quotas on ext4/XFS — soft/hard limits, grace periods, project quotas, reporting, and runaway-usage enforcement without locking out legitimate work.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Kernel Live Patching Prompt
Plan and operate kernel live patching (kpatch, kGraft, Canonical Livepatch) to apply CVE fixes without rebooting — eligibility, consistency model, rollout, fallback, and when a real reboot is still mandatory.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux rsyslog Configuration & Filtering Prompt
Author and debug rsyslog config — facility/severity rules, property-based filters, RELP/TCP forwarding, rate limiting, templates, and queues — so logs route reliably without dropping under burst.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
Linux sar & sysstat Historical Performance Analysis Prompt
Mine sysstat/sar archives to reconstruct what happened during a past incident — CPU, memory, I/O, network, and run-queue history — and turn raw sar output into a root-cause timeline.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Static HugePages Tuning Prompt
Allocate and tune explicit (static) HugePages and 1GB gigantic pages for databases, JVMs, and DPDK — sizing, NUMA placement, hugetlbfs mounts, and avoiding the over-reservation memory trap.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux tc Traffic Control & QoS Shaping Prompt
Design, apply, and debug Linux traffic shaping with tc — qdiscs (fq_codel, HTB, cake), classes, filters, rate limiting, and bufferbloat mitigation — without blackholing production traffic.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
Linux tmpfiles.d & Runtime Directory Management Prompt
Author and debug systemd-tmpfiles entries — creating, cleaning, and permissioning runtime/volatile paths in /run, /var, and /tmp declaratively instead of with fragile init scripts.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux WireGuard VPN Setup & Debug Prompt
Stand up and troubleshoot WireGuard tunnels on Linux — key management, AllowedIPs routing, NAT/MTU pitfalls, persistent keepalive, and the silent-handshake-failure debugging loop.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
bpftrace / eBPF Live Tracing Investigation Prompt
Use bpftrace and eBPF to trace syscalls, kernel functions, and latency on a live production host without recompiling, restarting, or attaching a debugger.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux conntrack Table Exhaustion Tuning Prompt
Diagnose and fix nf_conntrack table exhaustion on busy Linux hosts and gateways — dropped connections, log spam, and timeout tuning — or decide where to bypass tracking entirely.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux fstrim & SSD Discard Maintenance Prompt
Set up correct TRIM/discard for SSDs and thin-provisioned storage on Linux — periodic fstrim vs continuous discard — across LVM, LUKS, and dm-crypt stacks without hurting performance.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux inotify / fanotify Limits & Watch Exhaustion Prompt
Diagnose 'no space left on device' from exhausted inotify watches, tune the relevant sysctls, and decide between inotify and fanotify for large directory trees.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux io_uring Tuning & Debugging Prompt
Evaluate, tune, and debug io_uring usage on a Linux host — queue depths, SQPOLL, fixed buffers, completion handling — and weigh the security trade-offs of enabling it.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Transparent Huge Pages & THP Stall Investigation Prompt
Decide whether Transparent Huge Pages help or hurt a workload, diagnose THP-related latency spikes from khugepaged and compaction, and configure explicit hugepages where they belong.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux zram & zswap Compressed Memory Setup Prompt
Set up zram swap or zswap to absorb memory pressure with compressed RAM instead of disk swap, choose the right compressor, and avoid double-compression mistakes.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
systemd-oomd & PSI Pressure Tuning Prompt
Configure systemd-oomd and Pressure Stall Information (PSI) to kill the right cgroup under memory or I/O pressure before the kernel OOM killer fires arbitrarily.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
systemd Socket Activation Design & Debugging Prompt
Design or debug systemd socket-activated services — on-demand start, zero-downtime restarts, and privilege separation via .socket units — and decide when socket activation is the wrong tool.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
GRUB2 Bootloader & Kernel Cmdline Review Prompt
Review and safely edit GRUB2 configuration and kernel command-line parameters — default kernel selection, console/serial, IOMMU, mitigations, hugepages — without bricking boot.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
journald Remote Centralized Logging Setup Prompt
Design and debug centralized log shipping with systemd-journal-remote / journal-upload (or a forwarder), including TLS, buffering, and fleet-wide journalctl querying.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux CA Trust Store & TLS Certificate Management Prompt
Manage the system CA trust store across distros (update-ca-trust / update-ca-certificates), add internal CAs, debug 'certificate verify failed' errors, and audit expiring/weak certs on a server.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux CPU Scheduling & Affinity Tuning Prompt
Tune Linux process scheduling — nice/priority, scheduling policy (SCHED_FIFO/RR/OTHER), CPU affinity, isolcpus, and cgroup v2 cpu.weight/quota — for latency-sensitive or noisy-neighbor workloads.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
Linux dmesg & Kernel Ring Buffer Triage Prompt
Decode dmesg / kernel ring buffer output to triage hardware errors, driver warnings, OOM events, segfaults, and link flaps — separating benign noise from real failures.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux kdump & Kernel Crash Dump Analysis Prompt
Configure kdump/kexec reliably and analyze vmcore crash dumps with crash/drgn to find the kernel panic root cause after an unexpected reboot or hung server.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Namespaces Isolation & Debugging Prompt
Inspect, enter, and reason about Linux namespaces (mount, PID, net, user, UTS, IPC, cgroup) to debug container-like isolation, leaked namespaces, and unexpected cross-namespace visibility.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Slab & Kernel Memory Leak Investigation Prompt
Diagnose growing kernel/unreclaimable memory — slab caches, dentry/inode bloat, kmalloc leaks, and page-cache vs SReclaimable confusion — when free RAM shrinks but no process owns it.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
systemd-networkd Configuration Review Prompt
Review and debug systemd-networkd .network/.netdev/.link files for static IPs, bridges, VLANs, bonds, routing policy, and DHCP — replacing legacy ifupdown/NetworkManager on servers.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
apt / dpkg Broken Dependency Recovery Prompt
Recover Debian/Ubuntu hosts stuck in half-configured packages, held broken dependencies, interrupted dpkg, or a wedged apt state — without nuking the system.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
chrony / NTP Time Sync Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose clock drift, offset, and sync failures with chrony (or ntpd) so TLS, Kerberos, logs, and distributed systems stop breaking from skewed time.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
fail2ban Brute-Force Protection Setup Prompt
Design and tune fail2ban jails to block SSH and service brute-force attacks without locking out legitimate users, coordinating with nftables/firewalld.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
Linux File Permissions & ACL Audit Prompt
Audit and fix file ownership, mode bits, setuid/setgid, sticky bits, umask, and POSIX ACLs so shared directories work without world-writable security holes.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Multipath & SAN Storage Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose device-mapper multipath issues — flapping paths, wrong path policy, missing LUNs, and dm-multipath/SAN faults — on iSCSI or Fibre Channel attached storage.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Swap & Swappiness Tuning Prompt
Decide how much swap to configure, tune vm.swappiness and friends, and stop swap-thrash or premature OOM kills on memory-pressured Linux servers.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux ulimit & File Descriptor Limits Prompt
Diagnose and raise process resource limits — open files, processes, memlock — fixing 'Too many open files' across systemd units, PAM logins, and containers.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Zombie & Orphan Process Forensics Prompt
Track down zombie (defunct) processes, runaway orphans, and broken parent-reaping so process tables don't fill and services stop leaking children.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
logrotate Configuration & Log Growth Review Prompt
Audit and design logrotate rules so /var never fills, logs are rotated/compressed/retained sanely, and post-rotate signaling doesn't break long-running daemons.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Cron to systemd Timer Migration Prompt
Convert legacy crontab and /etc/cron.d jobs into systemd service+timer pairs with proper logging, failure handling, randomized delays, and dependency ordering.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
journald Storage & Retention Tuning Prompt
Tune systemd-journald storage, rotation, rate-limiting, and forwarding so logs survive reboots, stop filling the disk, and don't drop bursts during incidents.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
LVM Thin Provisioning & Online Resize Planning Prompt
Plan LVM thin pools and online filesystem grows safely — pool sizing, metadata, overprovisioning monitoring, and a step-by-step PV→VG→LV→filesystem resize that won't lose data.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Beginner
SSH Server Hardening Review Prompt
Harden sshd_config against brute force and weak crypto — key-only auth, modern ciphers/KEX/MACs, login restrictions, idle timeouts, and bastion-friendly settings — without locking yourself out.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux User, sudo & SSH Access Audit Prompt
Audit local accounts, sudoers rules, group membership, and SSH authorized keys to find privilege creep, orphaned accounts, and overly broad sudo grants — then produce a least-privilege remediation.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
sysctl Kernel Parameter Tuning Audit Prompt
Review and tune /etc/sysctl.d kernel parameters for a server's role — network stack, VM/dirty-page behavior, file handles, and security toggles — with a safe, persistent, reversible rollout.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
systemd-resolved DNS Resolution Debugging Prompt
Diagnose Linux DNS resolution failures driven by systemd-resolved — split-DNS, stub resolver, /etc/resolv.conf symlinks, search domains, and DNSSEC/caching quirks on Ubuntu and friends.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
systemd Unit Hardening Review Prompt
Audit a systemd service unit and add sandboxing directives (NoNewPrivileges, ProtectSystem, capability bounding, syscall filters) to shrink its blast radius without breaking the workload.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Patch & Package Update Automation Prompt
Design safe automated patching for apt or dnf fleets — security-only auto-updates, staged rollouts, reboot coordination, and held packages — with rollback and reporting.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Cgroups v2 Resource Control Deep Dive Prompt
Configure cgroups v2 — memory, CPU, IO controllers; understand slice/scope/service hierarchy; isolate workloads; debug throttling and accounting.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux strace / Syscall Debugging Prompt
Use strace, ltrace, ftrace, and bpftrace to find why an app hangs, what files it touches, why a binary fails on a new system, and which syscall actually returns the error.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux auditd Configuration & Forensics Prompt
Configure auditd rules for compliance (CIS, PCI, HIPAA), query audit logs with `ausearch`/`aureport`, investigate incidents, and avoid common rule-set performance pitfalls.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Kernel Module Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose kernel module load failures — modprobe errors, missing dependencies, signing issues with Secure Boot, DKMS build failures, hardware not detected.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
systemd Timer Debugging Prompt
Diagnose systemd timers that don't fire, fire at wrong times, miss runs after sleep, or run with wrong environment — `OnCalendar`, `Persistent=`, `AccuracySec=`, time zones.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux PAM Authentication Debugging Prompt
Diagnose Linux login failures — PAM stack misconfiguration, lockouts (`faillock`/`pam_tally2`), sssd/LDAP join issues, missing modules, password policy rejection.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
iptables → nftables Migration & Audit Prompt
Migrate a Linux firewall ruleset from iptables to nftables, audit hybrid setups, and avoid the silent-translation traps that cause production outages.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux VLAN & Bridge Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose Linux bridge and VLAN issues — tagged/untagged traffic confusion, bridge fdb mysteries, vlan_filtering, VXLAN overlay debugging.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Bonding / LACP Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose Linux network bonding (802.3ad LACP, active-backup, balance-tlb) — slave failures, LACP partner mismatch, throughput below sum-of-links, asymmetric traffic.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
LUKS Encryption Rescue Prompt
Recover access to a LUKS-encrypted volume — failed unlock, header corruption, keyslot management, header backup/restore, and TPM/clevis recovery.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
NFS Mount Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose NFS mount failures — stale file handles, hung mounts (D-state processes), soft vs hard semantics, autofs misbehavior, Kerberos (sec=krb5) errors.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Btrfs Balance & Snapshot Management Prompt
Manage Btrfs filesystems — data/metadata balance, snapshot lifecycle, qgroups, subvolume management, and recovering from chunk allocation issues.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
SELinux & AppArmor Denial Decoder Prompt
Decode SELinux AVC denials and AppArmor DENIED entries, identify the right fix (label, policy module, profile tweak), and avoid disabling LSMs as a shortcut.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Boot Failure & Rescue Prompt
Recover an unbootable Linux server — GRUB failures, broken initramfs, fstab errors, missing root, kernel panics — with a deliberate rescue sequence.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
XFS Filesystem Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose and repair XFS issues — log corruption, xfs_repair workflow, allocator/freespace problems, online vs offline checks, and dump/restore for the worst case.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
ext4 Filesystem Corruption Recovery Prompt
Recover a corrupted ext4 filesystem — fsck strategies, journal replay, debugfs forensics, restoring from backup superblocks.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Host Network Connectivity Debug Prompt
Diagnose single-host Linux networking — broken routes, firewall blocks, DNS, conntrack exhaustion, ephemeral port exhaustion, MTU issues — without confusing it with cloud/SDN problems.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
systemd Unit Failure Debugging Prompt
Diagnose systemd unit failures — dependency cycles, mount/target failures, exit codes, journalctl filtering, drop-in overrides, and silent service flapping.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
LVM Troubleshooting Prompt
Diagnose and recover LVM problems — missing PV, VG inactive, snapshot full, thin pool exhausted, online/offline resize, and metadata corruption.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux High Load & CPU Runaway Investigation Prompt
Diagnose high load average, CPU saturation, run-queue pressure, IRQ storms, and steal time on Linux servers — distinguish user CPU vs system CPU vs I/O wait vs steal.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Intermediate
Linux Disk Full / Inode Exhaustion Diagnosis Prompt
Diagnose why a Linux filesystem is full or out of inodes — including deleted-but-held files, journal bloat, reserved blocks, and hidden mount-shadowed data.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux NUMA Imbalance Investigation Prompt
Diagnose NUMA-related performance issues — cross-node memory access, allocation imbalance, scheduler migration, and how to pin workloads to nodes.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Context Switch & Lock Contention Diagnosis Prompt
Diagnose context-switch storms, futex contention, kernel-level lock waits, and CPU scheduling pathologies that masquerade as 'app is slow.'
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Network Performance Tuning Prompt
Diagnose slow network throughput, high latency, retransmits, ephemeral port exhaustion, and tune TCP/UDP stack parameters (BBR, buffers, queues) safely.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt - Linux Admins Advanced
Linux Block I/O Performance Investigation Prompt
Diagnose slow disk I/O, high iowait, queue depth saturation, and storage performance regressions using iostat, blktrace, fio, and per-device metrics.
- Claude
- ChatGPT
Open prompt
About these Linux Admins AI prompts
This is a free, curated collection of Linux Admins AI prompts for DevOps and platform engineers — prompt templates that turn Claude, ChatGPT, or Cursor into a focused Linux Admins assistant. Instead of re-explaining your setup every time, each prompt has fill-in placeholders, a realistic worked example, and explicit safety and back-out notes, so it's safe to use against production Linux Admins.
Browse all 152 above, or explore the wider Linux Admins prompts and troubleshooting guides, the full DevOps AI prompt library, and run or compare any prompt live in the Prompt Workspace. Hit a production issue instead? Try the free Incident Assistant.