Red Hat EX294: Red Hat Certified Engineer (RHCE) exam, Red Hat Enterprise Linux

Last checked October 22, 2026 against the official Red Hat exam page.

1. Question 1Automation with Ansible

   An administrator wants to run the same playbook against a group of web servers defined in an inventory file. Which option selects only that group?

   1. ARunning ansible-playbook site.yml with no -i option so Ansible falls back to localhost as the target
   2. BHardcoding the IP addresses of each web server into the playbook's tasks
   3. Cansible-playbook -i inventory.ini site.yml with the hosts key set to the group name
   4. DRunning the playbook locally on the control node with connection: local so no remote hosts are reached
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   Correct answer: C

   The hosts key in the play selects the inventory group, and the -i option points to the inventory file. Running without an inventory or on the control node only does not target the web servers, and hardcoding addresses is fragile.

2. Question 2Linux System Administration

   A system must have a static IP address that persists across reboots on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9. Which tool should be used?

   1. AEditing the desktop wallpaper and screensaver preferences in Settings
   2. BChanging the hostname in /etc/hosts and leaving the IP address unchanged
   3. CNetworkManager with nmcli to configure the connection profile
   4. DRunning ifconfig eth0 192.168.1.50 netmask 255.255.255.0 until the next reboot
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   Correct answer: C

   NetworkManager and nmcli store connection profiles that persist across reboots. Temporary commands without saving, wallpaper settings and hostname changes do not configure the IP address persistently.

3. Question 3Automation with Ansible

   Which ansible.cfg setting tells Ansible where to find the default inventory file?

   1. Ahosts under the [connection] section
   2. Bvault_password under the [ssh] section
   3. Croles under the [privilege] section
   4. Dinventory under the [defaults] section
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   Correct answer: D

   The inventory setting under [defaults] defines the default inventory path. The other keys belong to different concerns or are not inventory settings.

4. Question 4Linux System Administration

   Which command sets the system hostname persistently on Red Hat Enterprise Linux?

   1. Aecho server1.example.com > /tmp/hostnames/current.conf
   2. Bnmcli hostname set server1 --temporary --apply-now
   3. Chostnamectl set-hostname server1.example.com
   4. Dping -c 3 -W 2 -I eth0 -q -n -O server1.example.com
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   Correct answer: C

   hostnamectl writes the persistent hostname. Writing to a temporary file, nmcli syntax and ping options do not set the hostname properly.

5. Question 5Automation with Ansible

   A playbook must run commands with root privileges on managed hosts. Which play keyword enables privilege escalation?

   1. Abecome: true
   2. Broot: enabled
   3. Cprivileged: yes
   4. Dsudo_only: true
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   Correct answer: A

   become: true enables privilege escalation, which uses sudo by default. The other keywords are not Ansible play directives.