Hands-on Lab·Red Hat Certified System Administrator
systemd Timer Units
The third tool the scheduling objective names, and the one Red Hat now ships its own periodic work as. A timer is two units - a `.service` that does the work and a `.timer` that says when - and unlike cron the schedule can be checked with a command before you rely on it.
Deploy and Maintain Guide 45 of 67 Intermediate
- OSRHEL 10.0 (Coughlan)
- Kernel6.12.0-55.9.1.el10_0
- dnf4.20.0
- Flatpak1.16.0
- TimeAbout 13 min
- Reviewed23 August 2026
Written against the versions above. A `.timer` and its `.service` share a name: `foo.timer` activates `foo.service` unless `Unit=` says otherwise. **Enable the timer, not the service** - enabling the service would run it at boot, which is not what a schedule means.
| Server Name | IP Address | OS | Roles | CPU | RAM | HDD |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RHCSA-A01 | 192.168.0.31 | RHEL 10.0 (Coughlan) | Practice node (graded) - spare /dev/sda | 2 Core | 4 GB | 50 GB + 15 GB |
Before you start
- A sudo-capable account.
- The session writes two unit files and removes them.
-
The two units
-
Checking the schedule before trusting it
-
cron or a timer