tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3615332969083650973.post1008721603862632872..comments2024-03-23T07:59:04.047-04:00Comments on sysadvent: Day 20 - Becoming a SysadminJordan Sisselhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13694925032675599790noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3615332969083650973.post-21834495413607594052010-01-04T15:51:58.464-05:002010-01-04T15:51:58.464-05:00One of my favorite sysadmin quotes is from an old ...One of my favorite sysadmin quotes is from an old Usenix sticker my wife (who is also a sysadmin) had:<br /><br />"It's a dirty job, but someone told me I had to do it."ZZambonihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04095795888050488677noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3615332969083650973.post-238194524958022182009-12-21T03:02:33.934-05:002009-12-21T03:02:33.934-05:00If you work at a small company and you monkey with...If you work at a small company and you monkey with a computer at home, boom, one day you're the sysadmin.<br /><br />Clean a mouse, open the printer, get this email profile working over <i>there</i>, adjust the file permissions for the Cute Temp, install Office, burn a CD, reboot the server.<br /><br />Nifty, you just touched a server. <br /><br />Upgrade the RAM, install the Service Pack, buy a new disk and sit on the consultants' elbow as they do the work. Write it all up and report it.<br /><br />Now start on DHCP, on name resolution, and get that other office connecting to this one, ok? Would a Cisco work? How much do those cost? Is the network hub good enough, is it configured, and how much is a new one? And the cabling?<br /><br />Somewhere along the line, it was smarter to be a sysadmin rather than the office worker who did all the stuff so your department didn't have to wait for IT.<br /><br />That's pretty close to how I started to be a sysadmin... by degrees, not By A Degree.Andrew from Vancouvernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3615332969083650973.post-68511025663607924222009-12-20T18:07:13.742-05:002009-12-20T18:07:13.742-05:00I took the Help Desk route, as such. Desktop &...I took the Help Desk route, as such. Desktop & some server support straight out of high school, but company outsourced most of it's IT work to a third party, I acted as a go between whilst trying to do as much as possible.<br />Then on to straight Desktop support, picking up Novell server and some Linux server stuff along the way before moving on to a webhosting environment where I plunged into Linux & FreeBSD with a passion.<br /><br />Apart from the free & open source aspect of Linux / FreeBSD, which I consider important, one of the main reasons I love this is I'm back at the command line. I love using a command line, it's integral in the OS experience for me and always has been since my first computer (Sinclair Spectrum 48k.) I love getting my hands dirty in a metaphorical sense, and find I learn shells and such like with relative ease.<br /><br />Usually I pick up skills because I see a need for it. For example I've learned a lot about MySQL over the past 4-5 months because we need a DBA at work. Main sources are books, blogs and google searches. It's soon clear who knows stuff and who doesn't (e.g. Percona, OpenQuery etc. in the Do category.)Garphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14295116150678730079noreply@blogger.com