On 10-07-15 07:48 AM, Brodie, Kent wrote:
> My personal theory on this is, the typical type of troubleshooting
> skills that a good sysadmin has, simply cannot be taught. It has to do
> with your personality, how you were raised, your inquisitive nature,
> your willingness to take risks, and so on.
>
> The **technical** tidbits, yes, can be taught (“ok, here’s how you boot
> a *nix system into single user mode to begin a rescue…”), but the
> above-mentioned investigative skills? You either got it, or you don’t.


I have to completely disagree with this... It's the old talent vs. acquired 
knowledge debate. We all have more natural abilities in some domains, but 
there isn't a subject matter that cannot be learned. Drawing, playing music, 
singing, critical thingking, mathematics, engineering, languages, all can be 
learned, as a matter of fact, a lot of artists these days (concert violinists, 
singers, graphic artists) will get very upset if you tell them that they are 
"talented", washing away the thousand of hours (literally, look it up) they 
have spent acquiring and perfectionist their arts.

We have all heard about the, don't know what you don't know - know what you 
don't know - know what you know - don't know what you know, scale. I think 
when it comes to problem solving, most of the senior sys admins are at the top 
end of that scale, we can solve problems, but can't explain how we do it, add 
to that it is a subject area (problem solving) which has never really been 
formalised, or at least not that I know of.

My approach when talking somebody into problem solving is:

-break it down, understand the parts of the whole, find which part works and 
which doesn't and how the parts interact with each other.

-replicate the problem in a smaller, simpler environment

-reverse it, create a simple system that works, add complication one step at a 
time until it breaks

-look up the theory. Go find the design document, or the API, etc... Find out 
how it is supposed to work, rather than copying solutions that have already 
been applied, often by people who did not understand the design.

-re-validate all your assumptions (check the documentations that what you 
think is right is in fact so).


-- 
Yves.                                                  http://www.SollerS.ca/
                                                        xmpp:y...@zioup.com


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