I remember my second IT job, I was hired as the Network Administrator for this small company. My boss, the CIO, was also one of the co-founders. Whenever something came up, as I'm headed to the server room, to start troubleshooting, I would find him there already, at the console, poking around, clicking stuff. Was one of the major irritants I had at that place. My thought was, "Why did you hire me, if you're not going to trust me to take care of the system?"
>>> Ken Schaefer <[email protected]> 9/23/2010 3:29 AM >>> Agreed. Making random changes to servers based on "gut feelings" what are bad, isn't my idea of a desirable troubleshooting strategy. Gather facts Isolate Issue Identify Root Cause Implement Fix Cheers Ken From: Andrew S. Baker [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, 23 September 2010 6:13 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Re: Kick Ass Sysadmin (was RE: It appears that the Symantec Virus has affected PGP already) Another aspect of troubleshooting is the ability to keep track of what are actual facts, and what are as-yet-untested-assumptions. This includes knowing how to classify information that has been given you by the end user. ASB (My XeeSM Profile)<http://XeeSM.com/AndrewBaker> Exploiting Technology for Business Advantage... On Thu, Sep 23, 2010 at 2:42 AM, James Rankin <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: It's not what you Google, it's how you Google it. Even when interviewing now I tend to try and look for people who can work problems out rather than people who can simply rhyme off lists of stuff - and I'm always keen on people who check the obvious things first. (Think "how would you troubleshoot a GPO that's failing to apply" rather than "name the FSMO roles".) There's an art to troubleshooting technical issues that's sometimes hard to define. It's probably the old "clean minds and scruffy minds" thing. Scruffy minds move in unexpected directions and try things that wouldn't necessarily make sense. I can remember fixing some random server hang just by stopping a service I didn't like the look of. It's only afterwards that we realised that particular app was opening loads of ports and generally monopolising the system. I didn't really know what I was looking for, until I found it. On 23 September 2010 00:31, Jonathan Link <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: Sometimes I wonder if I'm just a good googler... Seems like 90% of my issues have been tackled (and documented!) by someone else. On Wed, Sep 22, 2010 at 7:17 PM, David Lum <[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote: The place with the ad you mean? I don't remember, but here's one in NY that is not completely different: http://www.linkedin.com/jobs?viewJob=&jobId=1007553 I do think I am generaly kick-ass, just don't call me an expert at anything. My specialty is the near-vertical leanning curve that is needed on an occcasional basis. I get stuff like this almost every month: Q. "Hey Dave, is this possible?" -or- "Hey this infrastructure piece is down and the guy who usually manages it is out and there's no documentation, can you make it work?" In both cases: A. "No clue..I mean in theory it is somehow possible" <run off> <back in 45 minutes> "yeah we can do it, here's a script/tool/some other clever capability". The answer of course sometimes comes from this list, or Exchange list, or Michael B. Smith. Ok I'm not kick ass at all, but I know how to contact a LOT of guys who are... Dave "my expertise is knowing experts and how to contact them" Lum ________________________________ From: Steven M. Caesare [[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>] Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 2010 1:46 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: It appears that the Symantec Virus has affected PGP already Hehe.. type of org? -sc From: David Lum [mailto:[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>] Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 2010 2:26 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: It appears that the Symantec Virus has affected PGP already That reminds me, I was looking at job openings and once place had the job description on their website "looking for someone who is kick ass at finding technical solutions...". Being an informalish kind of guy, I was tempted to apply just based on that kind of verbiage. Still like %dayjob% enough to not apply though... Dave From: Steven M. Caesare [mailto:[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>] Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 2010 10:16 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: It appears that the Symantec Virus has affected PGP already I'm using that on my next technical evaluation summary. -sc ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to [email protected] with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin
