Dave: > Most recently I've got hold of a small Sun Ray eval system and am having a > ball testing it to simply do basic stuff like running brower kiosk sessions. > Amazing technologies.
It's easy to imagine how Sun Ray technologies could be useful in any location where many users need access to basic internet and/or office applications: libraries, schools, hotels, etc. This is a very underdeveloped market for Sun Ray, I think. Now that Sun Ray is migrating to the Xorg Xserver, it will be far more accessible to users with disabilities. Once Sun Ray accessibility is a bit farther along, it could then be seen as a very cheap alternative to meet Section 508 Accessibility requirements and thus be very attractive solution. It's also interesting to imagine using Sun Ray in a home setting. You could inexpensively up a network where you could have a terminal in every room, an RFID chip in your wallet, and a session that follows you from room to room. If you were playing audio, watching a You-Tube video, just browsing the internet, or whatever, then you could just have it follow you. > So let's say I want to geek up and earn some serious dollars in the process. > What sort of opportunities are available out there for people with Solaris > expertise? For example, what are the sort of environments where people with > this knowledge would be in demand - ie. where should I be looking? Since it sounds you have interest in Sun Ray, and a working demo, then why not create a dog-and-pony-show and try to sell your services in setting up and customizing Sun Ray networks, providing people with inexpensive, and low-energy networking solutions? > Also, what level of expertise should I be aiming at for the above in-demand > roles? What aspects of the OS do I need bulletproof knowledge of? I'm not > stupid, > but UNIX is still very new to me, things like shell scripting I have next to zero > knowledge of. I can find my way around via CLI okay, but still have a preference for a GUI when available :-p Solaris is not that different from Linux or any other UNIX. So, to promote Solaris you need to find customers and-end users who need one of the things that differentiates Solaris from the other distros. Users who need things like ZFS, Java, or Sun Ray are good examples of areas to build expertise in order to be a Solaris zealot. To get the general UNIX knowledge, O'Reilly books are a good resource. I wouldn't say there is one set of skills a person needs to find a good UNIX-related job. People use UNIX in so many different ways, and they all require different skills. To be a system administrator, you probably need to know shell scripting, but if you are supporting a Web Application Server, then you probably need to know Java, and if you are a graphic designer, you would likely need to know GIMP. To be a salesman, you might not need to know the technical details with so much depth. Depends on what you want to do. > Should I do training or obtain certification? What's the best way to learn > "it" > - maybe attach myself to a casual project and work "for free" for a bit? Certifications and volunteer work are always good ways to build experience. Brian _______________________________________________ opensolaris-discuss mailing list [email protected]
