Jobs...

[Vlad]

On 7/20/06, Robert Brockway <rbrockway-wgAaPJgzrDxH4x6Dk/4f9A at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> On Wed, 19 Jul 2006, Vlad wrote:
>
> >       I know of several places that would instantly hire people with
> > good networking skills (Cisco routing and switching), firewalling (PIX
>
> Do you mean Cisco specific experience or an understanding of networking
> theory?

        "Yes."

> In my experience a lot of people are lacking a good theoretical
> understanding of networking.  Having this under your belt helps a lot when
> dealing with complex networks.  Examples of the network theory I'm talking
> about:

        Quite true, quite true. Same can be said about "thinking
outside of the box", or "being on top of an issue", as it were.

> - Be able to work with CIDR in your sleep
> - Understand what a netmask is and what happens if it is wrong
> - Understand broadcast, unicast, multicast and anycast.
> - Be at least comfortable with IPv6 concepts

        I'd consider those as mere building blocks, with a strong
emphasis being placed on routing (think BGP, OSPF, some MPLS, the odd
IS-IS implementation), and switching (think Cat6k and knowing CEF well
enough that you deal with its routing loops like it's your morning
coffee).

> > and *nix-based solutions), as well as *nix skills. Pretty good
>
> I think Linux skills are more in demand than they have ever been before.
> IMHO there has been a shift from big iron *nix skills towards Linux.

        Quite true again. For the most part, I'm pretty "Enh." about that.

        First, because it opens up the market to a lot more people
that know Linux or BSD, but not UNIX. This has a tendency to lower the
pay brackets, as there's so many C.S. students with Linux knowledge
and a degree, that are willing to work themselves to death for 40k a
year.
        Second, there are a fair amount of apps that I'd much rather
run on UNIX, than on Linux. For example, NetBackup on Solaris is great
(if you can afford the hardware). On Linux, not so much. Or, say,
NNM/OVO on HP-UX (11i).

        Just because something is cheap, or free, and it mostly
"works", doesn't mean that it should be used. Unfortunately, only the
people that have to put out the fires know and understand that.

> >       As for DBA or programming positions, those are much more the
> > Senior level, with ridiculous amounts of experience. Whereas the
>
> Good sysadmins tend to make average developers (and vice versa).  In my
> experience sysadmins mostly stay sysadmins and developers mostly stay
> developers.  Sysadmins are often drafted in as DBAs.

        True, I would say. A good sysadmin will know how an app is
made, how it'll talk over the network, and so forth. Ditto for a good
firewall and network admin. Just like a good developer should have
intermediate sysadmin skills, and be able to fix their own environment
for themselves.
        I don't really have much to say about the DBA bit. I can see
how a sysadmin would make a good DBA, and, thinking back to the old
job, most of the sysadmins had decent to good DBA knowledge/skills.

> Thus many people are recruited right out of university to do development.
> People get recruited right out of university to be junior sysadmins too.

        Call me cynical, but I think that's just because they're
young, naive, and will work for the proverbial carrot-on-a-stick,
whereas a seasoned developer/DBA/sysadmin will just laugh. Then get
replaced with someone being paid half as much, and that will,
eventually, learn enough to keep things slowly chugging along - or
it'll be a big disaster, for which management will never be held
accountable.

> I'm talking generally across the industry here.

        Likewise.

> Cheers,
>
> Rob

        Cheers,

        -- Vlad

> --
> Robert Brockway B.Sc.        Phone:          +1-905-821-2327
> Senior Technical Consultant  Urgent Support: +1-416-669-3073
> OpenTrend Solutions Ltd      Email:          support-wgAaPJgzrDxH4x6Dk/4f9A at public.gmane.org
>                              Web:            www.opentrend.net
> We are open 24x365 for technical support.  Call us in a crisis.
>
> If you are emailing regarding an open ticket please consider
> mentioning the ticket ID as this will assist us in responding
> as quickly as possible.
> --
> The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://tlug.ss.org
> TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
> How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://tlug.ss.org/subscribe.shtml
>


-- 
end
--
The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://tlug.ss.org
TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://tlug.ss.org/subscribe.shtml