Well, as if work and home life aren’t hectic enough, now I’m apparently running for president.

News3Online Breaking News

Many thanks to Cali Lewis at GeekBrief for the link to the site.

I talked about it a bit when we recorded Episode 55 (soon to be released), but the Sysadmin Meme has really taken off. Admins and scripters from all areas are responding and calling out their associates… I’ll update this as I see come across more.

In no particular order:

1. Shay Levy
2. Hal Rottenberg
3. Marc van Orsouw
4. Richard Siddaway
5. Rolf Masuch
6. Andy Schneider
7. Jacob Saaby Nielsen
8. Paul Muller
9. Jonathan Noble
10. James O’Neill
11. Kirk Munro
12. Jeff Hicks
13. Rick Savoia
14. Darren Mar-Elia
15. David Moisan
16. Paul Sylvester
17. Joel Bennet (Jaykul) - taking it back on the dev track
18. Oisin  Grehan
19. Joe Richards
20. Brandon Shell
21. Don Jones
22. Greg Shields

Thanks again to everyone for sharing their stories!

OK, here it goes.

How old were you when you started using computers?

I was around 12 or 13 when I started playing with computers. I saw them in Popular Science and was fascinated with them. I then pestered my parents for my first PC for Christmas and my dad finally took me to K-Mart where I had to choose between the Texas Instruments TI/99-4A, the Timex Sinclair 1000, and either the Commodore Vic-20 or C-64.

What was your first machine?

My first computer was a Timex Sinclair 1000. I remember my friend getting a Commodore and being jealous of the color graphics. My second and real springboard PC was a Radio Shack/Tandy TRS-80 Model 4 with 64 kb RAM and dual 5.25 floppy drives (360k each!) We had Tandy TRS-80 Model II and 3’s in my school district so I went with what I knew. My dad had IBM PC’s at work and showed me an ad for an IBM (Peanut, I think) and I decided to stick to the Radio Shack brand. I still have both of these units somewhere in my parents attic….along with all the other old stuff I’ve talked about on the show. My first x86 PC was a Bondwell B210 286 laptop with a 40 MB hard drive.

What was the first real script you wrote?

Hello World loop in Basic on the Timex Sinclair 1000……Isn’t that what everyone writes? I went on to write an inventory control system in BASIC for the company my dad worked for. I coded on the TRS-80 and then printed it out. A typist transcribed my code onto an IBM PC and then I came in to troubleshoot the problems. No reading floppies cross-platform in those days. There were subtle differences in the BASIC compilers back than for disk I/O and file handling. Sadly, this old geek can still remember that BASIC stood for Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code.

What scripting languages have you used?

Basic (No, not visual), Pascal, COBOL, and Fortran. Pascal will always be my favorite. Top down design rocks. If you haven’t declared it….you can’t freakin’ call it. That’s probably why I’ve had so much trouble grasping the object-oriented languages. Later on into today, it’s been DOS batch file scripts, SQL, Kixtart, and the occasional dabble into PowerShell.

What was your first professional sysadmin gig?I took a part-time job in 1987 doing data entry for free magazine subscriptions (International Computer Network) while going to community college for Comp Sci. When they found I had a tech bent, they started using me to do after-hours system tasks on the two mainframes we had (Tandem System I and Tandem System II). Load tapes for backups, load printers for labels or other print jobs, etc. The one thing I remember is the wide carriage printers in the data center. Before each type of print job, I had to run a paper tape with a series of holes punched in it through a reader on the printer. This would set up the printer for the type of job to be printed.

If you knew then what you know now, would have started in IT?

Definitely. During my college years, after I gave up on programming as a major, I focused on being in the financial markets. After a couple of years, however, things changed and I took on MIS as a second major and veered back towards IT. Mostly the change was in the industry. I wasn’t cut out to be a programmer locked in a hermetically sealed mainframe room, but that was the only college curriculum at that time. Once MIS and broader IS/IT curriculums came around it fit me better.

If there is one thing you learned along the way that you would tell new sysadmins, what would it be?

Everybody knows something you don’t. Talking to them and asking them is the only way to find out what it is. In return, share everything you know. Nothing is more counterproductive than having knowledge and not sharing it.

If I could add a second item, it would be; Nobody knows everything. If you think you do, it is time to get out of this field. You need to enjoy constantly learning new things because this is an ever changing field.

What’s the most fun you’ve ever had scripting?

I guess the scripts I am most proud of are the ones I did for Y2K at my old job. They had these old scripts using this Novell Netware add-on pack that allowed them to transfer files between a Novell NetWare server and a SCO Unix server. The Add-on pack was not Y2K compliant, so I replicated the scripts using FTP and DOS batch files. There are only one or two facilities still using these scripts, but thy are still there 10 years later.

Who am I calling out?

Paul Rj Muller at the Caffination Podcast

Justo Morales at the Pepe Show Podcast

Rick Savoia of the The Force Field Podcast

UPDATE: Paul and Rick have both responded. I’ll have to reach out to Justo and kick him in the asterisk. You can find Paul and Rick’s responses at the following links:

Paul’s Response

Rick’s Response

I’ve found a Software Development Meme (A meme  consists of any unit of cultural information, such as a practice or idea, that gets transmitted verbally or by repeated action from one mind to another) on a few blogs I’ve started reading (Larry Clarkin’s and Damon Payne’s), and I thought I would adapt it to the Sysadmin.

How old were you when you started using computers?

I was eight when I first started using computers.  My mom was a teacher for the local public school system and they were just getting computers.  She could bring one home over the summer and I started learning Basic on an Apple II.

What was your first machine?

The first machine we had in our family (other than the ones my mom could bring home) was an Apple II GS.  My first machine was a 486 IBM clone that cost me $2,000 (in 1993) (my summer work money - I was in high school).

What was the first real script you wrote?

The first “real” script I wrote was a Python script to enter addresses into a database system via ADO.

What scripting languages have you used?

I’ve used VBScript (marginally), PowerShell, and Python.

What was your first professional sysadmin gig?

My first professional sysadmin job is the one I currently have, with a local law enforcement agency.  I started officially as the IT Specialist here in April of 2006.

If you knew then what you know now, would have started in IT?

Definitely.  If I knew then what I know now, I would have finished college in the IT realm and started down this path sooner.  However, that might have changed how I’ve ended up, and I really like the position I have now and the opportunities in front of me.

If there is one thing you learned along the way that you would tell new sysadmins, what would it be?

Get involved.  I’ve learned more and met more great people getting involved in community.  By commenting on blogs, podcasting, spending time on IRC in the #powershell channel and participating in PowerShellCommunity.org, I have learned so much and met generous, knowledgeable people.

What’s the most fun you’ve ever had scripting?

The 2008 Winter Scripting Games were a blast, even though I got busy with work halfway through, I had a great time.  It was awesome watching the community provide their solutions and see people working on the challenges in the IRC channel and forums.

Who am I calling out?

Rich Niemeier

Keith Albright

Hal Rottenberg

Jonathan Walz

Shay Levy

Aleksandar Nikolic

Recorded: August 21, 2007
Your Hosts: Keith Albright, Rich Niemeier, and Steve Murawski

Show Length: 1:11:58

Our second ‘Special Topics’ episode. We welcome Steve Murawski to the show and discuss the need for a Code of Ethics for the IT Profession. Is something like this needed in our profession and why? We close with our suggestions for hiring ethical employees.

Here is a brief outline:

• Do we need a Code of Ethics?

-Does this problem stem from the psychology of the IT professional?

-Incidents in news related to IT professionals crossing the line

-Compare with other professions

-Have laws/regulations done part of the job (HIPAA, SOX, SB 1386, etc)

-What is crossing the line? If I am to be the information steward, do I not have the right to view ALL information?

-What about personal information (that does not belong in the workplace)?

• Can it be enforced?

-With no formal sanctioning body in place (e.g. Board Of Medicine, Bar Assn.) how can it be done.

-Has anyone ever been stripped of their certifications? MCSE, CCNA, etc.

• What can a company do to ensure their employees act ethically?

-Is an employee manual enough?

-Sign contractual ethics guarantee?

-How far does loyalty go?

Links mentioned in this show:

Too many to mention. Please see show notes for links.

View the full shownotes here.

Listen Now:

Download Here

Recorded: July 31, 2007
Your Hosts: Keith Albright, Rich Niemeier, and Ted Miller
Show Length: 1:29:40

This week we cover a variety of news and other topics; We have a brief discussion on technology vendor salespeople, Instant Messaging to interview job candidates, and a new fiber-optic cable. Ted informs us of the deadly threat lurking in our laser printers. As usual, we end with our website picks and we hope you enjoy.
NOTE: I think we finally nailed the sound quality. Let us know what you think.
Links mentioned in this show:

• Digital Pictures Backup Device
• Best Buy’s Geek Squad Tech Steals Porn
• Order food At Safeco Field from your Nintendo DS Lite
• Seven Ways Tech Vendors Blow The Sale
• Corning’s New Fiber
• E-Waste
• Using Instant Messaging In The Interview Process
• Cisco Adds CCENT Certification
• Secunia Personal Software Inspector
• Laser Printer Particle Health Risk

Other podcasts mentioned in this show:

Technorama

PaulDotCom Security Weekly

See the full show notes here.

Website Picks:

Keith’s Pick: Youlicit.com
Rich’s Pick: Free Church Music
Ted’s Pick: Etsy.com

Download Here

Recorded: June 22, 2007
Your Hosts: Keith Albright and Rich Niemeier
Show Length: 1:39:05

Rich and I discuss IT Organization structures and the trend toward the ‘hybrid’ model to align IT goals with the business. News items on Motorola acquisitions, RFID umbrella tracking privacy concerns, Safari Browser on Windows, and Spam Spikes. Rich talks about his battle with Internet connectivity problems during a big event and I relate my email and hard drive failure problems. We finish off with a couple of website picks.

As usual, we hope you enjoy.

Links mentioned in this podcast:

• Motorola Owns Netopia
• Nike Recycles
• Motorola Recycles
• RFID Umbrellas
• Computer Efficiency
• Safari For Windows
• Spam Spikes
• MessageLabs White Paper
• IT Organizational Structures
• More on IT Organizational Structures
• Even More on IT Organizational Structures

Full Show Notes

Website Picks:

Keith’s Pick: WhoCalled
Keith’s Second Pick: Feed The Pig

Rich’s Pick: PhysOrg
Rich’s Second Pick: Webcast Index

Download Here

I know; Rich and I discussed this on an earlier podcast.  Rather than bring this up on another show, I’ll just refer you to the article. 

I think this is an issue that most IT professionals have to address and I had my own struggles as well.  If you are experiencing this in your career, I’d advise you to pay particular attention to tip #1 - Ask yourself hard questions.

Do this after you’ve run through the rest of the tips since the results from those will affect your ability to answer those questions.  For me, I found that maintaining boundaries, delegation and strict scheduling wouldn’t and couldn’t work in the work environment I was in.

Take a few minutes to read the full article.

CIO Magazine: Five Sensible Tips for Achieving Work-Life Balance