Made the move to Linux System Administrator

Wanted to post a career update.

I've moved into a Linux System Administrator at my current company, working mainly with Red Hat Enterprise.

I'm sure I will have questions as time moves forward, however want thank everyone on this website for always willing to answer questions or offer advice.

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lsud00d

Congrats on the transition! Do you have any plans for a Red Had cert, like RHCSA or RHCE?

I moved from Help Desk/Windows Sys Admin to a Linux Sys Admin spot and my god was it daunting, but I had an excellent team around me and definitely hit the ground running with the opportunity. It was actually when I joined TE because I was looking for L+ materials. I cannot say enough good things about working with *nix because honestly, similar to learning foreign languages makes you understand English better, working with *nix made me understand EVERYTHING better, from Windows, to networking, to storage, virtualization...etc. Keep us updated!

JockVSJock

lsud00d wrote: »

Congrats on the transition! Do you have any plans for a Red Had cert, like RHCSA or RHCE?

Most definitely, I'll start with RCHSA and go from there.

darkerosxx

My southern brothers.

Congrats on the move. Enjoy it, and remember to take a break when Linux angers you, then get back to it!

NightShade03

Congrats!

Work Tip: Rebooting the system doesn't fix the problem

thenjduke

NightShade03 wrote: »

Congrats!

Work Tip: Rebooting the system doesn't fix the problem

I love the work tip. It is so true with Linux

cgrimaldo

Congrats, Chris! I hope you are doing well

UnixGuy

Congrats, great career move!

If you have any questions, feel free to ask 'darkerosxx' and 'nightshade' they're the best

Don't worry too much about certifications now, learn everything on the job and then go to RHCSA => RHCE.

UnixGuy

@NightSharde03

I worked with a VMware administrator who kept rebooting my Linux VMs to fix problems

JockVSJock

UnixGuy wrote: »

If you have any questions, feel free to ask 'darkerosxx' and 'nightshade' they're the best

Ironic you said that. I've been asked to benchmark Red Hat Network Satellite and Red Hat Network Monitoring. So I have some reading to do, however I may have some questions later.

thanks

UnixGuy

I haven't directly used either, but while you're benchmarking I'd look at TheForeman and Nagios and compare with them.

the_Grinch

NightShade03 wrote: »

Congrats!

Work Tip: Rebooting the system doesn't fix the problem

Learned this today actually!

JockVSJock

UnixGuy wrote: »

I haven't directly used either, but while you're benchmarking I'd look at TheForeman and Nagios and compare with them.

Actually the point of the conversation was to save money. My boss showed me the invoice and said look for ways to cut cost. I know that Nagios is very popular, so I will have to research that as well. I would like to look into Puppet too...

I am looking into getting the following books on Linux Sys Admin:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0596003439/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_S_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=6EZX78W2XZZ3&coliid=IHNDHDGK7J1CI

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0131480057/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pd_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=6EZX78W2XZZ3&coliid=I3R8IN4N9XRAR7

UnixGuy

I have read this book and I didn't find it useful
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0131480057/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pd_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=6EZX78W2XZZ3&coliid=I3R8IN4N9XRAR7&tag=viglink20307-20

you don't really need to pay for Red Hat's expensive tools. We use CentOS and we don't pay nothing.

Puppet is a configuration management tool. We use Puppet open source and it's free and does the job perfectly.

Nagios is for alerts and monitoring. We monitor everything in our environment with Nagios, it's great.

Read Michael Jang's book for RHCE and sybex Linux+ book is also good, I think it's a good study guide. Also, Google is your friend, there are great articles and How-to guides that you might not even need a book.

JockVSJock

UnixGuy wrote: »

I have read this book and I didn't find it useful
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0131480057/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pd_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=6EZX78W2XZZ3&coliid=I3R8IN4N9XRAR7&tag=viglink20307-20

I'm curious on your opinion on why you didn't like this book.

I was recommended this book from The Geek Stuff. I think his website is great and he posted a bunch of Linux books that he likes and I've gotten a few and have enjoyed them. 12 Amazing and Essential Linux Books To Enrich Your Brain and Library

UnixGuy wrote: »

you don't really need to pay for Red Hat's expensive tools. We use CentOS and we don't pay nothing.

I have a feeling that over the next few months I will be talking with my boss and seeing what free software I can use to replace the Red Hat tools with to save money.

So it sounds like in your prod env you don't run Red Hat Enterprise, just Cent OS? Is your management ok with that? I know that most managers don't like Linux because you can't pick up the phone and call for support when things go bad.

UnixGuy

I don't remember very well but I think the book was too generic and basic. I prefer Red Hat study guides, and O'Relly Bash book to this one. You run RHEL, so I'd stick with RHEL guides, but I'm sure you can learn a thing or two from the book. TheGeekStuff is a nice website, whenever I Google something it always comes up, the guy did pretty good how-tos.

Yes we run CentOS, and I found (purely anecdotal) that many firms that pay RHEL license rarely - if ever - use Red Hat support. We don't need support and we can rebuild our servers; the license costs aren't justified.

If I have an Oracle Financial software or SAP and something very critical like that, then I'd run it on Solaris and get support from Oracle.

darkerosxx

Also remember when running Red Hat, you can run Red Hat without a license if ALL of your red hat installations are unlicensed. The minute you license one, you have to license them all.

Edit: replace license with subscription. I'm lazy.

JockVSJock

UnixGuy wrote: »

If I have an Oracle Financial software or SAP and something very critical like that, then I'd run it on Solaris and get support from Oracle.

Is there a reason for installing on Oracle on Solaris Vs Oracle on Red Hat? I know that Oracle runs better on Linux.

N2IT

Certs - Smerts learn the technology! Oh and Gratz well deserved!

coreyb80

Congrats OP...I've been contemplating making the switch to Linux myself for a while now.

NightShade03

UnixGuy wrote: »

I have read this book and I didn't find it useful
UNIX and Linux System Administration Handbook (4th Edition): Evi Nemeth, Garth Snyder, Trent R. Hein, Ben Whaley: 9780131480056: Amazon.com: Books

+1

Reasoning: It's a great reference book for those that already know Linux and what to brush up on individual services/topics. Much of the book is scattered with different services that you will encounter, but if you are just starting out and have no clue how to install a basic Apache server why would you need to know all of the advanced configs that go along with it as well? Also by the time you reach "that level" you usually don't need a book

UnixGuy wrote: »

we don't pay nothing.

You can't do that to the English language

As for the whole Centos vs RHEL. I know a bunch of orgs that will run Centos from a cost saving perspective and then just spin up RH on the boxes that will need 100% uptime and support (like the DB server with all of the customer data). Honestly with the horizontal scaling effect taking over it is becoming easier and easier to keep services online 99.9% of the time and thereby minimizing the need for RH subscriptions. Many of the financial orgs still go all out and pay for it because a) they can and b) they are on the old school enterprise networks.

UnixGuy

JockVSJock wrote: »

Is there a reason for installing on Oracle on Solaris Vs Oracle on Red Hat? I know that Oracle runs better on Linux.

The reasons will start an OS religious war. In my humble opinion, Solaris is far more superior OS than Linux. Linux will do better in a distributed web applications while Solaris does better hosting database and mission critical systems. Having said that, do your own research, there are heaps of comparisons online. One point to keep in mind is that Oracle now owns Solaris, and they 'engineered' Solaris to run Oracle more efficiently. License wise, people might think they're paying more for Solaris but more often than not they end up paying much more for VMware license + RHEL subscription + Oracle database.

NightShade03 wrote: »

+1

You can't do that to the English language

...

Oh you haven't heard my excuse "English is my second language"...I say this at least 3 times a day. E.g. I'm late for work...sure English is my second language

Question: Do you think 'old school enterprise networks' are disappearing? I admit most of my experience is at those old school networks

yzT

NightShade03 wrote: »

Congrats!

Work Tip: Rebooting the system doesn't fix the problem

Want to see you fixing Bash without rebooting

RHEL

yum update bash

Call it a day.

NightShade03

@Unixguy - I firmly believe that enterprise type networks are definitely disappearing, but only for certain verticals. As I've said in other posts...Financial, Healthcare, Gov, are all examples of verticals where traditional networks will never go away. They are too set in their ways with zero tolerance for change. Everywhere else you are already starting to see a shift to the cloud, Openstack for private clouds (even VMware is on board with this now), SDN it starting to finally get on track, etc etc. It's not going to happen overnight, but in the next 3 - 5 years it will certainly be a huge change for many industries.

Case in point: http://blog.intronis.com/bid/red-hat-declares-client-server-computing-era-over

UnixGuy

@NightShade:

I see your point mate. I work in healthcare, so it's tricky for me to get hands-on experience with this new technology. I'm trying to introduce small changes here and there though to keep myself employable.

Pupil

UnixGuy wrote: »

The reasons will start an OS religious war. In my humble opinion, Solaris is far more superior OS than Linux. Linux will do better in a distributed web applications while Solaris does better hosting database and mission critical systems. Having said that, do your own research, there are heaps of comparisons online. One point to keep in mind is that Oracle now owns Solaris, and they 'engineered' Solaris to run Oracle more efficiently. License wise, people might think they're paying more for Solaris but more often than not they end up paying much more for VMware license + RHEL subscription + Oracle database.

I've heard others say something similar. What's the best way to go about gaining hands-on experience with Solaris outside of a job?

jdancer

UnixGuy wrote: »

I have read this book and I didn't find it useful
UNIX and Linux System Administration Handbook (4th Edition): Evi Nemeth, Garth Snyder, Trent R. Hein, Ben Whaley: 9780131480056: Amazon.com: Books

you don't really need to pay for Red Hat's expensive tools. We use CentOS and we don't pay nothing.

Puppet is a configuration management tool. We use Puppet open source and it's free and does the job perfectly.

Nagios is for alerts and monitoring. We monitor everything in our environment with Nagios, it's great.

Read Michael Jang's book for RHCE and sybex Linux+ book is also good, I think it's a good study guide. Also, Google is your friend, there are great articles and How-to guides that you might not even need a book.

LOL, I am in the process of changing from Puppet to Ansible and Nagios to Zabbix. Ansible for the agentless config and Zabbix to get way from nrpe. It's great there are lots of options.

Xavor

Pupil wrote: »

What's the best way to go about gaining hands-on experience with Solaris outside of a job?

You can install Solaris in a VM, but since Linux skills are transferrable you can just work with that. There are a few books which cover similarities and differences in the commands.

JockVSJock

UnixGuy wrote: »

The reasons will start an OS religious war. In my humble opinion, Solaris is far more superior OS than Linux.

I'm not looking to start a fight, I am genuinely curious. Its obvious that you have the experience and knowledge and I'm willing to listen.

I have never worked with Solaris. Its always been Linux. I didn't even realize that you could download a live disk from Oracle's website until I googled it.

RHEL

To each his own. Personally, Solaris jumped on my dislike list as soon as Oracle took over. As with the other big players in UNIX (HP-UX, AIX), corporations have started migrating over to Linux. If you're going to pay expensive support contracts, why also pay for expensive proprietary hardware?

That's why Solaris is now available on x86, and also why IBM is making a push to run Linux on Power architecture... They're trying to remain relevant in today's world. I've worked extensively with AIX, HP-UX, Solaris, and RHEL. In my opinion, if you were to focus on one thing, make it Red Hat.