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The Future of SysAdmins' Positions
prostoalex writes "With automated upgrade tools and self-updating software, will sysadmins be in such high demand that they enjoy today? Lisa Valentine from NewsFactor provides the answer - and it's a definitive yes. Wireless systems and GPS devices are the new area where sysadmins are expected to have some expertise, although lately companies have been upping their demands for more hands-on experience. This opinion seems to corroborate US Department of Labor forecast on system administrator and computer support specialist employment."
Not many I'd think. Most sysadmin types need to be able to lay hands on the systems they're supporting.
Hard to add new hardware to a box if you can't touch it.
Don't anthropomorphize computers, they don't like it.
There will always be jobs for persons in IT that are willing to learn new technology as it changes daily. There will always be a job for position "X" as it will change as technology changes.
There will always be positions for competent sysadmins. All the paper MCSE's running around out there might have a problem though. I don't have any respect for a (so-called) sysadmin who pees his pants if you show him a command line.
Wireless systems and GPS devices are the new area where sysadmins are expected to have some expertise, although lately companies have been upping their demands for more hands-on experience.
Which is fine for currently employed sysadmins, or more specifically currently employed sysadmins that have the rare opportunity to do research and put their hands on new technologies in addition to their day-to-day tasks. However, the majority of us (my experience, no empirical evidence) is that most of us are hired to do a specific task, or hired to handle a certain area. Then 90% of our time is eating up just keeping the walls from falling down, making it difficult to get up to speed on new technologies.
How are we supposed to get this high-demand experience if we're either busy doing our jobs or still looking (or both)? They don't exactly teach sysadmin in school, you know.
El riesgo vive siempre!
Yeah. Until something breaks that is.
In general I see my job to automate everything I can. Repetitive work is what computers are good at, get them to do it for you. The sysadmin will still be required to oversee it.
Government of the people, by corporate executives, for corporate profits.
Even with automated updates and other utilities it still will take someone with some brains to fix problems that are more than just installing the latest patches. Any moron can install a patch.
it's an interesting article, and it's dead-on about predections, but i think for the wrong reasons
sure, a lot of what we used to do is automated (as the article points out, software installs, etc.), but a lot of what we do is purely psychological
i doubt there is PHB anywhere that is so braindead to think that his human sys admin slave (who can receive a page at 3 am) can be replaced by a machine
nobody is so daft as to imagine that our work is anything but intellectual... they watch as at work, at front of the machine, and they know that what we are doing is no different that auto mechanics or detectiving or archaelogy... analytic problem solving employing a specific skill-set, and there's no machine that can do that, and upper management (thank god) knows it
until they invent a computer that can drive down to the co-lo in the wee hours and apply critical thought to packet-sniffer, humans will always be sys admins, and the article doesn't touch this part of it
I'm not trying to Microsoft bash, but as long as Microsoft controls the desktop and server market, and as long as there are software vendors that ignore programming guidelines, there will always be a need for admins. I get calls all the time from users trying to figure out how things are supposed to work. I find most problems easy, yet the users are baffled. That, combined with the constant threat of virus, hacker and spyware attacks, makes me confidant I'll be employed for a long time to come. Unless I waste too much time on /.
The problem for some is becomming a sys admin. Most sys admin want years of hands-on, but to get years of hand-on you first have to get a sys admin job, but to get the job, you first need years of hands-on . . .
With automated upgrade tools and self-updating software, will sysadmins be in such high demand that they enjoy today"
Oh brother. Alright, let's look at the history of cars:
Before ~1970: cars had: engine, manual transmission, radiator, distributor, carborator, master cylinder.
Everything was mechanical (excluding battery / ignition system). So, you took your car to a garage, the person who worked on the viechle was a mechanic. These guys were skilled at knowing how moving parts all worked together to make your car go.
After ~1990: cars have: engine, auto transmission, radiator, automatic distribution system, fuel injection, anti-lock breaking system, power steering...there's a lot more things that are electronically controled and regulated. But guess what? These things still break. We still have mechanics, because there are still a lot of things that are mechanical, but there are also "technicians" (and most mechanics have to be technicians as well) that know how to fix electronics. Even if the "systems" are more reliable than before, they still break. But at the same time, my radiator worked exactly like radiators 50 years ago.
Add more "systems" to computers, it's just more "systems" that admins have to administer to when they break.
I have supported many remote sites. If I needed to add hardware, I called the vendor. For one company, I never had to visit the remote sites at all. Local talent was contracted to do network stuff, and HP did the hardware end.
For the other (Sun systems), I did all the network stuff, and visited the remote site about once every 3-6 months. It was a new system, and we occasionaly re-worked the network for the first couple of years. We also did a couple of hardware swaps ourselves because we were able to, there would have been no reason not to have Sun do it.
There is no reason why a skilled admin in the United States, India, China, Brazil, or wherever cannot maintain a remote site anywhere in the world with the appropriate support structure. 99% of what a sys admin does has nothing to do with hardware itself.
If you find that you are having to constantly touch hardware, then I would look at whatever hardware vendor you are using and get a different one.
Or get a girlfriend.....
I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
I used to worry about this, but I don't any more.
I've been doing this shit for 14 years, and in that time, even with GUIs and Plug-and-Play, and DHCP, and all the other niceties, in sum total, the complexity I face has increased year over year, not decreased.
Of course, the technology has gotten easier to install and maintain, but there's a lot more of it now, and it has infiltrated all aspects of the business world to where it really is counted on more than it once was.
I just didn't see that level of dependency 14 years ago.
Oh, come on. Monkeys barter nookie for food.
You can bet before we evolved language or shamans some neolithic honey with a single eyebrow and no capacity for language was swapping nookie for food and protection from one of our earliest ancestors.
Sex goes way back and doesn't require a heck of a lot of cultural evolution to have occured.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I suspect I must differ.
The command line is fundamental, primitive. It's the simplest way to drive the system. Sure, voice controls and stuff may happen, GUIs will get better, and maybe we'll find a way to do it with mouse gestures and data gloves. Maybe most administration will be done with those tools.
But way down deep, spitefully neglected, the command line will still be there. For some systems, 'reformat and reinstall,' won't be an acceptable answer when the fancy stuff fails.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
Try the government and/or the military.
:)
No, really; as an independant contractor.
One of the interesting things about working as a defense contrator is that there is work everywhere in the world at present; doesn't matter where, we've got an investment, and that investment involves computers somewhere along the line. (Yes, even in Kuala Lumpor - even when it's disguised as France.)
Where there are computers there will be admins - there must always be admins - if only for the same reasons that there are doctors, lawyers, mechanics, and others of our ilk. On the whole it's stuff that reasonable people could figure out and generally take care of on their own. Sometimes they'd need a specialist for a particularly hairy problem. However, one of the defining traits of life is that people don't have time to be generalists -- we're a highly specialized society (even if some of those specialties are along the lines of the service industries). Admins exist to take care of what people can't or won't, and in theory to do a better job than they could without training.
This is doubly or triply true for the government and military. More amusing still is if you're doing defense work that requires a clearance. If you can find someone to sponsor you, and if you can pass the investigation (takes a semi boring life, or lots of honesty), by all means do. Most people who go for a clearance won't get one - or will eventually have it revoked.
Law of supply and demand, friends:
High demand + automatically limited supply = higher cost for the goods in question. (i.e., higher salary.)
Get your Top Secret and you've basically written your meal ticket for life; just lay off committing felony crimes and you're probably good to go.
History is always told by the winner.
No.
They may *bill* that much, but that's not what they take home.
You might be surprised at what your company bills *your* time at.
Also, there's a big difference between "having lots of sex" and "getting fucked a lot." Whores and sysadmins know a lot about the latter.
Welcome to the Turing Tarpit, where everything is possible but nothing interesting is easy.
Great post. But still, shaman is the 3rd oldest profession.
:)
0th = (you) = hunter/gatherer
1st = prostitute
2nd = spying or politics
3rd = shaman
Sort of fits Maslow's pyramid of needs. First you need food, then sex, then safety, then intellectual pursuits. Hunter/gatherer, prostitute/mate, spy/politician, shaman.
The debate on the 2nd is whether you prefer the Old Testament or Reagon as a source
A.
I don't have any respect for a (so-called) sysadmin who pees his pants if you show him a command line.
After all, being forced to type in paragraphs of complete gibberish is better than being able to click a checkbox. Your penis size, er, sysadmin skills depend on how many words you type a minute when you administer a network.
Applying absolutist views to every situation is a copout.
> they fail to understand that developers are not just another category of end-users.
[asbestos suit=ON]
When it comes to securing the network, uptime for people in profit centers, due diligence on things like privacy, data retention, legal compliance, and the ability of the sales team to SELL STUFF for profit...
developers ARE just another category of end user.
Profit centers, legal issues, company reputation, shareholders, etc, ALL come before the latest internal Java widget or database enhancement. Sorry, but unless you're developing your company's new flagship product, you'll need to get down off that high horse.
[asbestos suit=OFF]
Operator, give me the number for 911!
Why? If I want to reboot our server I ssh in and tell it to reboot - if I can't ssh in because networking on the box has died then I log i through the serial console. If power needs cycled you log in to the UPS - most big UPS boxes have a network connection for that - and power cycle the machine. Networking to the office is dead? Then you call your supplier and ask them to restore networking within 4 hours or whatever your SLA demands. Still need access to the box, the use a modem and dial in using POTS.
Physical access to a box cna be convenient, but other than for replacing hardware it's rarely necessary. Replacing ahrdware is something that's easy to outsource to other local companies too - now that's a market
I've read all the 3+ posts here. So far, nobody has mentioned a really important fact.
because the skillsets in demand are always shifting, and because HR people really want to check off boxes in their application interviews, you get obsolete very fast. As you move into your 30s and 40s and beyond, your skill set is NOT like a lawyer's or doctor's. Their experiences over time make them stronger and stronger, and more valuable to society. You become LESS so. While a lawyer needs to learn about new laws and changes to the system, the rate of change doesn't invalidate what they already know.
Our company just laid off 10 people who were 50-ish COBOL programmers and IBM sysadmins. These people were very good at what they did, but they were no longer needed. They now start sliding DOWN the chain, taking jobs in their fields for LESS money. No matter how smart you think you are, there are college grads who will fight you for your job and take half your pay.
A previous poster compared sysadmins to auto mechanics. That was a good analogy, but he didn't follow it through. What happened to the mechanic industry in the 80s and 90s? They stagnated or dropped, as existing mechanics found it harder and harder to adapt to all the new technology, the demographic shift in average mechanic age fell.
I don't mean to be doom and gloom here, but for those who won't go into management or strike out and become busines owners, the future is this: you MUST stay on top of all emerging technologies and keep certifying and run along the treadmill, or you WILL get replaced by somebody younger. Whatever guru status you think you enjoy, and however many times your manager calls you his "goto guy", that status changes OVERNIGHT.
You should look at the sysadmin field like playing MLB in your 20s and early 30s. It's great to make it there, and it helps you make money you wouldn't have otherwise made - but eventually you will be replaced by somebody better and faster and cheaper. You need a plan to do something outside the field after 40.
Quick aside, I looked at some job ads in the last few weeks. I think HR people haven't figured out that some of these ads are stupid, and the economy is picking up and they can't cherry pick quite so much. I saw an ad that the company wanted you to have 10+ of systems integration experience, consulting experience, have technical certifications like RHCE and know shell, programming in C++, Java and be a certified disaster recovery specialist - AND - you know, in your spare time, ALSO be a CPA. That's right, a CPA!
Now maybe I just don't know enough smart people, but so far I have yet to meet a CPA that is also a programmer, much less a highly experienced sysadmin. I don't even know any that can SPELL UNIX. I would REALLY love to meet the applicant that gets that job.
For several reasons:
How do you script a clicky-clicky solution?
How do you document it?
If you dare document it, will it be unambigious?
With CLI you get all that and more, so it is not a phallic contest but simply the truth and why a UNIX/Linux admin can administer more machines per head than a poor Windows sod.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Janitorial staff. What is that suppossed to mean?
SAs normally have a carrier path either laterally (we can become programmers if we want to fro example, we know the resources involved in any IT project which allows to use them more effectively when programming, many programmers just don't understnad how their little script wonder is exhausting all the memory on a given machine) or vertically (toward management, since "having the keys of the kingdom", a position most janitors only dream about, puts you in touch with project managers, business managers, etc. Most code which opens posibilities of progression, code monkeys just code and go home).
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Your analogy started off well but broke down when you claimed that the command line was not suitable to the big jobs.
Well, let's talk about scripts rather than command lines. Most admins use scripts, they don't sit and type all day just to do the same the next day.
And there is the power of the command line. The loop. Even if your brush is only small, if you put it in a loop and get the computer to wave it about your stadium then you can sit back, wait a few minutes and the job is done.
With the GUI you have to grab the little brush with the mouse pointer and drag it all over the stadium.
The command line is a programming language. Language scales infinitely better than pictures, because languages have control structures like loops and conditions, while pictures don't.
That's why scripting will never go away; the same reason programming will never go away. It's them most powerful interface to the operation of a computer (in the hands of the knowledgable).
GUIs are mediocre interfaces to that power, designed for use by those who lack the knowledge.
I'm not saying GUIs are not useful. In cases where constant feedback is required as your job progresses, such as creative work, GUIs are very good. But they fall down when it comes to "do this, a thousand times" kinds of jobs.
Yours Sincerely, Michael.
Increasingly we are seeing the executive branch (e.g., the departments that report to the President) either not publish statistics or publish misleading or partial statistics. This is true for many departments that previously prided themselves on non-partisanship.
The job forecasts and market outlook for programmers and software engineers did not mention anything about outsourcing. Could this be because outsourcing is a senstive political topic that the current administration is vulnerable on? I found it odd reading that job growth for programmers would be about the same as job growth overall, without any mention of why such tepid job prospects were being forecast. In fact, I found nothing about low wage competition for "knowledge worker" jobs.
Then there is the issue of job catagories. Apparently the job prospects for "software engineers" were bright, while those for programmers were mediocre.
I have never worked in an environment where someone did design and someone else implemented this design in software. Yes I've had customers provide a broad outline of what they wanted, sometimes in terms of system components, but the engineering of large software systems is closely tied to their implementation. So as far as I'm concerned the division between "programmer" and "software engineer" does not exist. In fact some of the problems encountered in offshore outsourcing involve the attempt to separate software engineering from programming. Those contracting for low wage programming must provide detailed documentation that describes exactly what they want and how they want it done. Even then sometimes the software that is delivered is not adequate.