Considering that a good plumber in California can make a nice low six-figure salary, it's more doable in the blue collar arena than it is in a technical field. Electricians make more than chemical engineers.
I admin my own machines as well and the primary reason I like OS X over Linux and Windows is the Software Update. I am evaluating migrating my Linux servers running qmail/oracle/tomcat-apache to OS X Server with postfix/sybase/tomcat-apache.
Not to knock OS X, mind you, but check out Debian before you decide to make that kind of a migration -- servers that can run OS X are not cheap. Debian's apt system is second-to-none[1], and the software is top-notch. If you're in the Sacramento area, I can probably even give you a hand.
I'd mod you up had I points, but I don't so I'll try and post an informative response instead.
The 'oldest profession' is actually the shaman, or witch-doctor; prostitutes didn't really come around we stopped wandering around so much, and started staying in one place long enough for commerce and property to become tangible things. The witch doctor, like many sysadmins[1], was often insane, but he helped people to make sense of the world around them, by relating things they couldn't understand to things they could -- he was their interface to the unknown.
Witch-doctors explained disease, thunder, life, death, although they never got the hang of taxes. They were often wrong, not having the tools of science, but their explanations were at least sometimes useful, oftentimes imparted sage advise, and almost always provided comfort to those who sought him for counsel.
As the world has progressed, so has the witch-doctor; in time, they became 'natural philosophers' and scientists. Today, we call them engineers, doctors, teachers, chemists, and programmers; they are the people that help all of the other people manipulate and comprehend the world.
They're also called 'sysadmins'; and I'm happy to consider myself a member. *shakes whale-bone and begins chanting*
You have obviously never been a system administrator. Allow me to introduce you to my friend, Clue-by-Four.
*whack*
The problem with things that are 'user-managed' is that it follows the classic path of the tragedy of the commons. Users tend to look at the systems and networks they use as infinite sources of storage, memory, and processing power, and when things break down because of this overuse, they have no way to fix things on their own.
The place I work is a great example of this -- our salespeople have sold a huge account to an overseas client who wants us to run 24x7; of course, they did this without even talking to the systems department. Had they tried to implement without a system administrator, things would have crashed and burned horribly, as prime time for our overseas users meshes nicely with all the nighttime automated tasks our system runs in the background (like backups and such). As is, we are having to almost double our server infrastructure and hire a new admin for our new (large) client; if we didn't, we wouldn't be able to keep them.
Admins do a lot more than set permissions on files. We help users understand complex aspects of the technology they use. We keep the systems maintained, patched, backed-up, and running smoothly. We chase down odd software and network problems that defy the complexity of neurosurgery. We keep the users from stomping over each other in their never-ending quest for disk space. We upgrade hardware and software to keep with the pace of user demands. We keep the baristas at Starbucks employed.
In short, as long as there are people who have time to either work or play with computers, but not both, there will be jobs for sysadmins.
Er, you do realize that cloudy, gray days provide this great, diffused light, which is perfect for a variety of subjects, whereas bright-and-sunnry days give very contrasty shadows which are very difficult to work with, even for professionals?
Wait, in what world does 30 / 12 * 0.70 equal 3600? I make twice what he does and I pull home $3600; his take-home is closer to $2000. He is likely living beyond his means as far as rent goes, although I don't know the area, and $300 a month for bills is about right, when you factor in car insurance (and that's on a cheap car). I'd say he doesn't have a car payment, or cable TV, or anthing along those lines, either.
Fact is, life is expensive, and at $30K a year in any major metro in the US, you're not going to have much spare cash living on your own.
Why do I have a feeling that the Secret Service would frown on any company who sells games to schoolkids that teaches them to shoot leading American political figures?
Why do I also have a feeling that the most of the rest of the world would pitch in for said company's legal defense fund? *grin*
History does have predictive value; at least, the real thing tends to. Take Napoleon and Hitler; had Hitler paid any attention to Napoleon's attempt to conquer Russia, he probably wouldn't have tried to do the same thing in the exact same fashion a second time around (with equally bad results) -- some people, such as myself, are quite happy that he screwed up so badly.
Stalin, on the other hand, did pay attention to history; he couldn't get rid of the Greek Orthodox Church (he wanted a totally atheistic state), so he just made them a part of the political structure (thank you, Henry VIII), and then by controlling the church, controlled all the people who wanted to listen to the Church over the State (Stalin).
All of our methods of any sort of prediction do, in fact, rely on history; even science does. The whole concept that the universe tends to behave the same way throughout space and time (homoegenity of space and time) is one of the cornerstones of physics.
The problem lies in revisionist history. Try to use that as a baseline for any sort of prediction, and you'll get garbage, because you put garbage into the front of the equation.
Wow, you certainly haven't kept up with the times. First off, insulting the guys at GPG because they want fair use of THEIR work isn't much of a point; after all, it's not like Microsoft lets anybody in the world use their code under any terms. Second, GPG does provide a highly secure way of encrypting email and documents which is compatible, by and large, with traditional PGP. It's a good system.
Linux has supported encrypted filesystems for some time now; I've been using them for about a year. You can even encrypt your swapspace if you like.
Both MySQL and PostgreSQL can support encryption; it takes extra work, but so does any secure system.
Linux doesn't yet support encrypted binaries, true, but this is probably due to an overall lack-of-need rather than a lack-of-capability; Windows needs signed binaries because it tends to let anybody run software on a system, thanks to security holes. But then again, the source is there, so if you don't like the situation, write a patch. Or pay someone to write a patch. I'll wager that it'd be cheaper than a SQL server license.
Linux does support encrypted authentication; ever heard of 'Kerberos'? It's the same system that Windows 2000 started using a few years back, and Unix has had it for decades. IPsec on linux is a bit of a pain to set up with FreeS/WAN, yes, but 2.6 uses Kame, which is easier, and the Linux implementations have much better debugging features.
Linux does have its faults, don't get me wrong; the FS encryption could be better, and I wouldn't mind seeing encrypted binaries myself. But it's still far better than anything Microsoft has to offer.
I look at as a simple cost-benefits equation. Does the cost of my time fixing my friends' computer problem equate to a net personal benefit to me (in terms of good will, feel-goodness, etc)? Would adding money change the picture?
There are some people I'll help out with computer issues without charging them; these are the friends that know what I do for a living, yet rarely ask me for a favor. The friends that just assume I'll fix things for free and ask for stuff all the time get the standard thirty-bucks-an-hour line.
Personally, I think I'm better off with friends that actually like me enough to not try taking advantage of me.
I'm also nominally more willing to help those learning Linux, partially because I know the system better, and also because it's one of the ways I can give back to the community.
Don't blame the market; blame the idiot shareholders, who actively work against corporate boards looking long-term. American investors have a very short-term attitude towards profits, and react very negatively towards companies that are willing to sacrifice tomorrow's profits for even greater profits throughout all of next year.
We see that free free free does not work unless there is some viable way to make money money money.
Right, so car dealerships should charge people for those hot dogs they give out on Sunday, and all those grocery stores that draw business using freebie promotions should stop, because it doesn't work.
Except it does. When your business model revolves around nothing but giving away crap, then yes, you are screwed. When you use free crap to leverage non-free crap (coffee and sandwiches), then you have what we know as an 'advertising expense'. $200 a month for a WiFi hotspot near a business park or university could easily earn ten times that back in increased customer flow.
People with laptops have spare change, usually, and are not likely to sit at a cafe for four hours and *not* purchase a few cups of coffee.
Honestly, because good local cafe hold their own just fine against Starbucks -- I live in downtown Sacramento (California), which is not exactly a cultural hotspot, and every cafe, indepenent or Seattle-borne, is filled pretty much every night of the week. In fact, the non-Starbucks do much better than the Starbucks do -- I can usually find a table at Starbucks on Tuesday night, whereas at Naked Coffee, it's almost standing-room-only, and Naked has more tables to boot.
In addition, Starbucks doesn't act like a Big Evil Corporation -- they don't try to undercut their competitors when they first move in, they pay their workers above minimum wage and give health benefits at 20+ hours a week (along with a free pound of coffee per week), and generally do a good job about letting the employees give each store a unique personality (compared to, say, McDonalds).
In fact, although I don't work there at the moment, I'm considering a Starbucks job when I go back to school full-time; it's a big pay cut from what I make now, but there aren't many part-time Linux/Solaris/BSD administration jobs out there.:(
Cowboy Bebob is fantastic. Don't even think of watching it if you're learning Japanese at the same time. I started learning Japanese before I discovered Anime (how ironic), and now I have to make an effort not to talk like Ed...
On the other hand, most of the nihon no onna think that my speech style is totemo kakkoi. *grin*
It's not that simple. Most people grossly overestimate XXX and underestimate YYY. Look at a business that decided to 'upgrade' to WindowsNT ten years ago, rather than keeping their paid-of legacy solution running. I'll wager that the average cost for 'keeping up' with Microsoft, including hardware, labor, and downtime is vastly more than the cost would have been to simply pay for additions and/or enhancements to that legacy system, especially if that 'legacy system' was Open Source.
Ten years from now, the equation will still work the same way. The biggest problem with business IT spending is that hardware and commercial software are viewed as low-cost magic bullets, when in reality they tend to become high-cost administrative nightmares.
You move to a new town and there are only two dentists - one with really good teeth and one with really bad teeth. Which one do you choose to be your dentist?
Oh, come on, this is easy. You choose the one with the bad teeth, because the other one is obviously French.
Slashdot Mirror
Considering that a good plumber in California can make a nice low six-figure salary, it's more doable in the blue collar arena than it is in a technical field. Electricians make more than chemical engineers.
I admin my own machines as well and the primary reason I like OS X over Linux and Windows is the Software Update. I am evaluating migrating my Linux servers running qmail/oracle/tomcat-apache to OS X Server with postfix/sybase/tomcat-apache.
Not to knock OS X, mind you, but check out Debian before you decide to make that kind of a migration -- servers that can run OS X are not cheap. Debian's apt system is second-to-none[1], and the software is top-notch. If you're in the Sacramento area, I can probably even give you a hand.
[1] Apt-RPM does not come close, sorry RedHat.
I'd mod you up had I points, but I don't so I'll try and post an informative response instead.
The 'oldest profession' is actually the shaman, or witch-doctor; prostitutes didn't really come around we stopped wandering around so much, and started staying in one place long enough for commerce and property to become tangible things. The witch doctor, like many sysadmins[1], was often insane, but he helped people to make sense of the world around them, by relating things they couldn't understand to things they could -- he was their interface to the unknown.
Witch-doctors explained disease, thunder, life, death, although they never got the hang of taxes. They were often wrong, not having the tools of science, but their explanations were at least sometimes useful, oftentimes imparted sage advise, and almost always provided comfort to those who sought him for counsel.
As the world has progressed, so has the witch-doctor; in time, they became 'natural philosophers' and scientists. Today, we call them engineers, doctors, teachers, chemists, and programmers; they are the people that help all of the other people manipulate and comprehend the world.
They're also called 'sysadmins'; and I'm happy to consider myself a member. *shakes whale-bone and begins chanting*
[1] Yes, I am one.
You have obviously never been a system administrator. Allow me to introduce you to my friend, Clue-by-Four.
*whack*
The problem with things that are 'user-managed' is that it follows the classic path of the tragedy of the commons. Users tend to look at the systems and networks they use as infinite sources of storage, memory, and processing power, and when things break down because of this overuse, they have no way to fix things on their own.
The place I work is a great example of this -- our salespeople have sold a huge account to an overseas client who wants us to run 24x7; of course, they did this without even talking to the systems department. Had they tried to implement without a system administrator, things would have crashed and burned horribly, as prime time for our overseas users meshes nicely with all the nighttime automated tasks our system runs in the background (like backups and such). As is, we are having to almost double our server infrastructure and hire a new admin for our new (large) client; if we didn't, we wouldn't be able to keep them.
Admins do a lot more than set permissions on files. We help users understand complex aspects of the technology they use. We keep the systems maintained, patched, backed-up, and running smoothly. We chase down odd software and network problems that defy the complexity of neurosurgery. We keep the users from stomping over each other in their never-ending quest for disk space. We upgrade hardware and software to keep with the pace of user demands. We keep the baristas at Starbucks employed.
In short, as long as there are people who have time to either work or play with computers, but not both, there will be jobs for sysadmins.
Er, you do realize that cloudy, gray days provide this great, diffused light, which is perfect for a variety of subjects, whereas bright-and-sunnry days give very contrasty shadows which are very difficult to work with, even for professionals?
Wait, in what world does 30 / 12 * 0.70 equal 3600? I make twice what he does and I pull home $3600; his take-home is closer to $2000. He is likely living beyond his means as far as rent goes, although I don't know the area, and $300 a month for bills is about right, when you factor in car insurance (and that's on a cheap car). I'd say he doesn't have a car payment, or cable TV, or anthing along those lines, either.
Fact is, life is expensive, and at $30K a year in any major metro in the US, you're not going to have much spare cash living on your own.
What you probably wanted was something along the lines of:
Nihongo no shiruno wa chouhou desu.
...which would come close to 'Knowledge of Japanese is handy'.
HTH. HAND.
Yes, I know this is off-topic.
Why do I have a feeling that the Secret Service would frown on any company who sells games to schoolkids that teaches them to shoot leading American political figures?
Why do I also have a feeling that the most of the rest of the world would pitch in for said company's legal defense fund? *grin*
History does have predictive value; at least, the real thing tends to. Take Napoleon and Hitler; had Hitler paid any attention to Napoleon's attempt to conquer Russia, he probably wouldn't have tried to do the same thing in the exact same fashion a second time around (with equally bad results) -- some people, such as myself, are quite happy that he screwed up so badly.
Stalin, on the other hand, did pay attention to history; he couldn't get rid of the Greek Orthodox Church (he wanted a totally atheistic state), so he just made them a part of the political structure (thank you, Henry VIII), and then by controlling the church, controlled all the people who wanted to listen to the Church over the State (Stalin).
All of our methods of any sort of prediction do, in fact, rely on history; even science does. The whole concept that the universe tends to behave the same way throughout space and time (homoegenity of space and time) is one of the cornerstones of physics.
The problem lies in revisionist history. Try to use that as a baseline for any sort of prediction, and you'll get garbage, because you put garbage into the front of the equation.
Next execute all mass murderers.
Now that's a nice self-referencing loop.
How much is a human life worth?
Well, I know that one of those and three-fifty will get you a Starbucks Latte.
I haven't any I haven't I haven't noticed haven't noticed noticed haven't noticed I haven't noticed any problems.
/.?
Hey, Max Headroom, when did you start posting on
Wow, you certainly haven't kept up with the times. First off, insulting the guys at GPG because they want fair use of THEIR work isn't much of a point; after all, it's not like Microsoft lets anybody in the world use their code under any terms. Second, GPG does provide a highly secure way of encrypting email and documents which is compatible, by and large, with traditional PGP. It's a good system.
Linux has supported encrypted filesystems for some time now; I've been using them for about a year. You can even encrypt your swapspace if you like.
Both MySQL and PostgreSQL can support encryption; it takes extra work, but so does any secure system.
Linux doesn't yet support encrypted binaries, true, but this is probably due to an overall lack-of-need rather than a lack-of-capability; Windows needs signed binaries because it tends to let anybody run software on a system, thanks to security holes. But then again, the source is there, so if you don't like the situation, write a patch. Or pay someone to write a patch. I'll wager that it'd be cheaper than a SQL server license.
Linux does support encrypted authentication; ever heard of 'Kerberos'? It's the same system that Windows 2000 started using a few years back, and Unix has had it for decades. IPsec on linux is a bit of a pain to set up with FreeS/WAN, yes, but 2.6 uses Kame, which is easier, and the Linux implementations have much better debugging features.
Linux does have its faults, don't get me wrong; the FS encryption could be better, and I wouldn't mind seeing encrypted binaries myself. But it's still far better than anything Microsoft has to offer.
Linux
I look at as a simple cost-benefits equation. Does the cost of my time fixing my friends' computer problem equate to a net personal benefit to me (in terms of good will, feel-goodness, etc)? Would adding money change the picture?
There are some people I'll help out with computer issues without charging them; these are the friends that know what I do for a living, yet rarely ask me for a favor. The friends that just assume I'll fix things for free and ask for stuff all the time get the standard thirty-bucks-an-hour line.
Personally, I think I'm better off with friends that actually like me enough to not try taking advantage of me.
I'm also nominally more willing to help those learning Linux, partially because I know the system better, and also because it's one of the ways I can give back to the community.
Don't blame the market; blame the idiot shareholders, who actively work against corporate boards looking long-term. American investors have a very short-term attitude towards profits, and react very negatively towards companies that are willing to sacrifice tomorrow's profits for even greater profits throughout all of next year.
Ah, didn't see that tidbit; my apologies.
We see that free free free does not work unless there is some viable way to make money money money.
Right, so car dealerships should charge people for those hot dogs they give out on Sunday, and all those grocery stores that draw business using freebie promotions should stop, because it doesn't work.
Except it does. When your business model revolves around nothing but giving away crap, then yes, you are screwed. When you use free crap to leverage non-free crap (coffee and sandwiches), then you have what we know as an 'advertising expense'. $200 a month for a WiFi hotspot near a business park or university could easily earn ten times that back in increased customer flow.
People with laptops have spare change, usually, and are not likely to sit at a cafe for four hours and *not* purchase a few cups of coffee.
Honestly, because good local cafe hold their own just fine against Starbucks -- I live in downtown Sacramento (California), which is not exactly a cultural hotspot, and every cafe, indepenent or Seattle-borne, is filled pretty much every night of the week. In fact, the non-Starbucks do much better than the Starbucks do -- I can usually find a table at Starbucks on Tuesday night, whereas at Naked Coffee, it's almost standing-room-only, and Naked has more tables to boot.
:(
In addition, Starbucks doesn't act like a Big Evil Corporation -- they don't try to undercut their competitors when they first move in, they pay their workers above minimum wage and give health benefits at 20+ hours a week (along with a free pound of coffee per week), and generally do a good job about letting the employees give each store a unique personality (compared to, say, McDonalds).
In fact, although I don't work there at the moment, I'm considering a Starbucks job when I go back to school full-time; it's a big pay cut from what I make now, but there aren't many part-time Linux/Solaris/BSD administration jobs out there.
I'm almost willing to wager you drive a Miata. *grin*
Actually, I think he's saying that he doesn't want to see the U.S. land on Mars first...
Err, yeah, who here has 200 close friends?
Agent Smith, duh!
Cowboy Bebob is fantastic. Don't even think of watching it if you're learning Japanese at the same time. I started learning Japanese before I discovered Anime (how ironic), and now I have to make an effort not to talk like Ed...
On the other hand, most of the nihon no onna think that my speech style is totemo kakkoi. *grin*
I had a tin can phone when I was a kid using the latest in string technology. The range and clarity still beat my cell phone today.
Another satisfied Sprint customer, I see.
It's not that simple. Most people grossly overestimate XXX and underestimate YYY. Look at a business that decided to 'upgrade' to WindowsNT ten years ago, rather than keeping their paid-of legacy solution running. I'll wager that the average cost for 'keeping up' with Microsoft, including hardware, labor, and downtime is vastly more than the cost would have been to simply pay for additions and/or enhancements to that legacy system, especially if that 'legacy system' was Open Source.
Ten years from now, the equation will still work the same way. The biggest problem with business IT spending is that hardware and commercial software are viewed as low-cost magic bullets, when in reality they tend to become high-cost administrative nightmares.
You move to a new town and there are only two dentists - one with really good teeth and one with really bad teeth. Which one do you choose to be your dentist?
Oh, come on, this is easy. You choose the one with the bad teeth, because the other one is obviously French.