Top 10 System Administrator Truths 561
Vo0k writes "What are your top ten system administrator truths? We all know them already, but it's still fun re-telling them. Stuff like "90% of all hardware-related problems come from loose connectors", even though you already know it's true, may save you from replacing the "faulty" motherboard if you recall it at the right time."
95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Power cables don't really "go" bad. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Application > Presentation > Session > Transport > Network > Data Link > Physical. This order is actually from layer 7 to 1.
If you had followed the OSI model, you would've found out that the *first* thing to do would be to check the physical connection (aka power cord) and found your problem right away.
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:4, Funny)
Indeed. Most of the problems here are "Layer 8" (the user)...
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Funny)
Layer 9 - Politics ("The boss wants it, even if it's stupid.)
Both of which are more important than the other 7 layers.
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:3, Informative)
Symantec fixes hardware now, too? Man, and I thought their software was bloated when it just protected against viruses...
Power cord story (Score:3, Interesting)
I went through three power supplies before I discovered the fact that I actually had a power cable that was going bad.
I used to work for a company that developed a very highly customized package for our customers, put it on the *NIX of their choice, and installed it in their data centers. Although based in the US, one customer, whose site I was working on, was in Basingstoke, England.
The client was (and probably still is) a hard-core Big Blue shop, so the *NIX of choice was AIX, running on a two-piec
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Funny)
-- BOFH
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Funny)
dude this maybe funny to you, but me and a dell technician spent 38 hours trouble shooting a poweredge scsi assemble. and I swear if voodoo was an option I would have tried it.
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Funny)
I've found for SCSI-2, you want to move the knife in a downwards manner.
And by the time you're working on low-voltage differential SCSI-3, you want to make a left-to-right transverse cut. The second yellow candle is crucial in this case.
Another one (Score:5, Informative)
Seriously, the "90% of all hardware-related problems come from loose connectors" bit is found nowhere in the article or on google for that matter...
Re:Another one (Score:3, Funny)
Not long after starting my first real tech job, I got called into my boss' office to help him when he complained that he didn't have network connectivity to his computer. (Note: the boss was the director of an organization which later supplied internet access to about 100k people).
I walked into his office, and looked at the laptop. Back then (1997 or so), the ethernet came via a PCMCIA card. They were Xircom combo-cards, which I remember mostly for being bright red. I think that's
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Doing some GUI consultant work and writing a few users manuals for some pretty complex software has taught me one thing: Most user error is the fault of crappy software. A good setup (hardware or software) should be easy to use given the users.
Now, obviously it is all about knowing the audience. If you are writing an application for use by other software engineers versus people living in an assisted living home, well, that makes a difference, and you certainly can't cater to all people (for example the guy who writes code for a living but can't setup his own email at home).
The bottom line is, as much as it displeases us, not everyone is a geek. Not everyone cares about the latest firmware for their router, the latest patch for Call of Duty 2, or how to make a projection TV from an old overhead projector and a laptop from eBay. Our job, as geeks, is not to show everyone why they SHOULD care, but rather to make it easy for those who don't care to still do what they need to do.
Just a few minutes ago I got an email forwarded to me from a "stupid" user who couldn't figure out how to perform what to me seems like a simple task in some software my team wrote. We emailed him the directions, even though they were very clearly stated in the manual that I wrote, but I took it one step further. I submitted a feature request in our bug-tracking database to put a message near where what he was trying to do to explain why that option is grayed out.
Anyone can write software or setup hardware that has tons of geek features that we all like, but it takes a lot more effort to make the setup actually usable to the target users.
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Geek aura (Score:5, Interesting)
Seriously, anthropomorphizing machines is a powerful technique. It gives you an approximate but effective mental model of a complex system. "Primitive" cultures are not dumb when they attribute personalities to objects. Our brains are wired to use personality to predict complex behaviour.
My Mother had no technical skills or knowlege - but she treated the automobile like a pet. She was alert to the tiniest change in sound or vibration of the machine, and very often alerted my Dad to problems long before he was aware of anything. One time, driving across country, my Mom said the right front wheel "didn't sound right". We were cruising along at 70, and everything seemed fine. But she insisted, so my Dad pulled over and checked all the tires. No sign of a problem. He pulled the hub cap off the right front wheel - and noticed that the cotter pin had broken! A few more miles and the wheel would have come off. My Dad panicked, since we didn't have any cotter pins in his repair kit. But my Mom dug in her purse and offered a bobby pin. My Dad didn't want to use it, because it was the wrong kind of metal and would break easily. My Mom said she had more, so he put it in. That bobby pin took us another 5000 miles.
My Dad does all his own work on his cars - at least he did until he ruined the valves on his Honda Accord a few years ago. Now he lets a mechanic do some stuff for him. I learned to be in tune with machines from my Mom, and learned to fix them from my Dad. When designing file system software back in the '70s, the rhythmic sounds of the disk access mechanism was my best feedback on its efficiency. Those were the days of 14" disk platters.
Re:Geek aura (Score:5, Funny)
Lots of people in IT find this. Generally, it's because most vaguely complicated electronics is sufficiently sentient to know when it's in the presence of a Higher Power, and that it Must Obey.
Fortunately, they're not that sentient. I have found an extremely good way to maintain system reliability is to place a photo of myself in the server room.
95% of bad GUI design.. (Score:5, Insightful)
I agree, good software should be intuitive, but far better to be proactively engineered to be more intuitive, rather than reactively veneered to feel less unintuitive.
Re:95% of bad GUI design.. (Score:3, Insightful)
In such cases, many times the best thing to do is examine what the overall purposes of the software is supposed to be and start over from scratch, but engineer the new solution
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:3, Insightful)
No, most user error comes from the fact that they are forced to learn a new package almost every year. If you think about an automobile's interface, it is pretty damn unintuitive. But because it has been more or less in the same form for decades, we hairless apes ha
Re:95% of all problems.... (Score:4, Funny)
User: It's working, how did you do that?
Me: I could tell you but your eyes will glaze over...
User: Tell me anyway.
Me: (Detailed techical explaination)... or I'm just magic.
User: Wow, my eyes did glaze over. You must be magic.
In no particular order.... (Score:5, Informative)
---------------
Getting Help
------------
Other People
------------
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Google is your best freind. ever. period.
This goes for admins, programmers, and just about every other profession, especially in IT.
Good managers ask for something in 5 days, but need it in 6.
Such a basic thing, but so so important. I always try to pad estimates for our department, but I should be sure to pad my requirements for my staff as well.
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyway, for the benefit of those who haven't seen this (very old and long, but somewhat entertaining) email that was doing the rounds a while ago... disclaimer: someone else wrote it, and I don't know who.
KNOW YOUR UNIX SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR - A FIELD GUIDE
There are four major species of Unix sysad:
1) The TECHNICAL THUG. Usually a systems programmer who has been forced into system administration; writes scripts in a polyglot of the Bourne shell, sed, C, awk, perl, and APL.
2) The ADMINISTRATIVE FASCIST. Usually a retentive drone (or rarely, a harridan ex-secretary) who has been forced into system administration.
3) The MANIAC. Usually an aging cracker who discovered that neither the Mossad nor Cuba are willing to pay a living wage for computer espionage. Fell into system administration; occasionally approaches major competitors with indesp schemes.
4) The IDIOT. Usually a cretin, morpohodite, or old COBOL programmer selected to be the system administrator by a committee of cretins, morphodites, and old COBOL programmers.
HOW TO IDENTIFY YOUR SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR:
-- SITUATION: Low disk space. --
TECHNICAL THUG: Writes a suite of scripts to monitor disk usage, maintain a database of historic disk usage, predict future disk usage via least squares regression analysis, identify users who are more than a standard deviation over the mean, and send mail to the offending parties. Places script in cron. Disk usage does not change, since disk-hogs, by nature, either ignore script-generated mail, or file it away in triplicate.
ADMINISTRATIVE FASCIST: Puts disk usage policy in motd. Uses disk quotas. Allows no exceptions, thus crippling development work. Locks accounts that go over quota.
MANIAC:
# cd
# rm -rf `du -s * | sort -rn | head -1 | awk '{print $2}'`;
IDIOT:
# cd
# cat `du -s * | sort -rn | head -1 | awk '{ printf "%s/*\n", $2}'` | compress
-- SITUATION: Excessive CPU usage. --
TECHNICAL THUG: Writes a suite of scripts to monitor processes, maintain a database of CPU usage, identify processes more than a standard deviation over the norm, and renice offending processes. Places script in cron. Ends up renicing the production database into oblivion, bringing operations to a grinding halt, much to the delight of the xtrek freaks.
ADMINISTRATIVE FASCIST: Puts CPU usage policy in motd. Uses CPU quotas. Locks accounts that go over quota. Allows no exceptions, thus crippling development work, much to the delight of the xtrek freaks.
MANIAC:
# kill -9 `ps -augxww | sort -rn +8 -9 | head -1 | awk '{print $2}'`
IDIOT:
# compress -f `ps -augxww | sort -rn +8 -9 | head -1 | awk '{print $2}'`
-- SITUATION: New account creation. --
TECHNICAL THUG: Writes perl script that creates home directory, copies in incomprehensible default environment, and places entries in
ADMINISTRATIVE FASCIST: Puts new account policy in motd. Since people without accounts cannot read the motd, nobody ever fulfills the bureaucratic requirements; and so, no new accounts are ever created.
MANIAC: "If you're too stupid to break in and create your own account, I don't want you on the system. We've got too many goddamn sh*t-for-brains a**holes on this box anyway."
IDIOT:
# cd
# echo "Bob Simon:gandalf:0:0::/dev/tty:compress -f" >
-- SITUATION: Root disk fails. --
TECHNICAL THUG: Rep
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:4, Funny)
Is it wrong that I was reading through that and taking mental notes on proper Unix usage for future reference?
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:5, Interesting)
1. Adobe products and antivirus cause the most software problems, but you cannot live without either.
2. Most computer hardware problems are the result of sticky rolls, janitors cleaning, computers being accidently kicked, or power failures. In that order.
3. When calling HP or Dell about anything other than servers, you will get bad tech support.
4. Three year warranties on individual PCs do not matter. On a system with dozens of computers, they pay for themselves.
5. There will always be a lower price. Get over it.
6. Phones cannot fail. Five nines of reliability is not good enough.
7. Documented organization of the network and supplies will save you more time than the knowledge a thousand certifications brings (which isn't that much anyways).
8. Researching and backing up information before beginning a project is the sign of a professional. So is spelling.
9. Soft operating expenses are always more expensive than hard operating expenses.
10. When working on a project, document everything. It is almost never needed, but if your coworkers know you have it, they will not try to screw you.
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:5, Insightful)
"Rebooting Solves 90% of Windows problems"
Nope. Rebooting only clears 90% of symptoms, it doesn't necessarily make the problems go away. For example, if you have a webserver that's got a memory leak and that leak takes 72 hours to fill RAM to the point that the system becomes unusable, rebooting clears the symptom (unusable system) but doesn't resolve the problem (bug in the webserver). Too many people think that the reboot fixes the problem, so they don't ever bother finding out what the real problem is.
Have a Knoppix (or other) LiveCD nearby (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:4, Insightful)
No, that's a bad project manager... or possibly a bad salesperson.
Good project managers are the other way around: If they hear "5 days" from the developer, they promise it to the customer in 6. This allows a little time for QA testing if the developer gets it done within his 5 days... and allows for a small buffer if the developer doesn't get it done on time.
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Well that is usually a half truth. Usually when you reboot a Unix system you do it for the following reasons.
1. You screwed up and have no alternative Interface to get in.
2. Your system has been on so long that you want to reboot it to see what whent down without it telling you.
3. You need to had hardware and it isn't hot swapable.
4. The disadvantage of downtime out waighs the time it will take to fix it without rebooting.
5. You lost power for an extended period of time.
6. Management tells you so.
7. Upgrading the OS to a level all services need to be restated.
8. There are many unknown processes and you want to be sure you are not stopping an important job.
9. Other...
But normally because the drives have been spinning for years. Having it Stop and then start again. Put strain on them and causes them to die. Or if the system has enough memory the drive may have died years ago but all the data is paged.
Re:In no particular order.... (Score:5, Funny)
Back in the mid 80s a co-worker of mine had told his boss at a previous job that the unix machines needed to rebooted when the PIDs got too high! Great bit of fun at the PHB expense. (This is also the guy who submitted an purchase request for some close parenthesis... got it signed also!)
Diabetic Shock in 3, 2, 1... (Score:5, Funny)
Great. Glad you feel that way. Now, before we all hug, skip, and fling daisies, you need to remember ONE thing:
THERE ARE NO FEELINGS IN IT. EVER.
Feelings are reserved for secretaries named Gladys who come crying to you when they accidently delete all the pictures of their grand kids.
"This article is very comforting."
You better sack the hell up if you are going to make it in the IT world.
Re:Diabetic Shock in 3, 2, 1... (Score:5, Interesting)
Do not befriend the users. Do not tell them what is actually going wrong. Never accept blame. Do not rush to complete requests.
Here are the reasons why:
If you befriend them, they will cease to be able to do the simplest thing without your help. This is fine if they're hot, but not if they're not.
If you tell them what is actually wrong, they will get it more wrong when they report it up the line, and you will be blamed for something. Instead tell the users something hugely general that will fit into that comfortable place in their minds.
If you accept blame, users will view this as a sign of weakness, and assign blame the next time, without waiting for you to volunteer.
If you rush to complete non-critical, non-it projects, users will use this as a performace benchmark, and you'll be forced to complete all of their projects first to avoid the appearance of slacking off, in the course of this you will have to ignore critical maintenance that can get you in real trouble later.
Never.... (Score:5, Funny)
Truth... (Score:5, Interesting)
Simple (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Simple (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Simple (Score:4, Insightful)
We had a problem, SQL was performing poorly a typical query on the machine that took 50 minutes was taking 2.5 hours and was sometimes failing. We instantly started looking at data and possible database corruption, the VP of Operations came down and started "directing us" we politely ignored and continued down our path. He then ordered us to rip the heart out of the SQL server, Remove 4 processors, remove 8 gig of ram, downgrade from Enterprise to standard and only 2 processors. over and over he kepts telling to do things that were insane because he usedto be a Ops manager in the company and knew what he was talking about.
4 days later and about 80 hours of wasted overtime we carefully rebuilt the server BACK to a last known good from a backup before the mess and then discoverd that Oh! there was a DATABASE DATA PROBLEM!
If someone start on a wild chase changing things wildly, I do not care who they are, tell them to piss off and please stand behind the glass, Or better yet, do that nicely by getting everyone inclusing the vendor to agree that what they want to do is not the right thing.... Ganging up on them typically works.
So the parent is 1000% correct. Not only is the solution typically simpler than you think but is usually the one that makes the most sense.
if your SQL server suddenly starts acting up after 2 years of good operation, there is almost no chance that ripping it's guts out will help anything.
#10 Reboot should be #1 (Score:5, Funny)
Re:#10 Reboot should be #1 (Score:5, Funny)
#6.5: (Score:5, Funny)
All I got to say is... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:All I got to say is... (Score:5, Funny)
Problem In Chair, Not In Computer :-)
Re:All I got to say is... ID10Ts??? (Score:4, Funny)
Top 3 (Score:5, Interesting)
2) Always ask the dumb questions: is it switched on?
3) Reboot cures most things EXCEPT rm -r * when logged in as root
After that, things could get tricky.
Re:Top 3 (Score:4, Insightful)
Never ask dumb questions like that. It embarrasses the user for no good reason. Find a subtle way of getting them to check the power without forcing them to reveal their mistake. Such as:
They'll still learn the lesson - check the power before calling tech support - but now they won't feel so uncomfortable that you were mocking them with your questions.
Re:Top 3 (Score:3, Insightful)
I also make a point of instinctually typeing WHERE immediately after a DELETE statement in SQL, then using the arrow keys to add the information between the two. Nothing like someone distracting you, and hitting return when your SQL statement says "delete from reallyImpo
Variation of #1 (Score:3, Funny)
PEBKAC (Score:5, Funny)
Most users should not being allowed to operate computers, let alone drive cars. Sysadmins need to learn who these people are and minimize the damage they cause. I suggest randomly changing their password every day until they quit in frustration.
Re:PEBKAC (Score:3, Funny)
"Kill them off?"
"YES!" (He certainly has a fixation) "Then what?"
"Hang up?"
"NO! Then they'll call you back when the problem recurs. Your job is to make them FEAR calling you. How can you work when people are calling? So, you make them pay for calling in the first pla
My own list (Score:5, Interesting)
-Make sure you can leave exactly like it was before you touched it.
-Dont fix what aint broken.
-Start from a known state of the system (switch off - switch on).
-Even you are genius level techie, follow the manual, RTFM.
-Dont reinvent the wheel. Compare with something thats working.
-Cables are not perfect. If something doesnt connect, check lower levels first.
-If its there, ther must be a reason. Never ever delete anything. Rename instead.
-You memory is not infinite. Write what you do.
From the user's side... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:From the user's side... (Score:3, Interesting)
It would be really interesting to see a study to determine whether changing passwords frequently actually increases or decreases your vulnerability.
We have the three rules. (Score:5, Insightful)
Rule 2. They don't know they are lying.
Rule 3. Sometimes they are telling the truth. Yes sometimes what you think is impossible really is happening or looks like it is happening.
Never make system config changes on Friday (Score:5, Funny)
My 2p (Score:5, Insightful)
Reboots, are you kidding? (Score:3, Interesting)
When I started working at my job, we had serveral servers that would reboot on a cron for the sole reason that someone was too lazy to figure out the problem. We eliminated all but one of these reboots, mainly because we don't care about the last one.
My holy grail would have to be strace/truss/tusk. I would take that tool over reboot any day. It doesn't always fix the problem, but at least you will know what it is, instead of rebooting like a coward.
Not too bad (Score:4, Insightful)
Is this really the case? We had several JetDirect enabled PCs at my former place of work and almost none of them had a card failure. We even had a few extra cards just in case. Several of the printers were actually quite old even. The biggest problem we had was with only HP-5P (I think that is the number). Some users departments did not have the money to replace those crappy old printers. On a bit of an aside, we had several JetDirect "boxes" (the external box that connected the printer port to ethernet) that were working great. I believe most everyone in the IT staff had one at home for their printers.
No One Ever Got Fired For Buying Microsoft.
Not really true. There are some shops so enamored with Novell (mostly because of bosses stuck in the stoneage) that the idea of purchasing Exchange or using a full out ActiveDirectory system with a Windows only network storage share were unheard of. I once again reference my previous job.
Not too bad of a list overall. Most of the items are right, and it is quite true. To be honest, the places I have worked there were really only a handful of problem employees, and most of them got handled directly by our SysAdmin or the head of IT because no wanted to worry about what lie they may come up with about the work we were doing.
Re:Not too bad (Score:5, Funny)
Microsoft has been BOUGHT!?!?
*Runs to Check the stock market*
Re:Not too bad (Score:4, Funny)
SB
Re:Not too bad (Score:5, Funny)
Actually not true. I know the guy, and I fired him myself.
(We are a Linux/OS X shop today.)
Top Ten Sysadmin Truths (Score:5, Funny)
Work smatah. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Work smatah. (Score:5, Funny)
My job requires me to wear a nametag while administering a Windows network.
They won't let me carry a gun. Even though I asked really, really nicely.
Bastards.
4 Rules (Score:5, Interesting)
Rule number 1. People are stupid. This one is true of all people. Tech support, highways, shopping, whatever. This rule has been extended to cover just about any stupid thing that anyone does.
"Why did that guy just..."
"Rule number 1."
"Did she think she could get away with that?"
"Rule number 1."
Rule number 2. People lie.
Me: "Has the computer been restarted since the problem started?"
Them: "Yes..."
Me: "OK. Let's try restarting the computer now and see what happens."
Them: "What do you mean by restart?"
And when you add 1 and 2 together, you get 3. Sometimes, people are so stupid, they don't know that they're lying. You know these people. They're the ones who have "Windows 2000 XP" or "2000 ME." They're the people for whom "Nothing happens when I try to check my email. Nothing! Just this error message..." Not realizing that the error message is *exactly* what I was looking for. An error message is *not* nothing. Grr.
There is a fourth rule that also shows up from time to time:
Rule number 4. No good deed goes unpunished.
In the famous words of the leader of the Uruk Hai from his battle call at Helm's Deep in The Two Towers: "Grr."
Re:4 Rules (Score:5, Insightful)
God, yes.
"Nothing happens when I check my email."
"Do you get an error message when you try it?"
"There was some dialog on the screen, yeah."
"Grr. What did it say?"
"Oh, I didn't read it"
Aaaarrgggh.
Re:4 Rules (Score:4, Funny)
"Which part of 'no such file or directory' didn't you understand?"
My rule (Score:5, Funny)
Re:My rule (Score:5, Funny)
First System Administration Truth (Score:5, Funny)
Don't get linked to by Slashdot!
None of the other nine truths will save your server!
Acronyms (Score:4, Funny)
Set Standards (Score:4, Insightful)
I've worked in two kinds of places, ones where they set (and stick to) standards and ones that don't. Every place that doesn't use or doesn't stick to standards has always been an experience in wasted time, confusion, and lots of bugs. Those that do can seem like you're always being nagged but in the end you find things work as expected, code is far easier to manage (especially when it is someone else's), and you aren't always having to reinvent the wheel (i.e. figuring out how to fix a subtle bug again because the solution was never written down the first time).
It sounds simple but it takes discipline at all levels. Even something as documenting what you did afterwards and putting it in an orderly file system can make a huge difference but how many people bother to do it? Managers and fellow developers have to crack the whip and keep people from trying to cut corners.
Standards should be open to some change and can be bent but there has to be a very good defendable reason for it.
One step at a time fool! (Score:3, Interesting)
Type twice, hit enter once (Score:5, Funny)
Now let me just kill that last background process with the old 'kill %1'
[$researchgroupserver]: kill 1 enter
Crap!
Treat users with respect (Score:5, Insightful)
Disk... (Score:3, Interesting)
I know, those are all corrolaries of Murphy's law, but hey.
You don't know everything (Score:5, Insightful)
Just to PO the "Don't post your list here" folks.. (Score:5, Insightful)
GeekSquad Top Ten? (Score:5, Insightful)
1. It must be this unsupported software: remove Firefox or any F/OSS.
2. It is a virus, your AV is no good, purchase Norton CoverYourAss v9.6 for $49.95.
3. The AV doesn't perform a deep clean by itself, we can run one for $24.95.
4. You need a bigger hard drive, w recommend Norton Ghost to copy it. $199.95 + $49.95.
5. We should install the drive. $24.95 + $8.95 wrist strap.
6. We should run ghost for you, $19.95.
7. You need USB 2.0 ports for your mouse to run faster, $49.95 plus $24.95 installation.
8. Your hard drive cables are old belt style, you needbthe snappy round cables, $29.95 plus $9.95 installation.
9. Your video board is old, the ATI MegaWow XL is only $199.95.
10. You should probably buy one of our Compaq BusinessPro by HP combinations, you burned your TCP/IP converter with static.
I pop open the discarded PC, replace the processor fan and blow out the case. All is fine - $30.
ironic (Score:3, Funny)
Is the monitor plugged in? (Score:3, Interesting)
They always claim there is only one socket the monitor will plug into, and without fail so far there has been an onboard one, which they are using, and one on a card, which is the one they should be using, and have completely missed
MS has permanently brain damaged all IT workers (Score:3, Interesting)
If you believe this or if you need this, you are running a
POS operating system and its probably from Microsoft.
That this would even be considered a rule by a professional IT
worker is all the proof we need that Bill Gates has caused
more damage than he can ever hope to make up for.
What utter crap.
Schmooze the users (Score:5, Insightful)
They started waiting for me to stroll in instead of paging me at night, just to be nice to me.
But the best part was, they thought of me as the guy who keeps the system running, because most of the time that I showed up, the system was running.
My colleagues who only showed up when their systems broke had the reputation "Here comes trouble!"
Taking credit for things going well is essential!
The Truths of Skippy (Score:5, Insightful)
A few for Oracle SysAdmins (Score:3, Insightful)
9) Patching only works 30% of the time
8) Metalink is like a massive "Magic 8 Ball" that pulls responses from the database. Treat it as such.
7) Tars are the same as 8, except you have a customer service rep reading the 8 Ball.
6) If it generates core files it's the DBA's problem.
5) It's ALWAYS the DBA's fault.
4) RMAN is your friend.
3) You know more about Apache than Oracle does.
2) Oracle won't admit this.
1) Autconfig doesn't.
Users are idiots, but (Score:3, Insightful)
Users are idiots. This is a good thing.
We expect them to be computer illiterate, and they rarely disappoint.
If I'm working at a biotech company, I don't want the researchers to be good at computers. If I'm working at an investment firm, I want the users to understand investments, not DLL's.
We're here precisely so that they can be idiots at computers... and experts at whatever it is they do when their computers aren't broken.
The company isn't here so that we have a network to play with.
Learn to praise the users' idiocy, they'll appreciate it.
If the users get frustrated, empathize with their confusion and blame Microsoft. Never fails.
3 from me (Score:3, Interesting)
Label everything (Score:3, Informative)
Proximity of genius effect (Score:4, Funny)
I've personally seen this happen all the time. Someone tells me "this doesn't work" and the moment I type the same command or push in the PCMCIA card myself or whatever, it suddenly works. We dubbed it the Proximity of Genius Effect and is similar to the following koan:
2-9 are generally just variations of #1.
Switch ports can't withstand mechanical load long. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Gunking up the works? (Score:5, Funny)
Spontaneously combust
Trust me -- you do not want to get that call:
Re:Gunking up the works? (Score:4, Funny)
Power failed one Friday evening.
What was found Monday morning is left as an exercise to the reader.
Re:listening skills... (Score:3, Funny)