| location: |
| Cupertino, CA |
| site: |
| Apple |
| site overview: |
| Apple Online Store. Need I say more? :) |
| job title: |
| Systems Engineer |
| time at this job: |
| About 3 weks :) |
| | |
| years as a sysadmin: |
| About 18 years |
| first computer: |
First used: Apple IIe
First owned: IBM PC/XT
|
| first OS: |
| DOS (for the Apple IIe) |
| favorite OS: |
| SunOS (Solaris isn't an OS! SunOS is the underlying OS
of Solaris)
|
| first computer with root/administrator access: |
|
Oh God. It was a box running UNIX Version 7. This was back in
Jr. High. I don't remember the type of box any more unfortunately. It
was great though. The box had a 5 meg platter. :D
|
| first programming language: |
| BASIC |
| favorite programming language: |
|
Hrm. Toss up between Perl, C and Shell (Bourne/Korn). I know
there are people who don't see Shell as being a programming language
however it most definately can be. I've written very complex app
frameworks in shell when I'm not guaranteed some other form of
interpretive language such as Perl. You aren't always guaranteed Perl
or a C compiler on a box but I can nearly guarantee you that there's
an instance of Bourne Shell somewhere. Of course this is assuming the
box in question is some variant or based on UNIX. :P
|
| most often used programming language: |
| Perl and Shell |
| first sysadmin job, computer and os: |
|
First SysAdmin job I was actually paid for (as an SA) was for
VoiceNet an ISP in the Philadelphia area. I ran several Sparc 2
running SunOS 4.1.3 and 4.1.4
|
| ideal sysadmin job: |
|
Any job where I'm challenged each day really. I get bored easily.
|
| favorite sysadmin tool: |
|
My Brain. You can have all the tools in the world but if
you're unable to process the information the data is useless.
safari.oreilly.com comes close though. I find being able to quickly
search through a list of online books to be highly helpful when I'm
dealing with something completely new.
|
| most interesting sysadmin tool: |
|
See above under favorite sysadmin tool. :P
|
| sysadmin tool I couldn't work without: |
| Yup... brain... heh |
| education: |
|
Background in Computer Science and Physics, however I never
completed my degree.
|
| when I was growing up, I wanted to be: |
| A physician. Then I realized I was better at this computer
stuff and had more fun at it.
|
| If I wasn't a sysadmin, I'd be: |
| I've seriously contemplated going to culinary school. I love cooking |
| when friends and family ask me to
“fix” the computer or
“fix the internet”, I say: |
| “Uhh. What do you mean. That's like me going to you and
telling you to `fix the car'. Can you be more specific? What are you
trying to do?” |
| when I first meet someone,
and they ask what I do, I say: |
I'm a Systems Engineer.
I don't use “Systems Administrator” too often these days. I've
gotten mistaken for being “an over-glorified secretary”. It was quite
humorous the first time it happened... then became quite annoying as
it continued to happen.
|
| system administration is ...: |
|
Architecture, creation and maintenance of computers and
computer systems from a hardware and software perspective.
|
| advice to a junior admin: |
|
This isn't hard. This is about experience really. Get out and
be willing to do different things. You're going to screw up at some
point. Everyone does. Learn from your mistakes.
|
| advice to a senior admin: |
|
Be gentle to the junior admins. Be especially nice to your
NOC/SOC/Monitoring group. You may hate them sometimes for waking you
up 18 times in a 3 hour period in the middle of the night... but
imagine how the hell would be worse without them. They're there to
help you. If they aren't doing something correctly teach them the
correct way don't just yell at them to “fix it”. Don't you hate it
when someone tells you to just “fix it”?
|
| | |
| favorite food/cuisine: |
|
Everything... though Korean and Southern foods are comfort
foods for me. (Hey! I'm Korean and I grew up in Texas, so sue me :P)
|
| pizza topping: |
| pepperoni and extra cheese |
| work music: |
|
Depends on my mood. I'm a child of the 80s so 80s music is
good all around but if I'm coding I'll typically listen to something
loud and hard or rap so I can drown out all other noise and
concentrate on what I'm doing but it really does depend on my mood.
I've been known to listen to the same 5 songs over and over again for
days. I use headphones now. :P
|
| crisis music: |
|
See above under “work music”.
|
| ___ gets me through the work day: |
|
Caffeine. Used to be caffeine and nicotine but I quit smoking
when my husband proposed. :)
|
| hobby/other job: |
|
Ooookay. Long list. I'm still into pen & paper RPGs and
various board/card games. I'm a cyclist -- in fact I typically ride
(yes a bicycle) to work and though I utilize the work shuttle in the
morning I normally ride all the way home -- about 15 miles daily. I'm
an Extra classed Amateur Radio Operator (Ham). I shoot firearms. I'm
an archer. I'm getting involved in airsoft and used to be involved in
paintball. I've done martial arts since I was young (about 6 or 7) and
have done Tae Kwon Do, Hapkido, Aikido, and Kodenkan Jujitsu though
I'm not really practicing now. I play tennis. I play various video
games. I race cars (Rally) with my husband. I volunteer as a member of
the ERT (Emergency Response Team). I'm a voracious and avid reader
(Fantasy, Mystery, Suspense and SciFi primarily). I'm also an avid old
time renaissance faire-goer.
|
| | |
| my office is: |
| Cluttered. It's only been 3 weeks and my office
is... cluttered.
|
| co-workers say my desk is: |
| You can *see* my desk? *looks around for it* |
| learned the most from: |
|
My peers. No one knows everything it's not possible. Thus you
should always be learning. A day where you learned something (even if
its trivial) is a day not wasted.
|
| wish list: |
|
I'm lusting over a MacBook Pro. :P
|
| daily web sites: |
|
There are several others that I check every few days.
|
| Is the Sarbannes-Oxley Act (“SOX”)
good for system administration? |
|
I haven't really been affected by it so I don't have any real
feelings one way or another.
|
| editor: |
|
ed is the One True Editor(tm). vi is its bastard child. I'm in
vi most of the time. :P
|
| mail user agent: |
| mutt. Though at work I use Mac OS X's Mail.
|
| web browser: |
| Firefox 99% of the time. |
| gui or cli: |
|
CLI. Have you tried to use a gui over a 1200 bps link over a
POTS line? I have.. it's not pretty.
|
| computers at home: |
|
Total? Uhm. I think around 18. Now actually on? If
you count the fileservers and print servers then 7.
|
| (primary) home computer and OS: |
|
I have two. An HP something or other running WinXP and FreeBSD
under VMWare and a G4 PowerBook. I bought the HP about 3 years ago so
it's getting old. I wanted a notebook with a 3D accelerator and at the
time it was one of the few without making me go broke.
|
| oldest hardware in your garage or basement: |
|
Uhhh. When was the Sparc 1+ released? Though the Atari
Portfolio might be older. I've got some SCSI peripherals lying about
which are probably even older than that...
|
| anything else? |
|
Well, I know I mentioned my husband Neil. For those of you who
are on EFNet's IRC network he used to go by the nick of Yoda or _Yoda_
and was in #unix there. He has two daughters so I'm a step-mom of two
now. We've been together for around 7 or so years at this point but
married for a little over a year.
Before this position at Apple I was at a copy called Netli.
Before that I was consulting at Apple. However, before any of the
Apple positions I was part of Hotmail's back-end operations group for
5 years. Yup, I did UNIX for Microsoft. That was quite a bit of fun
actually. :)
I've worked for or with various other companies in silicon
valley. I had a stint at Sun doing Kernel Panic Analysis and at SGI as
part of their support arm of engineering (called GTS at the time).
I've been acting MIS Director at Global Village (the Mac modem guys)
and have worked for various consulting groups such as Taos and Mind
Source. My SA career has been long, varied and interesting. :)
|
delicious
digg
technorati