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In this memo:
01. President's Corner: Transitions
02. Taglines
03. Job Openings
04. LOPSA Discount Code for LISA and 10th Anniversary Celebration
05. Looking for LISA'15 Help
06. Cascadia IT Conference
07. LOPSA-East
08. Chapter News
09. Thank you to our sponsors!
10. Comments or suggestions?
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01. Thoughts from our President
In the last year both my Dad and my Mom have passed away. This marks a
major transition for my myself that has left a big gap in my life. I cannot
ask my parents for their wisdom and my family's central gathering place
does not exist any more. This transition has not been easy, there is a
sense of loss with them gone, and we do not know what the future holds for
us. I mention this because the System Administration profession and LOPSA
are also undergoing major transitions.
System Administration is changing from an profession of hand crafted
machines, systems, and services to one where the focus is on writing code
to create the machines, systems, and services. Where we used to learn our
craft from more senior system admins, reading books, exploring existing
systems, and trial and error; we can now learn by reading code that sets up
a machine, system or service. Instead of working with physical hardware
many of us are transitioning to work with virtual hardware while a few of
us work at the level of the hypervisor. In the world we are moving toward,
we write code that isr repeatable, hopefully maintainable, and ideally
shareable with other system admins and organizations.
Like in my personal life, this transition will not be easy. This transition
is both exciting and scary for many system admins as we do not know what he
profession will be like in the future - just that it will be very
different. Many of us will have a very difficult time changing from hand
crafting systems to writing to code to create systems. These people may
feel a sense of loss as the profession seems to be passing them by. Others
will wonder why a person would ever create a system by hand.
Where does LOPSA fit into this transition? LOPSA can help a lot with
continuing education and training of system admins to help them through
this transition. LOPSA can do this via conferences, webinars, mentorship,
local meetings and members helping each other on IRC and mail lists. We can
be sensitive to people who are having a more difficult time with the
transition and help them
along. Members who have made the transition to coding systems can offer
their expertise by giving talks, tutorials, or mentoring which will help
the profession as a whole.
02. Taglines
Over the years LOPSA has searched for a tagline that describes LOPSA
without much success. I think this is because system admins do so many
different things that just one tagline will not work. So this time we are
looking for a small set of taglines that wecan put on new tshirts. Some
ideas are:
"Makes things work"
"We makes systems work"
"Professionals making systems work"
"When IT needs to be done right"
Please email your ideas to board@lopsa.org. Once we get a set of taglines,
you can vote on them and we will make up new shirts with
the most popular ones.
03. Job Openings
These are a few of the recent postings to our sajobs mail list...
Splunk/Linux Engineer - New York City, NY
Research Engineer in High Performance Computing - Milwaukee, WI
DevOps Engineer - Bothell, WA
For details on these jobs please check out the jobs list archives at:
https://lists.lopsa.org/pipermail/sajobs/
04. LOPSA Discount Code for LISA and 10th Anniversary Celebration
Summer is winding down and we are moving into Fall which means it is time
to make your plans to attend the premier system administration conference.
Yes the LISA'15 website is live at https://www.usenix.org/conference/lisa15 and as a member of LOPSA you get a $45 discount to attend. Please login
to https://lopsa.org and then go to https://lopsa.org/Member-Discounts
to see the discount code (please do not share with one else). LOPSA
will be holding its Annual Meeting at LOPSA and celebrating our 10th
Anniversary.
Looking forward to seeing you at LISA'15.
05. Looking for LISA'15 Help
LISA'15 is just around the corner and LOPSA is looking for volunteers to
help before the conference with planning and at the conference with the
table and the After Dark festivities. If you can help, please send an email
to board@lopsa.org.
06. Cascadia IT Conference
The Seattle Cascadia IT Conference is gearing up for our next conference.
We are looking for volunteers to help with organization, marketing, and
sponsorships. This is an easy and fun way to help the community and pad
your resume. You can be a volunteer for as little as an hour a month or as
much as a few hours a week. Would you like to know more? Contact
casitconf-chairs@casitconf.org
07. LOPSA-East '16
LOPSA-East '16 is coming up. As we are an entirely volunteer-organized
event, we could use your help! We are looking for volunteers
[5] http://lopsaeast.org/2016/lopsa-east-16-volunteer-interest/ who can
assist our teams in the areas of registration, A/V, graphics design, room
monitoring, speaker introductions and more.
If any of these sound interesting to you, and you would like to help make
LOPSA-East '16 our biggest and best year yet please get in touch
http://lopsaeast.org/2016/lopsa-east-16-volunteer-interest/.
LOPSA-East '16 will be held May 6-7, 2016 at the Hyatt Regency, New
Brunswick NJ http://lopsaeast.org/2016/hotel-travel/.
Welcome to the team!
08. Chapter News
SASAG has a new location, meeting regularly at the Stamatatos Lab 2211
Elliot Ave, 1st Floor, Seattle WA. During the August SASAG meeting, LOPSA
Board member and SASAG organizer Ski Kacoroski presented on "How to pick
your next SAN". In September SASAG will hear from Lee Fisher, local infosec
expert on "Defending Intel UEFI systems from firmware attackers"
09. Thank you to our sponsors!
We'd like to thank our sponsors. We're deeply grateful for their
continuing support of LOPSA. For more information on how to become a
sponsor visit Become a Sponsor
Thanks to our individual sponsors:
Platinum: Jennine Townsend, Dan Rich, Ski Kacoroski
Gold: Steve VanDevender
Silver: Matt Disney, Lee Damon, Scott Murphy, Ian Viemeister
Bronze: Gary Studwell
Sponsor: John Boris
Bronze Sponsor O'Reilly Media spreads the knowledge of innovators
through its books, online services, magazines, and conferences. Since
1978, O'Reilly Media has been a chronicler and catalyst of cutting-edge
development, homing in on the technology trends that really matter and
spurring their adoption by amplifying "faint signals" from the alpha
geeks who are creating the future. An active participant in the
technology community, the company has a long history of advocacy,
meme-making, and evangelism. Check them out at http://www.oreilly.com/
LOPSA's website is hosted by ServerBeach, check them out at
http://www.serverbeach.com/.
10. Comments or suggestions?
As we close out this month's LOPSAgram, we want to make sure we're
giving you the information you want or need. If you have any comments or
suggestions, please feel free to send them to communications@lopsa.org
