Not Having Linux Skills is IT Malpractice

People who hire IT staff have no idea about Linux or real IT skills and so don't hire people with Linux and real IT skills.

From my own experience - employer has windows based PC displaying errant behaviour. On site Head of IT (with degree in IT and several MS Certs) has no idea what the problem is - phones off site support staff who want £3000 to bring out a replacement PC, drop it in, take away the other one and sort it out (it was dedicated to CCTV which, I was informed, justified the price). It took me 10 seconds to spot it was dodgy RAM, and a further 2 minutes to fetch a replacement stick and swap it over - result = no more problem. I wasn't even thanked and 3 months later the entire IT Department was made redundant because "it was cheaper and made more sense to use off-site IT Support".

Oh hi Sal, is that really you? It's been a while since we saw you here - what have you been up to? Are you back on Linux again after your sojourn in Apple land?

It's a good job you people aren't running a Hospitality Company because you are one cold, frosty and unfriendly bunch of people.

My apologies Sal. I read the thread just not the author name, so I didn't connect the dots. So let me be the first to say "Hi!", from an Apple iBook ironically :-)

Sal who?

Sal A. Mander

Sorry, Sal. Like Sander, I read the comment without noting the name. Welcome back.

Yes, welcome back Sal!

Personally, I figured you'd been On the Road, and you'd have lots of tales to tell.

Pf, so much for friendly. Drops in, calls us names, then disappears again. I repossess my nice vibes.

Your wut?

She has "nice vibes," she's just picky about who gets them. You know, like Unix.

Such skepticism! OK so it's one nice vibe. A small, meager, stunted nice vibe. But nevertheless it exists.

Quoting:It's a good job you people aren't running a Hospitality Company because you are one cold, frosty and unfriendly bunch of people.

No, just ordinary people, on an Internet forum, who don't really know each other, and unlike those on the Social Sites, aren't bothered with the pretence of friendship.

What do you really expect from a bunch of acquaintances who you've only ever met on line, who know each other even less well than the group of people I used to drink with.

The rudeness is yours, for expecting of people who are barely more than strangers, the welcome of a long lost and dearly loved family member.

Do please get a grip on reality here.

To be honest, I haven't tracked the time you were away Sal. But glad you're back.

Sometimes people on this forum disappear and reappear years later (I remember Paul and Caitlyn, who disappeared for the second time now it seems), though sadly most ones only disappear.

If we ran a hospitality center, at least we might be knowing the face we're dealing with and recognizing it years later, because you can never know who's behind a login-name.

Yet again Carla Shroder is strident, eloquent and over the top.

Learning any operating system is a huge investment of time and effort. Learning two is doubly huge. Personally I'd much rather spend my time learning Linux, and I begrudge every second I've had to spend in a Windows environment. Not everyone sees things that way. A lot of people have traveled a different road. Windows was the first system they came across, so they learned what they could about it, at great cost, and they are reluctant to repeat that experience. I pity them for their misfortune, but I can't say I blame them.

Well, if the first OS they learned was Windows I can somewhat comprehend that people are reluctant to learn another OS. Windows is a PITA to learn. Learning Linux however has been a breeze compared to my Windows experiences.

True story: a sysadmin at some former workplace had to manage some 30 servers. 25 Linux and 5 Windows. He spent 95% of his time dealing with issues on the 5 Windows machines.

> Learning any operating system is a huge investment of time and effort.

I've never found that to be particularly so. There's quite a bit of overlap between operating systems, so much of what you know is transferable. Of course, it helps greatly if you didn't start with Windows. I've used TRSDOS, MSDOS, OS-9, most of the various version of Windows, VMS, Linux (usually Slackware, but I've used several), and one of the BSD's (I can't remember which at this point) that I can think of offhand.

"Learning any operating system is a huge investment of time and effort."

Learning deep down how computers work, how e.g. TCP/IP works, and etcetera is a huge investment. Once you know that, any new operating system is a matter of "how do I make the change I need". The problem is that Windows (and to a lesser extent OSx) is designed specifically to keep you from gaining that knowledge. So yes, if you learn Windows first you still need to learn a "real" operating system.

That's a big part of why I hate Windows so much. I'm tired of the "where T.F. did they put the button this time?" bull puckey.

(There's also it's slowness and power-user hostility as well)

Didn't the Comes v. Microsoft (a.k.a. Iowa Anti-trust trial) reveal that Microsoft arbitrarily changes their APIs to make it harder to "commoditize" them?

I can't find the reference off hand, but I'm pretty sure that some discussion of Win32 by MSFT execs revealed that they made it a lot harder than they had to, and changed it around every so often just to keep competitors from making a Win32 emulator.

I honestly don't understand why anyone would develop for Windows, knowing what we do about MSFT's motivations. You're going to have to re-learn everything every 2 years or so, and you know it's only going to get more complicated. There's also the fact that MSFT has never published the "NT Native API", so a Windows developer ends up having to choose between speed and following the Win32 "standard". MSFT can always always pull the carpet out from under you by changing the Native API or adding to or changing the Win32 API, either to favor themselves, or another competitor.

Knowing more than one OS should most assuredly be mandatory for IT staff. At the small university where I teach, the art and communications professors had to run their own Mac labs for eight years, because the IT staff had no idea how to do so.

Last year, I developed a web based system using mysql/PHP to track various academic related outcome data for free in my spare time. We almost had to scrap the thing because IT couldn't support it. We ended up using linode.com.

Utterly ridiculous.

Until you've used a Microsoft IIS server, you won't know the true meaning of suffering

"Learning any operating system is a huge investment of time and effort."

Meh. We're IT folks. Learning is what we do, remember? Anyone who wants to rest on their laurels and never learn another thing after entering the workforce should become a door to door salesman or something.

I started out with windows, but learned unix, through usenet, man pages, o'reilly books, massive does of caffeine, and lots of hands-on experience. I've managed solaris, hpux, aix, irix and unixware, as well as most of the main linux variants. If you know one unix, learning another is easier. If you know more than one unix variant, you can learn to work on any of them.

People who complain about having to learn *should* *not* *be* working in IT, period!

But I disagree that everyone should be forced to work on everything. That's nuts, there are benefits to specialization of labor. I fault the companies who hire only peecee jockeys, and then whine that, surprise, surprise, none of their people know linux.

I got a great idea for these companies: Hire a linux power user. problem solved.

Quoting:Anyone who wants to rest on their laurels and never learn another thing after entering the workforce should become a door to door salesman or something.

Except a door to door salesman needs to learn the product he is trying to peddle.

Perhaps the door greeter at a store doesn't require learning anything new.

Quoting:a door to door salesman needs to learn the product he is trying to peddle.

So encyclopedia salesmen are the smartest people on the planet?

@herzeleid:

I find it interesting that you quoted me before your statements. Just to clarify, my point was that the learning curve (at least IMHO) is easier going from an O.S. that doesn't shield one from nitty gritty details to Windows, than vice versa. That is to say a Linux admin could learn Windows easier than a Windows admin can learn Linux. I can't even count the times I've run into Windows "administrators" that didn't even know that 192.168.1.3/24 and 192.168.2.4/24 will be a problem on the same network...

To further clarify: IMHO it's harder for the Windows guy because (s)he didn't learn an operating system, (s)he learned Windows. Now (s)he has to go through the same learning curve again because Windows goes so far out of it's way to make it impossible to figure out what's going on under the hood.

I agree though. If one is a technologist then it is incumbent on one's self to be in a constant learning cycle.

@mrider

"That is to say a Linux admin could learn Windows easier than a Windows admin can learn Linux."

Agreed - all the more reason to have a unix/linux techie on staff - even if he/she isn't terribly familiar with the latest microsoft windoze menu decorations, he/she typically has a much deeper understanding of the technology and the underlying principles of OSes and networking, and can see the big picture much more clearly than the average mcse,

Quoting:my point was that the learning curve (at least IMHO) is easier going from an O.S. that doesn't shield one from nitty gritty details to Windows, than vice versa.

This is indeed true.

Albeit reluctantly, I turned down an interview with Google recently...The HeliOS Project, while it does not pay near as well is my passion. The requirements for this position were some basic python and bash skills...stuff some of us pick up over the years. More and more I am seeing LINUX SKILLS PREFERRED in many of the IT positions posted.

And they are going to be more in demand as time passes.

h

True Story!

Medium sized business looking for a new sysadmin to take the load off of me. Mainly Windows due to vendor lock-in, but a few Linux, Solaris, and AIX servers along with a handful of OS X laptops. Found a NIX person and a Windows person that claimed to know some Linux and who was supposedly wiling to learn what he didn't know. Was told to hire the Windows person as they would fit in better with the rest of the staff which were all Windows admins. Three months later I was asked by management why we shouldn't go with the new sysadmins plan to "make everything easier to manage" by switching the OS X laptops and the *NIX servers to Windows.

I always tell people that operating systems are like tools. You should have as many as possible under your belt so that you can use the one that is best for the job.

Quoting:So encyclopedia salesmen are the smartest people on the planet?

They should be. Though I have never encountered a convincing one, so they probably aren't spending enough time learning what their product has to offer.