IT Advice HELP 1

[Louie77]

Hello all, I just found this message board. I'm so glad that I found it.

Well on to my question.

I worked for an e-company for about 3 ½ yrs and got laid off. My skills as a tech guy are ok. I use to take care of an nt machine, win98 box’s and a database in access. My CTO told me to learn linux, that it would be better for me.

Well when I got laid off, I still worked with linux plus I have a tone of books at home. Well my problem is know that I'm trying to find a job, I notice that a lot of companies are looking for admin, IT analyst for nt win2000 sever, network admin. I don't know if I could do it. I know how to load nt win2000, but doing the admin for it I'm lost. I also learned html, but I would like to learn more programming. In other words I would like to be a good IT guy and ok programmer

Would someone point me in the right direction on being a good admin for the win environment?

I order a basic mcse books that I could read. I'm the type of guy that likes to start from the bottom up.

Sorry it’s so long but right now I'm stressing out on what I'm going to do with my life. You could pretty must say that I feel lost.

Thank you
Louie

 

[Trudster]

Personally what I would say is to go to a technical college or even a local two year and get an associates degree. That would be a start and give you some heads up on some of these topics that you have written about.

That is what I did and after my first two semesters I found an internship at a local company. That helped tremendously towards my knowledge. I then went and finished my two year and then found a job as a systems coordinator. I went forward from there and finished my BSBA and now I have a systems administrator job. I did all of my degree work as I worked as a MIS manager at a local company they were willing to hire me with only the Associates degree while I finished my Bachelors and they even paid for some of my classes through tuition reimbursement.

Things along the way that helped are getting an old system and just messing around with a small home network signing up users and network shares and all the likes that a user might need as a user in a company.

Then just use your gained knowledge to broaden your sites on that Network admin or system admin job that you are looking for.

Trudster

 

[Louie77]

I just want to thank you for the post. I was thinking about going back to school soon. But for me I have a family that I have to take care of. My girl is working in the mean while. So right now I'm trying to refresh myself again to work in the win environment.

Question
What should I work on the most? NT , win2000 server , or networking? That way I could get my foot in the door with a company.

Thank you for the post.
Louie

 

[carp]

If you are going to try doing this on your own from books, I would strongly recommend going with the one that interests you the most.

For that matter, no matter how you are going to learn, I would recommend picking the career field that you find most appealing.

 

[Louie77]

***carp ***

Thank you for your comments. To tell you the truth I would like to be a admin, IT Analyst for the win's env.

I know that most IT guys know a lot on different OS. That's where I would like to be. Right now I know how to load the software and keep it updated with secrety patch, create users.

And yes I'm going to learn it by myself.... What a good site or tutorials for nt win2000 server & client, Exchange?

Plus I bet no one knows where I could download Exchange from or SQL right?

 

[dilettante]

The best investments I made to learn these things was to get my hands on them.

First is to get some cheap boxes. You probably have a PC or two, but it doesn't hurt to have a couple of stable machines (middle-of-the-road) to use as servers.

I went with three used Dell Optiplex machines I got cheap from Dell Leasing through their auction site. These are 2 PII 350s and one PIII 533. I shopped around for cheap RAM and upgraded one HD to a 40GB unit. A cheap KVM switch and discount cables saved on monitor costs. Bought a "rack" at a home supply store - just a heavy steel shelf unit. Bought a cheap "cable router/switch" to tie the network together.

Then I started attending local MSDN and TechNet presentations to scoop up "trial editions" of things like OSs and server products such as Exchange and SQL Server. Some of these I had to order online (as trials) and pay like $10 shipping on. In many cases there were books and other materials as well as training in the local seminars. Most of these were limited-time trials - 120 days here, 60 days there, 360 days in other cases.

So while I got everything together I cracked a few books I got for cheap. Made myself read through ALL of it, even if some got glossed over - at least I knew where it was covered in the book.

Finally I loaded up the software and took it a step at a time. Started with AD. Moved to Exchange. Then tackled IIS and ISA. This was a huge platefull.

I went through those books again, and tried to make as much of it make sense and work out as I could stand. Took a break. Came back to it again. Looked through TechNet for scenarios to try out. Took as many free-sample online prep courses and exams as possible to tell me where I was naive.

Soon I had to get new "trial" software 'cause much of it expired. Went on to SQL Server.

Rinse, repeat.

Once I started dealing with "the real world" I found out there were many scenarios I never anticipated in my self-study. But you know what? I found out I had the fundamentals down pat, knew how to extract information out of TechNet, and was able to find solutions quickly.

Sometimes to learn to ride a bike you need to just get on one and try it, fall down, then try some more.

 

[Louie77]

***** dilettante ******

Well thank you for the advise. Well today I got all my books that I order plus some free ones.

Plus I also put together a sample box to play with...

Well i load win2000 pro to see how that is.... I have the book " MCSA for dummies" it had 5 books in one...

I will start working on learning more and more...

thank you everyone for helping me out.

Louie

 

[dilettante]

I should caution you that "box jockying" whether desktop or server only gets you so much.

I pursued NT server product administration skills because I needed them. I found out that doing software development on Microsoft platforms was a nightmare if I tried to rely on the skills of the "administrators" at customer sites.

This is why so many people are disenchanted with in-house developers too. But instead of cutting their pay they seem to choose to outsource software development to cut costs.

I find that software development in many shops is hampered by a lack of platform skills. This limits their Microsoft developers to things like desktop applications, simple ASP pages, and the like. The on-site platform administrators don't help much either, because they are generally clueless about the needs of custom applications. People calling themselves "DBAs" can be particularly scary. And project managers are hampered by having seemingly no skills at all besides berating the other team members and every vendor involved.


Example:

I went into one shop that had an application that was stuck with a requirement to accept a data file from an off-site machine via FTP and batch-load the new data into a table daily.

The "NT admin" there didn't have a clue how to configure the IIS FTP server. The "SQL Server admin" had no idea how to batch-load data (!). Neither one knew how to write a VBScript to automate the process, nor did they even know about scheduling scripts to run periodically. The "network admin" had no idea how to configure the firewall rules to let this FTP in and keep others out. The application coders were sitting on their hands because unless this data started appearing in the database "by magic" they couldn't move ahead either. The "project manager" had no idea any of this was even needed and just kept complaining about "shoddy Microsoft technology holding up our schedule."

So I spent 3 days meeting, investigating, configuring, scripting, testing, documenting, and debriefing. This was something their people should have done in a couple hours because they already knew what they wanted to do and where their boxes all were, etc. etc. They had been held up for almost 4 weeks because of this though.

I also warned them about the service packs and security fixes they hadn't installed. I showed them all the space eaten up by a couple of years of log files they'd left to accumulate. This got me the cold shoulder and they acted like I was trying to "pad" the job. Oh well.


So where I am going is... to be truly valuable you need to know a lot about a lot. A "box admin" is becoming a low-paid, commodity job - certainly not a career. So keep your horizons wide if you want to stay in this field longer than a couple years unless you want to try to feed a family on $8 to $14 US per hour.

 

[Louie77]

***** dilettante ****

Thank you very much dilettante for you comments. Well for me I'm just trying to learn as much as I can. Right now Im working with 2000. I know how to load it and stuff. But i would like to be come more then that.

Just like you, I would like to learn how to run a SQL server, know all the little secrets and how too.

if you don't mind me asking but what website or url do yo ugo to, so you could keep up with your tech and other skills you have learn?


or anyone else, what sites do you guys or gals go to keep infom of all the new tricks...

Thank you
Louie

 

[dilettante]

For Windows "tech" topics I scour Microsoft's TechNet site regularly... and I mean scour.

Every week or two they add a number of articles, presentations, and documentation updates. As I learn more about a topic I dig deeper into the online documentation on that topic.

Regarding software development for Windows I hit their MSDN site just as hard.

For mainframe platform work I do the same thing at those vendors' sites. Lately for me that has been Unisys.

For Unix or Java guys or IBMers there are probably corresponding sites sponsored by SCO, Sun, and IBM.

And don't forget the NNTP "UseNet" newsgroups sponsored by the same vendors.


In some rare cases I've found useful "niche" sites operated by 3rd parties. Most general sites are pretty miserable though - I think it's a question of recources on their end. There are a few that deal with tutorial and basic topics, but you outgrow them very fast.


I find that getting hold of the vendor's reference documents and the hardware and software beats the heck out of most of the books on the market. What the books do is get you started though - which is about all you can really expect out of any sort of class.

 

[Louie77]

***** dilettante ****

Well would you be able to post on here if you don't mind the url that you check out? Plus any other sites that might be good for me to learn database, DNS, TCP/IP, routers, VPN and soo on...

Like I sayed before I start learning this a while back but my last employer wanted me to learn linux and a phone systems. So know I'm trying to get a new job but look of companies are looking for sys tech on win platforms. ...

Thank's once again for the help

Louie

 

[dilettante]

There is a list of various TCP/IP resources at:

http://www.private.org.il/tcpip_rl.html

I'm sure others can fill in a few more URLs, but some of the important Microsoft sites include:

http://msdn.microsoft.com

http://msdn.microsoft.com/training/seminars/

http://msdn.microsoft.com/architecture/default.aspx

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/treeview/default.asp?url=/technet/tcevents/olseminars/Default.asp

http://www.microsoft.com/office/developer/default.asp

I'll bet many Tek-Tips members have favorite 3rd party sites for information and tutorials as well.

 

[ukjane]

I always think that teaching yourself gives you a head start, but it's nothing like doing NT admin or anything else in the real world, in the large company environment.

I suggest looking for a job in a company that would train you on this. Or a job where you can be a tech, and maybe learn from the IT Analyst there.

 

[Louie77]

********* ukjane ******* dilettante ******

Thanks for the help. Well later this week I'm going to go buy me a router so i could hook up a nt box and 2000.

I will check out those site that you post up for me. Where I live its hard to find a company that will teach you plus give you a job. like I sayed over the weekend I read a couple of chapters on my box and tested something. I know how to load it and bring it up to par. But after that I'm lost on the admin side....

but thank you once again, for the url if anyone has any more feel free to post them up to help me out with my admin teaching....

Louie

 

[RiverGuy]

You might try looking at a non-IT company doing entry level/help desk stuff if you find the need to get a job. Try to find a nice medium sized company with an array of systems. See what you like to do and what you're good at, and go with that.

If you go somewhere and try hard, even if you don't make the big bucks at that company, you will get noticed and learn a lot. It's good for experience too.

The main point is to get a job somewhere, and learn all you can--even if its not your job, tell them you want to learn it and ask questions.

Experience counts more than certs, and you'll probably get further if you can tell someone you've done certain things at a business over having certs.

 

[Louie77]

**** RiverGuy *****

Thank you you got a good point. Well last night I bought my linky sys rounter. I got my 2000pro up and running. I'm going to study tonight on it plus try some things ... I download vb6, going to try that program out also too.

But thank you all for the great word and helpful links.
I know that I will make it plus will not give up.

Louie

ps. if you have some more comments or url's that might be able to help me out on learning how to be a good admin or IT guys let me know..

Louie