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cptInsane0 posted:Yes, usually you can contract a cabling guy if you are at a place that can afford it. I am just saying I would personally trust someone who knows how everything works because they have experience over someone who took this path: Ganon posted:I wouldn't mind being somewhere where they're starting from scratch and running all the cables and setting up the server room. Sounds like it would be interesting. cptInsane0 posted:Sometimes it is nice to pay someone to do the cabling for you, but it's good to know how to do it yourself. For instance, your entire network goes down. You start at the physical layer, and discover some rear end in a top hat cut the cable. You could go get another cable, or just crimp an end on and be done with it in less than a minute. I'm sure there is a better example than that. Red_Fred posted:Is it weird that I prefer the cabling, installation and working with the hardware in networks more than the other things? Monitoring and opening and closing ports just seems dull. evil_bunnY fucked around with this message at Feb 5, 2012 around 14:37 |
| # ? Feb 5, 2012 14:31 |
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| # ? May 25, 2013 19:06 |
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Obviously evil_bunny you must be terrible at your job dealing largely with abstract concepts if you didn't spend time pulling cable.
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| # ? Feb 5, 2012 16:05 |
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Wow, you guys got really upset about this. I guess I should clarify. I don't mean people need to specifically pull cable to be good at their jobs. I went to school and got a job and have 10 years of experience. However, I have paid my dues by doing lovely stuff that FNG's have to do. I am saying I don't respect the kind of people who go to school, get an MIS degree, and don't really know anything other than concepts, and go straight to management. I understand that the whole point of that major is to do that, but those people don't tend to know as much technical stuff, have not paid their dues, and therefore don't know the feasibility and technology behind many projects. I would rather work for someone who worked their way up from the bottom. Goddamn.
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| # ? Feb 5, 2012 17:11 |
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evil_bunnY posted:They'll change the plan or cut funding (do more with less! turns into pay-less-get-less) half way and it'll end up a clusterfuck anyway! Uh, goddamn dude are you my boss and/or co-worker? We had a new facility, ended up with a clusterfuck anyway. We have a strict "someone making $40-50/hr should not waste their time making cables" policy at work so we order them all. Our time is mathematically more valuable than that. Anyone who's making decent money shouldn't be making cables unless they actually ARE more efficient than buying cables in bulk or your bosses have some idiotic "they're employed so the cables are free!!!!" mentality.
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| # ? Feb 5, 2012 17:22 |
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Telex posted:Uh, goddamn dude are you my boss and/or co-worker? Well yeah, you don't pay someone 40 bucks an hour to make cables. You make your intern or FNG do it for like 10 bucks an hour.
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| # ? Feb 5, 2012 17:25 |
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cptInsane0 posted:Well yeah, you don't pay someone 40 bucks an hour to make cables. You make your intern or FNG do it for like 10 bucks an hour. On the other hand, you do pay engineers 40 bucks an hour to vacuum and dust their own offices. It's a cost cutting measure.
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| # ? Feb 5, 2012 17:43 |
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workape posted:Assuming you aren't trying to be sarcastic, what would you like to know? I've worked my way up to where I am after switching into network engineering from being a unix sysadmin. I'm one of those experience > certs > formal education people. I've worked for people in the past that the whole thing was turned around. Never work for someone with a Ph.D.. Oh, sorry if that was confusing. I was more interested in the stories of people applying for Senior Positions when they couldn't even explain /24. You'd think HR would simply filter them out beforehand. At the Microsoft vendor I worked for we had an online interview with simple technical questions like this before our real interview.
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| # ? Feb 5, 2012 21:53 |
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Tab8715 posted:Oh, sorry if that was confusing. I was more interested in the stories of people applying for Senior Positions when they couldn't even explain /24. You'd think HR would simply filter them out beforehand. At the Microsoft vendor I worked for we had an online interview with simple technical questions like this before our real interview. Binary filters are the worst thing ever, they weed out the people who have more EXP/understanding, over people who have a 4year and probably can't tell you anything outside of basic windows administration, entry level java, and maybe if they are really smart know a scripting language or two. I know someone with a 4year degree who didn't know what iScsi was and they went in for a Systems Engineering degree in a very respected VA college. But they knew what NFS was, and it is "Pretty much the same thing" after I explained iscsi
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| # ? Feb 5, 2012 23:13 |
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Since the general consensus is that people with 4 year degrees are terrible, what happens when you have a master's degree AND you understand of the IT technical nuances? Are you automatically proclaimed a God and issued a harem on site? I don't have any of these things, but I am curious.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 03:22 |
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People with degrees are deemed terrible by people with envy of them.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 04:02 |
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Looking at the wages listed I sure as hell am hoping my Helldesk internship has a large pay increase when it turns into a full time position. That or I really need to move to a major city.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 04:08 |
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three posted:People with degrees are deemed terrible by people with envy of them. I don't despise people with 4 year degrees, just the way HR looks at it as a "THEY KNOW EVERYTHING!" deal, when in actuality they may have just gotten a passing C- in everything and know the most basic of tech support, my room mate is a Systems Engineer for his college and getting a 4 year degree and knows a poo poo gently caress tonne of stuff. But quite often I meet people who went into IT for, "I like video games" and "good with computers(so long as they are gaming rigs)". But don't know anything outside of their personal likes/dislikes. Corvettefisher fucked around with this message at Feb 6, 2012 around 04:34 |
| # ? Feb 6, 2012 04:31 |
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Tab8715 posted:Oh, sorry if that was confusing. I was more interested in the stories of people applying for Senior Positions when they couldn't even explain /24. You'd think HR would simply filter them out beforehand. At the Microsoft vendor I worked for we had an online interview with simple technical questions like this before our real interview. Oh christ, let's see in the last 5 people that I've interviewed for senior positions I have people who don't understand how First Hop Redundancy Protocols work, can't successfully explain what a Hypervisor is, and my all time favorite was the guy interviewing for the senior security engineer position who couldn't explain the difference between IPS and IDS. I've had one good one out of there and we are looking to hire the individual for the senior vmware engineer position. This person not only answered questions within their comfort zone, but also was able to walk us through their thought process for design and security. Most HR groups that I have worked with simply kick resumes through so long as the buzz word filter is met. It's pure poo poo. I've sat in interviews where the one of the interview team ended the interview in 3 minutes. We have an interview team made up of the senior engineers/architects from the groups who all get together and conduct the technical interviews. We make up the rear end in a top hat question as well. The rear end in a top hat question is something that appears to be simple, unless you know the right questions to ask then it starts to compound in complexity. My all time favorite interview so far has been the junior engineer position in a different team where the interview morphed into a teaching session. 1 hour turned into 3 and we ended up taking the guy out to lunch.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 04:43 |
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In the past, I've asked HR to just forward all resumes onto me regardless of content and I've just had my junior guys look at them to tell me if they're worthwhile or not.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 05:51 |
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Misogynist posted:In the past, I've asked HR to just forward all resumes onto me regardless of content and I've just had my junior guys look at them to tell me if they're worthwhile or not. I would absolutely love this. It would really cut down on a lot of the cruft that manages to winnow through onto our radar.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 06:12 |
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Corvettefisher posted:I don't despise people with 4 year degrees, just the way HR looks at it as a "THEY KNOW EVERYTHING!" deal, when in actuality they may have just gotten a passing C- in everything and know the most basic of tech support, my room mate is a Systems Engineer for his college and getting a 4 year degree and knows a poo poo gently caress tonne of stuff. But quite often I meet people who went into IT for, "I like video games" and "good with computers(so long as they are gaming rigs)". But don't know anything outside of their personal likes/dislikes. That's true, IT seems to be one of the only places where HS Diploma doesn't equal intern/bottom-level only positions. That said, 4yr degrees are, unfortunately, the diploma of the 60's/70's. Everything I've read and can relate to about college 30-50 years ago seems that it was much tougher, and was less "hand-held" (even if I directly benefited from today's less-rigorous college atmosphere). I have mine solely to play the game and pass through HR's ever-tightening butthole of ridiculous filters, and I always advise everyone I know who asks for advice to get one, solely for the doors it opens.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 21:15 |
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Honestly the main thing that prevented me from pursuing a 4-year degree was the costs associated with it. I felt pretty well prepared for my current job with an AAS and I'm experience pretty decent career growth with my training on the job. That said, I'm not averse to the idea of going back to school. Then again, the longer I stay out the more difficult it will be to return. Plus I have a 40+ hour a week commitment to work. That's a lot to juggle around based on my age and impending house move within the next year. I haven't felt held back any in terms of my career by opting for a 4-year, but I could definitely see it helping me get a gravy job at a university somewhere doing IT. I think the issue with people being terrible while even having 4 year degrees is the somewhat lack of social skills present in IT graduates. Of course colleges tend to promote this inflated sense of self worth in order to get people to pursue degrees, in my opinion. Sure, I have my quirks, but I manage to get along with people. Maybe it was the community college I went to, but there were some straight up elitist assholes in my classes that were terrible to interact with on a basic level. Even the guys wearing video game shirts were assholes and I thought I had at least common ground  .
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 21:28 |
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I got a degree because I enjoy learning. My area of study had absolutely nothing to do with the job I'm working in now.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 21:30 |
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psydude posted:I got a degree because I enjoy learning. My area of study had absolutely nothing to do with the job I'm working in now.
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 21:39 |
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Question from a student who just started working on an AS in IT, but isn't quite sure if it's the right fit yet: What made you decide to get a career in this industry? Do you like it or regret it? Would you recommend it for someone who isn't sure what they want to do, but just wants a job?
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| # ? Feb 6, 2012 23:47 |
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Entreri posted:Question from a student who just started working on an AS in IT, but isn't quite sure if it's the right fit yet: Not a bit, IT is a very fun field and while we may bitch a lot it is more easier/laid back if you know your poo poo. Only thing I regret is working for some companies who abused the IT department, but those companies are in every field. If you aren't sure what to go into try Networking (with a side of systems administration) or if you like a challenge virtualization is going to be the next big thing coming up as more places want it. Networking can be very relaxed and fun to build, when I wasn't sure what to get into just starting out in IT I stuck to networking + Linux admining and now do Virtualization.
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| # ? Feb 7, 2012 00:25 |
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Entreri posted:Question from a student who just started working on an AS in IT, but isn't quite sure if it's the right fit yet: Honestly, I'd keep in mind that IT isn't the big money field as the last few pages made it out to be. One of the bigger myths out there is that computers and nursing are always going to have jobs. But they don't mention that both fields are suffering a glut of people, and this glut will drive down wages. It's one of the bad things about 'big' fields: they're big because wages are too high, and having more people on hand will create plenty of jobs, but not in the pay range that you see here. If you want to go into this field, accept a few things: 1) You will have to get certified, and this will cost money. And you might have to certify over and over again to keep it 'current' and that becomes a money sink. 2) The industry services many fields, and this will be a sink on your time. IT is not that respected and given the amount of people getting more certifications/degrees/et cetera, chances are you'll eventually be outsourced or simply not paid much until you have to find another job, making you constantly on the job hunt. 3) You'll see several people who are trying to justify their luck by saying 'this certification is perfect' or 'no, this one is' and over and over again. The real truth is that the lack of standardization in IT means that any real promotions you get are based on either luck or that you're cheap enough. A lot of people will go on about how good companies will treat their employees right and give all sorts of free goodies. But this is more the exception than the rule. 4) You will deal with some bitter people who got a degree in some technical field and cannot stand people in other fields (any other field, actually) who can't believe that a certification can put that someone on their level. I don't mean to drive you away, but if you're looking for a job, then make sure IT is what you really want. The pay can be there if you want it to be, but it's by no means a surefire thing. Learning this stuff takes a long time and is sometimes inaccessible. And given how the wages are dropping ($40 for Helpdesk is a fantasy, and even $15 is a dream in the Midwest), it may not be worth it. I'll end this on a good note. Go to a community college, take a few classes in a variety of topics (networking, Unix, system administration, etc.) and make a decision there. Dive right into it. If you like it, then you can take a few more classes or ask if they have paths to certification or labs you can play around in. On top of that, you could meet some people to get you in the door. If not, you can go and do something else in a popular field without wasting a lot of time and effort. IT isn't the only career field out there that will give you a secure living, and we're at the point where you may not get out of it what you put into it. It's not a surefire route to a job anymore, and if you flounder around you'll just waste a lot of time on a field that will probably be automated in another decade or two.
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| # ? Feb 7, 2012 00:43 |
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psydude posted:Since the general consensus is that people with 4 year degrees are terrible, what happens when you have a master's degree AND you understand of the IT technical nuances? Are you automatically proclaimed a God and issued a harem on site? Don't I wish.
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| # ? Feb 7, 2012 01:23 |
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quote:Question from a student who just started working on an AS in IT, but isn't quite sure if it's the right fit yet: I just kind of fell into IT. I've always been good with computers and other technology. Not in the "my nephew is a computer guru" way. Computers aren't really my passion. That's reserved for food, but I wouldn't want to ruin that by making it into a job. However, if you are willing to keep up with technology, and you have very good people skills, you can do well in this field. Find an area you like though. Maybe programming sounds good to you, or maybe networking, or maybe sys admin stuff. Do your research, even after you have a job. Hell, do your research every single day. Technology changes so often that you don't really want to specialize in a specific one, so much as you want an area of expertise, so you can solve problems with a variety of technologies. Also, don't just learn the tech, but learn whatever business you are in too. If you can understand what people are trying to do, and why, it will make your job easier, and people will value your opinion more, as long as you are able to express it correctly. Don't get disenfranchised if you aren't making the wages they are talking about here. It varies from company to company, and location to location. I certainly don't make 6 figures a year, but I live in a place with a low cost of living, and am comfortable. Things don't work like they used to back in the day either. It is rare that you would stay at a company for 15-20 years. Usually a promotion means going to a new company. Always be looking for work, no matter how comfortable you are.
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| # ? Feb 7, 2012 01:32 |
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workape posted:Oh christ, let's see in the last 5 people that I've interviewed for senior positions I have people who don't understand how First Hop Redundancy Protocols work, can't successfully explain what a Hypervisor is, and my all time favorite was the guy interviewing for the senior security engineer position who couldn't explain the difference between IPS and IDS. I've had one good one out of there and we are looking to hire the individual for the senior vmware engineer position. This person not only answered questions within their comfort zone, but also was able to walk us through their thought process for design and security. Name one IDS that isn't also an IPS. Not saying there aren't any, but there aren't any among enterprise class products.
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| # ? Feb 7, 2012 04:48 |
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three posted:People with degrees are deemed terrible by people with envy of them. Misogynist posted:In the past, I've asked HR to just forward all resumes onto me regardless of content and I've just had my junior guys look at them to tell me if they're worthwhile or not.
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| # ? Feb 7, 2012 09:53 |
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Entreri posted:Question from a student who just started working on an AS in IT, but isn't quite sure if it's the right fit yet: So to chime in on a more positive answer to this, it may be because I am green to the industry. That is, I have been working IT related fields for 5 years. 3 years of physical helpdesk (non-phone), 1 year of net admin, and now 1 year of net engineering. What made me decide to do IT was because I enjoyed doing it. I started out kind of a gamer and a geek, but I have good social skills and I enjoy a good get together more then a WoW raid, I don't play WoW, just a reference. I came in enjoying IT in general, then I started to hate helpdesk. Not because of the work, but because I always knew I wanted to do networking related stuff. I then narrowed that focus to network engineering, which does pay very well, but I don't do it for the money. I don't regret getting into IT, I love doing what I do and I would take a pay cut to do it. Don't get me wrong, I love money and I love that network engineering pays so well, but at the end of the day as others have said you really have to have an enjoyment for IT. I think this should be normal for all fields though, I wouldn't be able to do anything 9 hours a day and not have a passion for it. This will also make you a cut above the rest, honestly. If you enjoy your work, you just tend to be a better IT employee as you enjoy learning/researching and improving. I wouldn't recommend anything to anyone for someone just looking for a job. IT can be just a job, and it can be a rather easy one. I don't suspect anyone would enjoy it and there could be a lot of regret there if you invest a career into something you hate doing. Can someone do it to get by during college? Sure. But I wouldn't stick with it if it's not what they want to do in their heart of hearts. EDIT: I am kinda young I guess, if it matters. 26 here. Sorry for the wall of text. Also, to jump in on the debate earlier about network engineers needing to know how to run cable. I don't know how to run cable through ceilings. I do know how to punch down ports. I do know how to make a cable, though I am sure I am pretty lovely at doing it. I don't think it's a requirement to be good at running the cable through the ceilings to be a good network engineer. It is important to know how cables work and Layer 1 stuff. Just knowing basic cable capabilities and actually cabling racks yourself is good enough I think. EDIT 2: Also, the pay comparisons in this thread are kind of silly. In Texas I would suspect 15 dollars to be on the 'high-end' of your FIRST help desk position. But I have seen them go to 18-20 bucks an hour... all the way down to 11-12 bucks. And, this is in San Antonio. In Austin it is a bit more due to cost of living. I guess my point is, we can compare all day how much a helpdesk/net engi/admin should get, but at the end of the day cost of living and wages are going to vary so much we can't compare them. I could be making 100k somewhere and 50k somewhere else and be living the same way. You can make a career out of helpdesk and people are happy in their jobs. Making 25 dollars an hour after they have built up their time. Bardlebee fucked around with this message at Feb 7, 2012 around 17:25 |
| # ? Feb 7, 2012 17:20 |
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Entreri posted:Question from a student who just started working on an AS in IT, but isn't quite sure if it's the right fit yet: Fast forward a couple of years and I ended up as a 16-year-old intern in a mom-and-pop web hosting company, knowing more on the technical side than the other tech I worked with. They liked me, and they kept me, so I stuck around there for about five years, soaking up what I could, playing with Linux as a hobbyist for that time. Around the time I was ready to graduate college, I hated IT, so I wanted to keep going with school and get a Master's degree in computer science, specialized in human-computer interaction. Around that time, I was doing the ACM/ICPC programming competitions in college. One day I was cleaning out my work email and found a recruitment email from Google. I was working my way through their process, and decided I had better brush up on my Linux skills. I ended up basically setting up 15 or 20 VMs, imitating a high-availability corporate infrastructure with all Linux on the backend. Eventually they dropped the ball and stopped answering my emails, so I figured I'd look around for other jobs with better advancement potential than the situation I was in. So that bit before about hating IT? Well, it turns out I just hated my job working for a dead-end company. I ended up at a different organization, taking my hobbyist Linux skills and experience running 4 or so production Linux machines and using it to get a job running 650+ of them. This worked out pretty well, and with a small stint in between at another company, I'm now managing that group and heading up around 8 headcount responsible for all our servers and storage. The short of it is that I sort of drifted into the position because I had a passion for technology and I ended up with the right opportunities. If anything in my life had played out differently, I have no idea what I would be doing right now. I was a pretty bad underachiever in high school and all the uninteresting bits of college. I love the poo poo out of what I'm doing. Today I'm talking to vendors to quote out a high-performance compute cluster with 1,750 cores and 14 TB of memory. Tomorrow I'm planning out a 4+ PB storage environment, trying to fill open headcount, and working on finding a location for our next datacenter. It's never the same thing day to day, and I wouldn't change that for any other career. Most other things completely bore me. As for you: IT is a profession where you need to be really good at what you do, or your job will be automated away for pennies a day. Usually, this means being really passionate and being a great learner, and spending a lot of your own time keeping up with technology because it's something that you enjoy. If you're not sure if this is you, give it a shot, but be fully cognizant of the fact that if you're not 100% into it, it's going to be really hard to get the respect of your peers. But make sure you're at the right company. Some environments make technology really boring, and that will make you think that technology is boring. It isn't. Misogynist fucked around with this message at Feb 7, 2012 around 18:19 |
| # ? Feb 7, 2012 18:15 |
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Entreri posted:Question from a student who just started working on an AS in IT, but isn't quite sure if it's the right fit yet: I started working in IT at a local college back in highschool doing pretty much every entry level task imaginable: configuring workstations, providing desktop support, imaging labs, installing switches, punching cables, moving heavy poo poo. By my 4th summer (when I was entering my sophomore year of college), one of my bosses was slowly starting to go insane due to Grave's Disease. I couldn't take it anymore so I quit and said "gently caress that poo poo" to working in IT. Fast forward to 2011 when literally no part of the economy is hiring college graduates except the part dedicated to outsourcing American jobs overseas or making sure money stays in "right" hands. . . oh, and IT for some odd reason. A Lieutenant Colonel signal officer I was working with suggested that I work in the field since I had experience and a security clearance. I banged out a few certs and got hired into this gig doing a mix of desktop support and junior systems/network administration. Liking it a lot so far; it definitely helps that my boss is cool. I'm trying to get more into the networking side of things, since that's the part I like the most and it's far enough away from normal desktop poo poo that I know it won't ruin the love I have for computers. psydude fucked around with this message at Feb 7, 2012 around 18:34 |
| # ? Feb 7, 2012 18:32 |
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Can you go active duty military if you wanted?
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| # ? Feb 7, 2012 19:21 |
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Me? I could have in college, yes, but I chose not to. Now? Nearly impossible for another 3-4 years.
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| # ? Feb 7, 2012 19:41 |
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Would it be considered bad form to refer to former co-workers by the password they used to use when I see them out in public? "Hey boating32!" "phildo! How are ya!"
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| # ? Feb 8, 2012 15:52 |
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Bob Morales posted:Would it be considered bad form to refer to former co-workers by the password they used to use when I see them out in public? It'd get awfully confusing calling everyone "passw0rd", wouldn't it?
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| # ? Feb 8, 2012 15:57 |
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Bob Morales posted:Would it be considered bad form to refer to former co-workers by the password they used to use when I see them out in public? I call them by their usernames?
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| # ? Feb 8, 2012 16:12 |
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Today someone in the corporation decided to do a "reply to all" with an email that went to the whole corp.. Users all across the world are no "replying to all" with things such as, "you might have the wrong john smith," "this isn't meant for me" "please stop with the virus" Fun day here!
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| # ? Feb 8, 2012 16:18 |
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Crunchtime posted:Today someone in the corporation decided to do a "reply to all" with an email that went to the whole corp.. Users all across the world are no "replying to all" with things such as, "you might have the wrong john smith," "this isn't meant for me" "please stop with the virus" BCC motherfuckers, do you know how to use it? (Not directed at you, of course.)
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| # ? Feb 8, 2012 16:28 |
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Walter_Sobchak posted:It'd get awfully confusing calling everyone "passw0rd", wouldn't it?
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| # ? Feb 8, 2012 19:28 |
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Crunchtime posted:Today someone in the corporation decided to do a "reply to all" with an email that went to the whole corp.. Users all across the world are no "replying to all" with things such as, "you might have the wrong john smith," "this isn't meant for me" "please stop with the virus" This would happen at my old company to lists of 1000+ users and I always wanted to reply with an attached 5MB email etiquette guide. I figure that would solve the problem for a while.
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| # ? Feb 8, 2012 21:21 |
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SubjectVerbObject posted:This would happen at my old company to lists of 1000+ users and I always wanted to reply with an attached 5MB email etiquette guide. I figure that would solve the problem for a while.  "SubjectVerbObject, I CANNOT GET EMAILS THIS IS  AFFECTING PRODUCTION. IT SAYS SOMETHING ABOUT MAXIMUM ALLOWED MAILBOX SIZE. I NEED YOU TO FIX THIS RIGHT NOW."
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| # ? Feb 9, 2012 13:26 |
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| # ? May 25, 2013 19:06 |
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SubjectVerbObject posted:This would happen at my old company to lists of 1000+ users and I always wanted to reply with an attached 5MB email etiquette guide. I figure that would solve the problem for a while. http://www.dtcc.edu/cs/rfc1855.html
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| # ? Feb 9, 2012 13:47 |
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