CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration People CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Topics Organizations Perception and Visibility Time Management CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Sizing Questions How many people do you need? Which people do you need? Categories Customer/desktop support Customer server support Infrastructure support CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

Scaling the Organization Small Company 1-2 SAs, no formal helpdesk Need helpdesk software at around 20 employees Medium Company Need formal helpdesk by 1000 employees. SAs specialize by OS or task (network, security) Large Company Well-staffed helpdesk with 2nd tier support team. Highly specialized SAs. Formal communication paths. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Cost Centers IT is viewed as a cost center, not a profit ctr. De-centralized Model Each business group has its own IT staff. SAs provide better service, have more visibility. Centralized Model One central IT group supports everything. Groups have incentive to maximize usage. Unless groups are billed for their resource usage. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Infrastructure Teams Infrastructure must be consistent and interoperable across different sites. Routing Authentication Email Infrastructure teams may be centralized or distributed across sites. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Customer Service Centralized Support Good automation improves support. Better communication w/ SAs than customers. De-centralized Support Better communication with customer base. Handling requests may dominate infrastructure needs. Centralize help desk contact. Have single phone number to call. Have single e-mail address / request tracking. Each large site needs its own physical help desk. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Outsourcing When should you outsource? Small organization. Basic computing needs. When should you not outsource? Large organization. Need for high availability systems. Need for high levels of security. Internet site generates revenue. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

Consultants and Contractors Bring in outside expertise your SAs don’t have. Useful for introducing new technologies. Must work with in-house SAs to ensure maintainability of new services. Contractors Perform same tasks as current in-house SAs. Use contractors to allow SAs to work on new development projects. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

Perception and Visibility Perception: A qualitative measure of how people see you. Visibility: A quantitative measure of much people see you. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Perception is Reality If customers don’t know you exist, you don’t exist. If customers can’t see evidence of your activities, they’ll assume you’re doing nothing. If it takes a long time to resolve customer requests, customers will assume you’re lazy or incompetent. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration First Impressions Ensure customer is set up for first day. PC is installed and configured. Account is created. Customer knows where to get support. Meeting customers Be on time. Be polite, friendly. Listen. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Attitude Who do you support? lusers users customers Align your priorities with their expectations Satisfy “small” requests quickly. Prioritize larger requests. Customers aren’t always right Some requests have unexpected impacts. Others are too expensive, time-consuming. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Be an Advocate “System clerk” Do requests when received. Do infrastructure work when asked by mngr. Advocate Automate simple tasks. Advocate customer needs to manager. Involved in planning new projects. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Visibility Paradox SAs aren’t noticed when everything works. 100% uptime takes tremendous effort. SAs are noticed when something breaks. SA becomes a hero by fixing down server, &c. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

Managing your Visibility System Status Web Page Make it your customers home page. Include useful content so they keep using it. Announce down services so customers know you’re on top of the situation. Management meetings Meet with customer managers to inform them of the status of projects relevant to their groups. Learn their needs and priorities. Newsletters Regular updates, FAQs, etc. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Time Management Why is it hard? SA is interrupt-driven work. Convert interrupts into requests. Follow through Resolve all requests in a timely fashion. Make it to all meetings on time. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Principles One “database” for time management information (use one organizer). Conserve your brain power for what's important (conserve RAM). Develop routines and stick with them (reuse code libraries; don't reinvent the wheel). Develop habits and mantras (replace runtime calculations with precomputed decisions). Maintain focus during “project time.” Manage your social life with the same tools you use for your work life. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration One Database Use one organizer Digital (PDA) Analog (notebook) Take it with you everywhere. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Conserve Brain Power Write it down Use request tracking system for requests. Use organizer for other to-do items. Use wiki or notes file for instructions. Memory is fallible. You will forget. You will waste time worrying about what you forgot. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Develop Routines Do your daily planning every morning. Do backups on a regular schedule. Re-use code from previous scripts. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Habits Trust your processes. Don’t skip planning on busy days. Don’t put off essential tasks on hectic days. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Maintain Focus Ensure you’re not interrupted when working on projects. Deal with interrupts appropriately Resolve critical issues as needed. File requests for other issues. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration One System Manage your social life in your organizer too. Avoids conflicts between work/social events. Ensures that you do something other than work. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Daily Planning Start the day by planning Review to-do list. Prioritize tasks. Schedule tasks. Should only take about 5 minutes. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration Touch All Paper Once Process each mail message completely. Throw it away. Resolve the problem, then throw it away. Respond to it, then throw it away. File it. Don’t put it in a pile to read later. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration

CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration References Mark Burgess, Principles of System and Network Administration, Wiley, 2000. Aeleen Frisch, Essential System Administration, 3rd edition, O’Reilly, 2002. Thomas A. Limoncelli and Christine Hogan, The Practice of System and Network Administration, Addison-Wesley, 2002. Thomas A. Limoncelli, Time Management for System Administrators, O’Reilly, 2005. Evi Nemeth et al, UNIX System Administration Handbook, 3rd edition, Prentice Hall, 2001. CIT 470: Advanced Network and System Administration