New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#1

Post by zdw » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:27 AM UTC

New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins
usenix.org

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#2

Post by jaryd » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:57 AM UTC

I'd also recommend any sysadmin to start looking into an automation framework like Chef, Puppet, Ansible, or any other of the myriad options.

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#3

Post by pchander » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:58 AM UTC

Excuse my ignorance, but what's wrong with nslookup and ifconfig?

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#4

Post by ams6110 » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 4:59 AM UTC

3. "Check that your backups are working the way you think they are."

3.1 "Check that you can actually restore a file/recover a database"

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#5

Post by jaryd » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 5:00 AM UTC

pchander wrote: post #3

Excuse my ignorance, but what's wrong with nslookup and ifconfig?

short answer: `/bin/ip` replaces `ifconfig` -- it's newer and more powerful

more info: http://www.tty1.net/blog/2010/ifconfig-ip-comparison_en.html

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#6

Post by ams6110 » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 5:02 AM UTC

pchander wrote: post #3

Excuse my ignorance, but what's wrong with nslookup and ifconfig?

They're a bit dated. Use dig instead of nslookup, and right from the ifconfig man page:

NOTE

This program is obsolete! For replacement check ip addr and ip link. For statistics use ip -s link.

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#7

Post by ams6110 » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 5:04 AM UTC

jaryd wrote: post #2

I'd also recommend any sysadmin to start looking into an automation framework like Chef, Puppet, Ansible, or any other of the myriad options.

Absolutely. Automate relentlessly. As a bonus, the recipes/playbooks you develop serve as documentation for how things are configured.

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#8

Post by jaryd » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 5:08 AM UTC

ams6110 wrote: post #7

jaryd wrote: post #2

I'd also recommend any sysadmin to start looking into an automation framework like Chef, Puppet, Ansible, or any other of the myriad options.

Absolutely. Automate relentlessly. As a bonus, the recipes/playbooks you develop serve as documentation for how things are configured.

Yeah that's a huge bonus that I didn't anticipate before beginning. My cookbooks are essentially dynamic documentation that morph with my changes in system requirements.

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#9

Post by protomyth » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 5:14 AM UTC

jaryd wrote: post #2

I'd also recommend any sysadmin to start looking into an automation framework like Chef, Puppet, Ansible, or any other of the myriad options.

Automation is a fine thing except for some of this damn "enterprise software" that not only doesn't automate real well[1], but actually cannot be installed on VMWare[2] or even go to a hot swap machine[3]. Sysadmins always love government required software and stuff bought before we got there.

1) luckily backup seem to be reasonably automation friendly

2) "We do not support virtualization of any kind"

3) tied to hardware on one machine - f'n brilliant.

Re: New Year's Resolutions for SysAdmins

#10

Post by protomyth » Fri, Jan 03, 2014, 5:15 AM UTC

ams6110 wrote: post #4

3. "Check that your backups are working the way you think they are." 3.1 "Check that you can actually restore a file/recover a database"

3.1.1 "Do it daily to a box in another building while dumping the backup to offsite storage"