System Administrator

"Water water everywhere but not a drop to drink"

So goes an old saying that a sailor once said while dying of thirst in the deep seas. The INTERNET world is also going through a similar stage and there is a huge number of vacancies and scarcity genuine System Administrators.

With its ever expanding use and unbelievable growth, we are moving towards a world as Andrew S Tanebaum once stated, "Right now a race is going on between Communication & Transportation. Whoever wins will make the other obsolete!"

How true is that saying, with everything we want under the sun at our fingertips, who would take the effort to move around for the same. This new INTERNET world is growing so rapidly and unleashed that we are experiencing a dearth of the highly skilled System Administrator. Its a fact that System owners these days have to take the word of people claiming to know this job, their abilities and risk accepting their proclaimed talents to meet their ever growing system administrative needs.

In this article I would like to highlight a few criteria that should differentiate a System Administrator from a Computer support personnel.

Who is a System Administrator? A normal person would say, he is someone who handles the technical support of our servers and maintains it. Now is that what we call System Administration?

Let us take a analogy, our government administers our country. Does that mean they only handle the problems we face and maintain whatever resources we have? If thats the case, we should not call it administration, just some day to day services like some courier company. If you notice, our governmental administration, handles day to day activities, plans for future possible droughts, oil price fluctuations, inflations, plans and designs cities, roads etc with the future in mind. Similarly a system administrator is not just a caretaker of our servers or systems, he is supposed to be like that weather station that alerts about present day situations as well as forecasts weather and advices best course of action.

So lets redefine a System Administrator as someone who can setup, maintain. document as well as think ahead keeping in mind future requirements, catastrophes, vulnerabilities and upgradations that a System would need.

JOB PROFILE

These are the people who make IT work.Systems administrators are the information technology employees responsible for the efficient use of networks by organizations.They ensure that the design of an organization’s computer site allows all of the components, including computers, the network, and software, to fit together and work properly.

Furthermore,they monitor and adjust performance of existing networks and continually survey the current computer site to determine future network needs.

Administrators also troubleshoot problems as reported by users and automated network monitoring systems and make recommendations for enhancements in the implementation of future servers and networks.

SKILL SETS

There is no clear cut distinction on what academic qualifications are needed for a System's Administrator. But usually people with a degree in computer science and/or with certification courses are best adept in thriving as well as understanding the intricate details that ensures professionalism in the way it is administered.

Persons interested in becoming a computer support specialist or
systems administrator must have strong problem-solving,analytical, and communication skills because troubleshooting and helping others are vital parts of the job. The constant interaction with other computer personnel, customers and employees requires systems administrators to communicate effectively on paper, via e-mail,or in person.Although they sometimes work independently, they frequently work in teams and hence they must be able to communicate effectively with other computer personnel, such as programmers and managers, as well as with users or other staff who may have no technical computer background either in person or remotely.

Strong writing skills are useful when preparing manuals for employees and customers.

Systems administrators must be able to think logically because they often deal with a number of tasks simultaneously, the ability to concentrate and pay close attention to detail is important.

Based on this we can classify System Administrators in their various stages of experience and knowledge as novice, junior, intermediary & senior System Administrators.

Since System Administration is mainly for Unix based operating systems such as Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD etc., its primary that they have a theoretical knowledge of the Unix type of Operating Systems. Recently windows is also gaining a wide acclaim and they have even started online training courses for Unix System Administrators to learn administration of Windows OS based servers.

Novice System Administrator

Primary Skills:
1. Is familiar with Unix type OS such as Linux or so and its commands/utilities at a user level; can edit files, use a shell, find users' home directories, navigate through the filesystem, and use i/o redirection.
2. Is able to follow instructions well.

Desirable:
1. Previous experience in customer support, computer
operations, system administration or another related area.
2. Motivated to advance in the profession.

Junior System Administrator

Primary skills:
1. Strong inter-personal and communication skills; capable of
training users in applications and Linux fundamentals, and
writing basic documentation.
2. High skill with of most Linux commands/utilities.Familiarity with most basic system administration tools and processes; for example, can boot/shutdown a machine, add and remove user accounts, use backup programs and fsck, maintain system database files (groups, hosts, aliases). Fundamental understanding of a UNIX-based operating system; for example,
understands job control, soft and hard links, distinctions between the kernel and the shell etc.

Desirable:
1. Familiarity with networked/distributed computing environment concepts; for example, can use the route command, add a workstation to a network, and mount remote filesystems.
2. Ability to write scripts in some administrative language (Tk, Perl, a shell).
3. Programming experience in any applicable language.

Intermediate/Advanced System Administrator

Primary skills:
1. Strong inter-personal and communication skills; capable of
suggesting purchase justifications, training users in complex
topics, making presentations to an internal audience, and
interacting positively with upper management. Independent
problem solving; self-direction.
2. Is comfortable with most aspects of UNIX systems administration; for example, configuration of mail systems, system installation and configuration, fundamentals of security, installing 3rd-party software.
3. A solid understanding of a UNIX-based operating system; understands paging and swapping, inter-process communication, devices and what device drivers do, filesystem concepts ("inode", "superblock").
4. Familiarity with fundamental networking/distributed computing environment concepts; can configure DNS,Apache,MySQL,Firewalls, can use 'dig' command for DNS query, understands basic routing concepts.
5. Ability to write scripts in some administrative language (Tk, Perl, a shell).
6. Ability to do minimal debugging and modification of C programs.

Desirable:
1. Significant programming background in any applicable
language.

Senior System Administrator

Primary skills:
1. Strong inter-personal and communication skills; capable of writing proposals or papers, acting as a vendor liaison, making presentations to customer or client audiences or professional peers, and working closely with upper management.
2. Ability to solve problems quickly and completely.
3. Ability to identify tasks which require automation and automate them.
4. A solid understanding of a UNIX-based operating system; understands paging and swapping, inter-process communication, devices and what device drivers do, filesystem concepts ("inode", "superblock"), can use performance analysis to tune systems.
5. A solid understanding of networking/distributed computing environment concepts; understands principles of routing, client/server programming, the design of consistent network-wide filesystem layouts.
6. Ability to program in an administrative language (Tk, Perl,a shell), to port C programs from one platform to another, and to write small C programs.

Desirable:
1. Extensive programming background in any applicable language.
2. Publications within the field of system administration.

Experience level to be in each grade varies from 0-1 year for Novice, 1-2 years for Junior, 2-3 years for Intermediary & 3-5 years for Senior System Administrators.

Some additional special talents such as a good knowledge in networks, routers, security of systems, RDBMS administration, spam prevention etc widely add to the effective growth of the organisation and make these professionals highly in demand.

JOB OPPURTUNITIES

Computer support specialists and systems administrators are
projected to be among the fastest growing occupations over the
2002-12 period.

Computer support specialists and Systems administrators held
about 758,000 jobs in 2002. Of these, about 507,000 were
computer support specialists and about 251,000 were network and
systems administrators. Although they worked in a wide range of industries, 35 percent of all computer support specialists and systems administrators were employed in professional and business services industries, principally in computer systems design and related services such as webhosting industries, Network Operations Centers etc.

PAY SCALE

According to Robert Half International, starting salaries in
2003 ranged from $27,500 to $56,500 for help-desk support staff,
and from $51,000 to $67,250 for more senior technical support
specialists. For Systems Administrators, starting salaries in
2003 ranged from $49,000 to $70,250.

The above statistics were for the payscales received by Support Staff working in the US. With the advent of Outsourcing, more and more US companies and webhosting industries are moving their support services to remote locations with India as a front runner, Philipines etc. By such outsourcing, these companies are able to obtain higher qualified people at one-third to one-fifth the salaries given in the US.

EPILOGUE

With the increasing demand of qualified system administrators in US not being able to be met with local people, the outsourcing boom has caught up and the cost effectiveness and quality is resulting in most companies choosing a mixed approach. With essential System Administrators hired locally and the rest being outsourced, they are able to bring a highly competitive model of business.

A System Administrator's job cannot be measured in terms similar to a computer programmer or developer. Their role and importance tend to be overlooked until one fine day when Murphy's law catches up with Client networks & servers. Thats when the difference of having a good System Administrator comes to the fore!

With the growth of the INTERNET, System Administrators are more and more being employed at Network Operation Centers and by Web Hosting Companies. So there is huge demand in having System Administrators who can work 24/7 as well as mingle well with customers and give them simple, friendly & understandable solutions to their problems.