I’ve been in the sysadmin game for 16 long, torturous years. Some years good, some years bad. I’ve administered systems as diverse as Solaris, Linux, FreeBSD, Windows and OS X between across three different industries: ISP (including dial-up and broadband access), web hosting, and film/TV post-production VFX.
Today is the one day you non-sysadmins should bow down and worship us. Give us cakes. Send us loving gifts. Massage our foreheads. Give us more money. Promote us to Chief Vice President in Charge of Everything.
We make your infrastructures tick along, we make your web sites work, your emails get delivered, your Facebook statuses updated, your blog post full of amusing pictures of cats doing strange things with dogs reach tens of people, your YouTube video of you miming along to pop songs before the RIAA sues your arse, your film & TV visual effects rendered on time, and just generally make the whole bloomin’ internet keep going.
We are the necessary evil of your organisation. We are the backroom boys and girls. We are part of your IT support, your development team, your go-to-guy or girl for anything that’s more complicated than a light switch. We are the people that laugh at your unrealistic expectations given a stupid budget to start off with.
When things go wrong you curse and abuse us. When things work as they should, you ignore us. When things go spectacularly well, you STILL ignore us. But not today.
We are system administrators. Hear us compile kernels.
Happy System Administrator Appreciation Day everybody!