Sunday of my Life

There’s an old saying that I heard many a week ago now: “The first day of your first networking job will serve to show you how little you actually know”. Boy, how true that is, especially when applied to me.

I’ve been lax in my blogging as of late. I simply have had neither the time nor the inclination to write anything worth reading, so I simply haven’t bothered. So, quick update:

Last week I went for a job interview for the position of Network Administrator with . Friday I received an email telling me that I had been accepted to the position and could I start on Monday. So ended just a little more than 15 months of unemployment of one kind or another. Today being Monday, I just got home from my first day of work. I enjoyed it, truth be told. It’s a great working environment with an easy-going air to it and I work with a good bunch of people…and a golden retriever. Keeleigh is..well…she’s big, that all I can say…but very good natured and placid, so she’s good to have around. She drains any tension out of the air. More workplaces should have their own dog.

I get picked up from the station by my boss this morning so I wouldn’t have to walk all the way there (about 3 - 4 km). I believe this ‘pick Adrian up from the station’ thing will be a regular occurrence, which can only be a good thing in my mind. I really don’t relish walking all that way every Monday morning and all that way back every Monday night; particularly when I start at 8:30 and finish at about 5:30 - 6:00. So anyway, got in there today and basically set straight to work. First order of business was to go around and install an antivirus and update the definitions on each of the network nodes and the server, because two of the computers were recently trashed by viruses, so this spectrum of security had been going wanting for a while. Next up I moved two printers around and redistributed shares around the network so the appropriate people had the appropriate printer installed and set to default. That went off without a hitch (almost…one person managed to sever their network cable with their shoe so I had to make a new one, but that’s ok, I enjoy that kind of thing), or so I thought. Within an hour we’d had 5 paper jams (that’s a hardware problem, I know, but still frustrating), and several cases of corrupted drivers (ie: the printer prints gobbledy-gook). The corrupted drivers got me worried, because they weren’t always corrupted, and it wasn’t all on one computer. The fault appeared to have fixed itself though, and if it happens again they have instructions on what to do.

The galling part of the day was the 8 1/2 hours that I spent setting up the Active Directory, DHCP and DNS framework on the server so that they could have:

1. Individual User Accounts
2. A Transparent Section for their R&D team
3. separate resource allocations for the different divisions
4. Personal files stored and backed up with the server
5. Intra-office messaging for management to be able to send messages to individual staff members and admin to be able to do a general broadcast messages
6. For the network to actually be at least mildly secure

That’s a lot, believe me, but all very doable, and I spent 8 1/2 hours today setting up the framework for it so it could be implemented and we could all move onto a more secure future. Doable? Yes. Easy? No. Successful? Hell no. I don’t know exactly what it was I did wrong, but something I did, or probably all of it, caused all kinds of havoc. The front desk could print to the new printer on everything except the application they really needed to. Accounts couldn’t print at all (I solved that one though, bad part was that I don’t know how). The call centre kept dropping off the network and every time the manager tried to hook into the server it crashed with the dreaded BSoD, which just screwed up everyone. *Sigh*..I really wish I knew what I did wrong, but I don’t. I’m going to talk to FunkyTeacher about this tomorrow and see if he can tell me where I erred. So the last half hour of my 10 hour day was spent undoing everything I’d done on the server that day and attempting to restore it to which I was partially successful in. The manager still couldn’t do a remote desktop session with the server without crashing it. Oh well, she can walk over to the cupboard to do what she has to do for the next 4 days until I get back next Monday and have the pleasure of backing up the server, wiping everything and starting all over again. This time, with FunkyTeacher’s assistance, I will hopefully get it right. That is, if he can tell me where I went wrong, cause I sure as hell don’t know.

I did have a good day though, all-in-all, and they didn’t fire me for being such an incompetent, so I suppose it isn’t all bad. Estimated income for this week, after tax: $550.65, which is not bad, compared to the $104.50 a week I get now on government benefits.

Oh yeah, NOTE TO SELF: Contact Centrelink and tell them I now have a job and exactly where they can stick their forms, their phone-calls and their careers counseling.

I think maybe it’s time I tell you guys about the teacher at my school who helps me survive all of Fuckrag’s crap. I’m going to call him Funkyteacher.

This guy’s really cool, and not in the nerdy, teasing kind of way. He’s an eminently strange guy, makes very bad jokes and is of undefinable racial background. He’s short, dark and ocassionally funny, but my god this guy knows things. He knows IT, he knows chemistry, and he knows people. He’s great at listening to things and is always willing to give you a go. What can I say? I like the guy! He’s one of the first teachers here I actually liked, and I have always continued to like him. He’s one of those people who’s undeniable, undefinably cool. It’s not like he tries, it’s just what he is (which makes him even cooler).

Heh…I’m babbling. I love this guy’s classes…there’s always some funny moments, particularly since he’s realised that Fuckrag is a wanker, and so now makes fun of Fuckrag’s habit of making pirate noises when he’s thinking, and so on. I’m having fun, I can tell you now

FunkyTeacher is our programming teacher, and so we’re getting lectures on what would normally be some very dry subject matter, how to open, read, write and close files in C++. Boooooor-ing you may say; and under normal sircumstances you would be dead right, but not in FunkyTeacher’s classes. He has a way of presenting material to his classes that, no matter how dull and dry the subject matter may be, engages you and gets you interested. He could be presenting a detailed treatise on methods of cow manure sorting and manure compost’s effects on soil pH, and he would still be able to make it interesting. You would still come away from the lesson with the feeling that you’ve learned something worth knowing.

You will meet few good teachers in your life, even fewer who are good at teaching and teaching worthwhile things. Tresure them when they come along, becuase I can guarantee you they won’t be there forever.