Some discussion with some colleagues made me consider how someone who was lazy / inexperienced / crushed for time might be tempted to solve a web app problem. If you’ve performed the following operation…. just sit in the corner and think about what you’ve done.
One year has come and gone! In early 2011 I started a challenge to all interested Systems Administrators to add 10,000 points to their existing ServerFault reputation. Quite a few people signed up for it, but how many actually made it to the finish line? Oh, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Let’s talk about what our participants will win.
How many IT workers, in the course of being a SysAdmin / Developer / Frobnosticator, have come up against a seemingly insurmountable quandary? If you are in that category, how many times have you written out your woes in a forum post, only to have the problem (and solution) become clear to you as you’re nearly ready to post your question? I thought it was just me and my strange brain, however it appears that it’s a common experience.
This experience is so common for me that the main reason why I even have a blog is because I so frequently find solutions as a result of writing / talking out my problems. There is a name for this kind of behavior within the IT realm. It’s commonly known as “Rubber Duck Debugging.” I think all SysAdmins, IT workers in general and human beings both near and far would see immense benefits from calmly talking out their problems. To encourage this end, the prize for our winners will be handsome Luxury Ducks made by a company called bud (intentional lower case ‘b’).
Specifically, those who achieved their goal of adding 10,000 points in the year 2011 will receive a large luxury duck of their choice:
Those who achieved at least half of their 10,000 point goal will receive a mini luxury duck of their choice:
Finally, we get to our well deserving winners. We only have two participants who added 10,000 points to their January 1st 2011 reputation levels. Those two winners are:
We have a few participants who made a valiant effort to get to 10,000 points, but only passed the halfway mark:
The whole goal of the ServerFault / Stack Exchange challenge was to encourage professional growth, community involvement, knowledge sharing and some old fashioned fun. I hope it achieved its goal, but only you can be the proper judge of that.
Congratulations to all of those involved! Your contributions are top notch and help to teach the next generation of professional IT workers and even the current crowd. No one knows it all and every one of us can help another to learn a bit more and become a bit better.
Thank you for what you did in 2011 and what you continue to do.
Will there be a 2012 challenge? Will it be the same format? Same prizes? Same rules?
Stay tuned…
…and keep answering questions on ServerFault.
Are you a SysAdmin? Are you also a gamer? Do you use the Steam platform? If you answered yes to all three of those questions, you have a new group that you can join. It’s the ServerFault Steam group.
While the group’s name and logo show strong ties to ServerFault, one does not have to be a member of ServerFault to join the group (although it might help for familiarity’s sake). The group is new, with no home on the web beyond the steam group page nor is there an event calendar. However, we’re still young and the opportunities are limitless.
Join up, help out and we can help… umm… decommission some users. Load your LARTs and ready your PODs. It’s game time!
Seriously, Cisco Press. What is your problem? I used to think you were incompetent. Now I think you’re deliberately evil. They explicitly stated that transport layer traffic that uses UDP is called a “datagram.” That stands to reason. After all, UDP is a TLA for “User Datagram Protocol.” Then, immediately afterwards, they state (emphasis mine):
However, this book refers to data formed in the transport layer as a segment, data at the network layer as a datagram or packet, and data at the link layer as a frame.
No rhyme. No reason. Just fiat. “Hey, we know that it’s standard practice to call a specific type of Layer 4 traffic a datagram, but we’re gonna call Layer 3 traffic a datagram. Or we might also call it a packet too, JUST ‘CAUSE WE’RE GANGSTAH LIKE THAT!”
For those wondering, I’m brushing up on my networking knowledge by going through “Interconnecting Cisco Network Devices, Part 1 (ICND1): CCNA Exam 640-802 and ICND1 Exam 640-822 (2nd Edition)” It’s already caused me to make the first part in this series. A series which will likely have many sequels.
I’m not even halfway through it and already finding some annoying inconsistencies. I thought I left things like this behind when I stopped reading MS Press books. Apparently vendor endorsed books have a disproportionate amount of fail in them.
I’ve been researching web-based server control panels for a few months now. Most people will likely think of cPanel when they hear the phrase “server control panel” and have visions of web hosts dancing in their heads. Server control panels can be used for much more than web hosting, however. Control panels can allow people to administer systems with the click of a button having little interaction with the gorier details. Some might think that kind of scenario is categorically wrong, but I disagree. There are some *NIX oriented colleagues that I’d tackle before they got too close to a Windows server. For them, WebsitePanel might be a better option. There are also some folks that have need of their own server(s) and are happy to perform their own button mashing to reboot services and etc. I’m reminded of Jordan Sissel’s SysAdvent post “Share Skills and Permissions with Code.” In those scenarios, server control panels are excellent.
The nature of server control panels makes them most desirable by web hosting companies. As such, most of the web-based server control panels that I have found are slanted in that direction and might take some creativity to warp to your needs. Others appear to be more easily used as a general “E-Z Mode” SysAdmin front-end (Open Panel comes to mind). Don’t discard a control panel simply because it is slanted to web hosting. Some of them are much fuller than that.
Here is my list of web-based server control panels:
I’d like for this to become a definitive list of web-based control panels (regardless of their focus; server management or web hosting). Basically, if it can manage a server or services and has a web front-end, I’d like to know about it. I’d appreciate any social shares. Likes, +1s, Tweets, Stumbles, Digg’s and etc. are awesome. If you know of any control panels that I’ve missed (active or defunct, since I love history), or if you spot a control panel that I mis-categorized, please let me know in the comments below.
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