Getting started with servers

hargi

hargi

hargi

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19 Jul 2006
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I thought id get more replyies in here but feel free to move it to another area if needed.
A chance may be coming up at work to get more involved with Servers our dedicated server guy is off sick dunno if he will return. We have technitions that know about them and do the day to day stuff with them. But from next year i will need my own dedicated server as i will be incharge of our Moodle.
So would like to know and be able to fix anything that goes wrong asap.
But also in the office there used to be a guy that would be able to make test servers straight away with out having to call the techs, this guy has left so i have seen a gap that i could fill.
Couple of questions.
Is it worth trying to go this route?
How complicated is it to learn? How long?

And how long approx should it take to set up a Live Communications Server (test server)

TIA
 
Get a couple of old PCs, or failing that a decent PC with VMware.
Set up a couple of Servers/VMs with the Server OS installed.
Start playing. I'd recommend learning set up a domain first.

This is how I started learning
 
oddjob62 said:
Get a couple of old PCs, or failing that a decent PC with VMware.
Set up a couple of Servers/VMs with the Server OS installed.
Start playing. I'd recommend learning set up a domain first.

This is how I started learning
Click to expand...

Good advice. Live kit is NOT for learning on.

Just tinker about, surf up information, buy the books, even get on the training courses.

As for how long it takes, well, for ever. Don't ever expect to stop learning.

LCS can be a pain to get going, it needs AD configured in a certain way, and you need to have it populated with the SIP information on each user, and the SIP client (communicator 2005 or 2007) gives nack all in the way of useful diagnostic data. There is a Diagnostic SIP client that is fantastic for this. Which is nice.
 
Weird question. You will never learn everything there is to know... General Systems Admin is pretty straight forward in general though.. especially these days now there are plenty of GUI tools to help you. I would do what oddjob said and get a few old pc's/virtual machines and have a play around.
 
hargi said:
I thought id get more replyies in here but feel free to move it to another area if needed.
A chance may be coming up at work to get more involved with Servers our dedicated server guy is off sick dunno if he will return. We have technitions that know about them and do the day to day stuff with them. But from next year i will need my own dedicated server as i will be incharge of our Moodle.
So would like to know and be able to fix anything that goes wrong asap.
But also in the office there used to be a guy that would be able to make test servers straight away with out having to call the techs, this guy has left so i have seen a gap that i could fill.
Couple of questions.
Is it worth trying to go this route?
How complicated is it to learn? How long?

And how long approx should it take to set up a Live Communications Server (test server)

TIA
Click to expand...

Microsoft Virtual PC is free!

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/downloads/virtualpc/default.mspx
 
vmvmvmvmvm!

Moodle can require a lot of ram though - ours has 8GBs in there along with a quaddie. Seems our LEA wants Sharepoint however so it will get wipped at some point and a couple more servers introduced to it..
 
Moodle? Oh how I don't miss working in Education. eThis and eThat. I take it your LEA want SharePoint so they can run something like Capita's Learning Gateway on top of it?

Day to day running of servers is like shooting fish in a barrel, it is the initial config (getting it right that is, any idiot can install an OS) and figuring out what the hell is wrong in a hurry under pressure that is hard. The former is easy to learn by study the later is more of a gift.

What's your current skill level and what do you do? Best not to go tinkering why the Sys Admin is off.

Oh and the next time somebody mentions SharePoint run as fast as possible in the other direction.
 
Nothing at all wrong with sharepoint, of course the place i am at is managing to get it all wrong. Its making the UK technical people put our docs on the sharepoint system, so far so good, where shall we locate the sharepoint server ?

Sweden.

That'll be nice and slow then.
 
Currently im the admin for fronter here, the VLE we buy in but we want to go with moodle which i dont mind gives me moer to do and hopefully more money. and yeah were moving to sharepoint 2007, which i dont have a lot to do with at the moment but i know my colleges are finding it a bit tedius.
At the moment im admining fronter and another bought in system that runs on a moodle platform, along with this i do a bit of webdesign and making e learnign stuff.
I know that my boss when we get moodle wants me to be responsible for that server as were short staffed on techs. I dont want to go poking about with any of the other servers like student works and teachers work or any of that stuff.
Current skill level well not really high in anything server wise, can set up an apatche lite server :P and that. Im more web/media but dont mind getting involved with that stuff.
The setting up a live Communiations server test would be as a favor for someone in the office... best to keep away from that then??
Lumpeh what config is your moodle server?
Lordsplodge take it you like working better out of education how much better is it?
 
hargi said:
Lordsplodge take it you like working better out of education how much better is it?
Click to expand...

The whole working environment where I worked had a distinct them and us culture between Teaching and Support Staff. The final straw was when they put an idiot (who happened to be a teacher) in charge of me and he kept making the worlds most stupid decisions that i then had to support/make work. He was never made culpable because he was a Teacher and the whole culture was to blame support staff.

I am not saying all schools are like that but from my experience with people in Support in Education it isn't far from the truth for most locations.

I still work for Local Government in the Fire Service so the pay still sucks but at least you are treated like an adult here!

Stolly said:
Nothing at all wrong with sharepoint
Click to expand...

Nothing right with SharePoint. Bloated, complicated, top heavy. Sure it can be integrated quite well with other Microsoft technologies but most places can have a cheaper, easier to setup Intranet by avoiding SharePoint.


Berserker said:
I haven't tried admining the server side but the sharepoint client we have (presumably the standard one) is satan-spawn and best avoided.
Click to expand...

Thank your lucky stars then. Server Side is super Satan-spawn.
 
Sharepoint
Click to expand...

*vomits*

Sharepoint is horrible, horrible, bloated, ugly, difficult, and crap to use.

Not as bad as Oracle's Time Management/ Expenses software though... THAT is bad!
 
OP: I'm currently have the problem as you, 3years ago I really wanted to get involved with Linux/Unix/Windows servers so I picked up lots of old cheap old PCs where I could & plenty of library books.

Now 3yrs later I use Unix/Win2003 on a daily basis at work.

You never know it all so your always learning, but you may want to look at how much it's worth to you getting these skills and how much of a salary increase this will net you.

But now my skills are worth something to the company I work for, it's beneficial for me to purchase myself a new dual quad ESX server and several cisco routers/switches, as I know I'll get this back later through salary increases.
 
Thanks ThomP. Anything i can do to make me worth more money or more enployable is good.
Just installed virtualPC and going to install 2003 server on there and have a play
 
Hi,

I've not used the program you mention, however I've used vmWare Workstation and it was very good. On my work PC, 160GB SATAII, C2D 2.13Ghz, 2GB DDR2 667 I can run three instances of Win23k OK.

Keep up the learning dude, if you can you should evolve your learning around a hobby or something you enjoy. Keeps the interest there and the want for success & no failure.
 
Right got a virtual Pc and a Virtual 2003 Server set up that can see each other. There both in vinnila states.
What should i do now? What would be the easyiest thing to get me learning? ANy good tutorials or sites?
 
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