Happy sysadmin day

Yes, you did read that correctly; today, Friday 29th July is System Administrator Appreciation Day, the 12th since its inception.

For 364 days of the year sysadmins toil away unappreciated, their arcane skills only really being noticed when a problem needs sorting out (and nobody can do any work at all until the sysadmin’s done her or his stuff). And we all rely on them these days – some too much, as is evident from the Description section of the relevant sysadmin man page:

sysadmin takes care of everything, is generally harangued, must be supplied with coffee, chocolate, and alcohol in order to function properly, cannot be exposed to direct sunlight and must not be allowed to have a life.

If you think you are a sysadmin, you might like to try this little Sysadmin Purity Test (a mere 555 questions).

As I write our own admins here are busy preparing a mobile LTSP suite for a jaunt to Walesby in Nottinghamshire for the Woodcraft Folk annual gathering. In our case this involves tweaking the LTSP server configuration in a final fine-tuning before it goes on its way in an hour or so’s time.

So thank you sysadmins everywhere. It’s nearly beer o’clock and I’ll buy you a drink in gratitude for your services… if you happen to be at my watering hole at the time.