Best business management & leadership books according to Reddit
Reddit mentions of Practice of Cloud System Administration, The: Designing and Operating Large Distributed Systems, Volume 2
Sentiment score: 11
Reddit mentions: 24
We found 24 Reddit mentions of Practice of Cloud System Administration, The: Designing and Operating Large Distributed Systems, Volume 2. Here are the top ones.
- Addison-Wesley Professional
Features:
Specs:
Height | 9.05 Inches |
Length | 7.05 Inches |
Number of items | 1 |
Release date | September 2014 |
Weight | 1.8518830008 Pounds |
Width | 1.3 Inches |
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#17 of 1,469
The "Practice of System and Network Administration"; probably a bit too early in your career but has some strong advice.
https://www.amazon.com/Practice-System-Network-Administration-Enterprise/dp/0321919165
There's also a volume 2 which is cloud/site reliability engineering related.
This book has been suggested a few times so I finally got around to reading it. I think it has some good information in it. I'm only about halfway through it, but I like it so far.
Time Management for System Administrators
Other books would be any of the social books like "How to influence people", "7 healthy habits..." Etc.
I haven't read this one yet, but It has been suggested to me if you plan to go more into management/leadership Start with Why
Other books that have I have ear marked due to being mentioned:
Also, do a search for "Books for IT Professionals" to find a lot of other suggestions.
Here are my nominations:
I haven't read them all through but have started on the Time Management book. So far so good.
This mentions The Practice of Network and System Administration, and how it could do with an update; that would be here, in The Practice of Cloud System Administration, which as I understand is effectively the 'replacement' book, at least for an approach more suited to modern infrastructure.
The senior part is more of a technical grade level and not necessarily management... granted I'm in the lead role here, it's my first time as one. All I can say is what help me spring forward at a lull at mid-level was picking up Thomas Limoncelli's books, [the sysadmin one] (https://www.amazon.com/Practice-System-Network-Administration-Enterprise/dp/0321919165/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1512041042&sr=8-1&keywords=thomas+limoncelli) and [the cloud one] (https://www.amazon.com/Practice-Cloud-System-Administration-Practices/dp/032194318X/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1512041042&sr=8-3&keywords=thomas+limoncelli) /r/sysadmin recommends them too. These are your best practice books, these tell you why to do things, not how. It will turn you from being the guy that mops the floor in a burning building into knowing when to yell, "FIRE!"
Cert wise, unless a specific company or contract requires it, I don't bother with the time and money on certs if you already have years of experience on the books. I'd probably go for a Security+ and then go for a Red Hat and/or CCNA certification as they are both prestigious. Red Hat is a big deal just by its practical application test.
If you want to go into cloud related stuff, you might want to brush up on your programming. This is what is limiting me, I have very minimal bash scripting experience coming from military in the Windows world then making a move to Linux.
Honestly, I would focus on being both as they both overlap very often unless you are in really large stovepipe enterprise environments, but you never know if you need to make a move to something smaller where you have the many hats role. I'd get your degree in something Computer science related (CS, CIS, EE, CE, etc) and then go RHCSA/CE and maybe Sec+/Net+ or instead of Net+ just go for something Cisco related. My networking is Net+ strength at best and I resent not doing better when I was younger.
EDIT: Also, if you can do the math, BS is Computer Science all the way... sysadmins are still really kind of not doing well in the degree program department, mainly because were so... trade-like I guess. Honestly, we're the new Millwrights like my dad was. We keep the factory going and fix it when production stops. It's kind of cool actually, it's nice to be able to have some kinship to my dad in that way.
Might as well get the follow up:
https://smile.amazon.com/Practice-Cloud-System-Administration-Practices/dp/032194318X
The book is good, but again a little too Google focused.
If the Practice of System and Network Administration is a bit dated, check out The Practice of Cloud System Administration: Designing and Operating Large Distributed Systems, Volume 2, September 15, 2014, by the same author.
I found the O'Reily Linux Networking book to be very informative.
https://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Linux-Network-Internals-Networking/dp/0596002556/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1543153401&sr=1-3&keywords=linux+networking
Also here
https://www.amazon.com/Practice-Cloud-System-Administration-Practices/dp/032194318X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1543153468&sr=1-1&keywords=cloud+administration
"The Practice of Cloud System Administration" is my bible. Every time I have a question like this, I find the answer in here.
https://www.amazon.com/Practice-Cloud-System-Administration-Practices/dp/032194318X
This is more of an operational problem and less of a programming problem. The troubleshooting aspect is about the only thing problem related, i.e. stack traces, perf, flame graphs, and logs on the programming side.
The operational side is how do you keep the program running adequately and the simple answer is to detect when it fails automatically, and have a new process start if its failed. So healthchecks, triggers, siem, and probably a cloud based 3-4 tier topology (load balancers, orchestration [docker], app, databases/fileshare [state]) if it needs high availability or the ability to scale.
The Practice of Cloud System Administration is a must have for a starting point in developing resilient services.
And [The Practice of Cloud System Administration: DevOps and SRE Practices for Web Services] (https://www.amazon.com/Practice-Cloud-System-Administration-Practices/dp/032194318X)
I think all of those things you've listed are valuable in their own right, however I think a bit of focus may help. First, determine what you are actually trying to accomplish because learning all those at once is not really feasible. Break that long term goal down into more meaningful steps.
For example, a good long term goal may be:
> Deploy an source controlled application on AWS using a configuration management tool, leveraging Infrastructure as Code to make it repeatable and Immutable Infrastructure to provide stability.
Breaking that down we have a series of things to learn:
These things can be done somewhat in parallel, but I would say focus your efforts will most likely provide the best value. The order in which I've listed these I find is the most useful to instruct people that are new to the area.
AWS:
Building A Scalable Web App on AWS
General Cloud Architecture
The Practice of Cloud Systems Administration
GIT
Git Book
Sysadmin, I've been doing Lead SysEng/DevOps/SRE for the past 4 years and literally have multiple written offers I'm trying to choose from right now.
I only started looking 3 weeks ago.
Learn multiple clouds(I've done the big 3 in prod and other ones for utils/tools/hobby/legacy systems), Kubernets/docker, Linux, distributed systems and ansible/puppet/chef
Read this:
https://www.amazon.com/Practice-Cloud-System-Administration-Practices/dp/032194318X/
and this:
https://www.amazon.com/Site-Reliability-Engineering-Production-Systems/dp/149192912X/
See if you can buy time for the internship offer, having multiple offers is always better :)
Is the internship paid?
Though you're asking in the context of AWS, there are many best practices for designing and operating a distributed system at scale whether it's under AWS or not. The Practice of Cloud System Administration is platform agnostic and a fantastic place to start. No referral link!
The title is a little misleading, but the latest version of The Practice Of Cloud System Administration is excellent.
Second those and add The Practice of Cloud System Administration: Designing and Operating Large Distributed Systems, Volume 2 1st Edition
> What knowledge do you carry over from the history of our field that you can't easily learn or discover now?
and
> Instead of one system to do everything for the business, I am starting to see a trend towards many specialized systems that are built to interface with other systems.
Go together nicely. This is how things were before the PC took over. What did the old-timers do? What approaches to system design need to be taken into consideration when dealing with multiple vendors that are not interoperable? What about support contract management? These things haven't changed much. And they are hard questions to answer through a book.
Books to read? Hmm. I generally suggest:
And yes these are written by old people.
Well I'll be the first one to give you generic information that you could have found with the search function.
You just do the needful.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/032194318X/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=3IXCECMPTZ0C5&coliid=IJFXHOHENJ2FH
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0321492668/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=3IXCECMPTZ0C5&coliid=I3J2AR8V86JZMD
https://www.amazon.com/dp/0596007833/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=3IXCECMPTZ0C5&coliid=I2OPTI4J0S4UG2
Good screwdriver set.
https://www.ifixit.com/Store/Tools/64-Bit-Driver-Kit/IF145-299
A network tone tester in case you need to map out your network and document everything. Also functions as a basic cable tester.
https://www.amazon.com/Fluke-Networks-MT-8200-60-KIT-IntelliTone-Toner/dp/B00N2S6RPY/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1473701817&sr=8-5&keywords=fluke+networks+tester
A punch down tool.
https://www.amazon.com/TRENDnet-Punch-Krone-Blade-TC-PDT/dp/B0000AZK4D/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473702091&sr=8-1&keywords=punchdown
An ethernet crimper.
https://www.amazon.com/TRENDnet-RJ-45-RJ-12-RJ-11-TC-CT68/dp/B0000AZK4G/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473702137&sr=8-1&keywords=ethernet+crimper
A quick cable stripper.
https://www.amazon.com/Monoprice-Stripper-Cutter-Cables-107051/dp/B0069LRBU6/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1473702190&sr=8-3&keywords=ethernet+stripper
A usb hard drive dock.
https://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-External-Duplicator-Function-EC-HDD2/dp/B00IKC14OG/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1473702021&sr=8-2&keywords=usb+hard+drive+dock
A notebook.
https://www.amazon.com/Rhodia-Meeting-Book-Made-France/dp/B001DCDSW6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1473702220&sr=8-1&keywords=rhodia+meeting+book
Your necessities may vary, this applies to more of a one-man shop, and there's plenty of other things you'll want to get that I don't have listed here depending on your job.
I dunno how much you should get paid.
Stay on-prem.
Unfortunately, you're asking a very broad and vague set of questions. All of those topics you're asking about are an issue to be managed even if you're only using a single cloud provider, let alone multiple ones. Books have been written on these topics. Read those books and build the answers that apply to your job. That's the best way to handle those challenges. There's no silver bullet, not for any one of those topics.
Here's a good starting point, especially if you literally don't know where to start.
https://www.amazon.com/Practice-Cloud-System-Administration-Practices/dp/032194318X/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_t_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=7D6GJ0MDAF0DA469WJK1
Senior Level Software Engineer Reading List
Read This First
Fundamentals
Development Theory
Philosophy of Programming
Mentality
Software Engineering Skill Sets
Design
History
Specialist Skills
DevOps Reading List
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/032194318X/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o08_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
It sounds like you're trying to use technology to solve a problem that correct and useful documentation and processes would solve.
You don't want your team to have to re-invent the wheel every-time a patch is required.
Here is a useful book I would recommend.
Book
Good for you, you're seeking out your knowledge and it sounds like you're dedicated to learning as well.
You won't get a good sense of what we do alone, especially because it is a very diverse field and can include specializations in storage, virtualization, databases, helpdesk, desktop support, mobile device management, security (which in itself has a number of specializations), operations, project management, monitoring and reporting, copper and fiber networking, firewall management, programming or developing... See my point? You can read a little more on the fields here
Anyway, if your computer is capable I would suggest you at least familiarize yourself with SOME of what we do, try and get Hyper-V running and learn some of the Powershell commands for interacting with the VMs, then use those VMs to run some *nix stuff and learn how to use those.
There is honestly a ton of free stuff, books, documentation and such available for you, you just have to know where to look and what you might want to see. The search bar here sucks but use the google advanced search for this subreddit and there is a ton of stuff to find, here's a few examples you may find useful:
... I've got literally dozens and dozens of relevant links that you might find useful. My suggestion is to start wide and shallow and figure out what you might interesting, then explore that further. If you want career advice I would suggest you focus on programming and *nix administration (there's a great comment on here in the last year with a path of things to accomplish) as these would give you the greatest variety of skills to create programs, apps, shell scripts, admin servers, etc... Also, don't neglect your soft skills or negotiation abilities as they are very valuable in helping you complete work when not working alone. Good negotiating skills will help ensure you don't get a $14/hr job when you're doing the work of a $70k