Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab
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@scottalanmiller said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
@Breffni-Potter said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
Now here's another question...would you let an interviewer see your lab setup? Or would it just become another interview question that you blag your way through.
How would one go about doing that, though, I wonder?
SSH in from my phone...
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What ever happened to "work / life balance"? I don't have a home lab because I unplug when I leave the office. Wouldn't mind having a lab to dick around with between 9am-6pm, but I have no desire to have noisy ass servers blaring on in my home. So I guess I'd be fuct if I ever went to find a new job?
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@Breffni-Potter said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
@scottalanmiller said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
@Breffni-Potter said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
Now here's another question...would you let an interviewer see your lab setup? Or would it just become another interview question that you blag your way through.
How would one go about doing that, though, I wonder?
What would you say if I told you I have a lab and I don't have the tools to manage it remotely? Now at a standard interview this would be unfair to spring it on someone but if they are pre-warned before the day to bring their laptop/tools?
Assuming that the lab is of the types of things that could be accessed remotely, was designed for that purpose, etc. But a good lab would often be being torn down and rebuilt (or likely would be, I guess) so assessing a "current state" as opposed to what it is used for would be, I think, bad.
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@RojoLoco said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
What ever happened to "work / life balance"? I don't have a home lab because I unplug when I leave the office. Wouldn't minf having a lab to dick around with between 9am-6pm, but I have no desire to have noisy ass servers blaring on in my home. So I guess I'd be fuct if I ever went to find a new job?
I actually think that a lab is critical to having a work/life balance. Without one we become beholden to our jobs and lose the critical bargaining power that we need.
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I've had labs over the years. Currently my home PC is my lab as I primarily live on my laptop. I don't have anything as dedicated as a server as I have in the past.
I do have a website, though it's really more a storage repository than anything.
My day job does allow me extra resources and some time to build things I want to play with, so the need for that at home are greatly reduced.
though I spend more time on ML and less time than I should actually playing in my VMs.
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I do not have, a home lab. I have never had a home lab. I would enjoy the resources, but honestly don't know what I would do with that investment in technology.
I've run a BBS, a few hosted websites in the past, but never had the financial resources to own a decked out server box.
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I think one of Scott's points is that you don't need a decked out box to make a lab happen.
I had an old 486 running Novell Netware what seems like 100 years ago, and a Pentium running Windows NT 4.0 This was when P II's were the rage, or was it PIIIs?
10+ year old hardware used to be completely usable for most lab setups. now with Virtualization, you need something a bit newer, x64 and supports virtualization, but that started becoming very common 8 or so years ago, so there's that. But real servers aren't needed either. A desktop can run VMWare ESXi or XenServer or Hyper-V just fine (assuming the virtualization hardware is there). Other factors will limit the number of VMs you can run, but hey, this is a lab.
Then today we can get $5/month VMs online - so there are options.
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@gjacobse said
never had the financial resources to own a decked out server box.
My first ever lab, was virtual box running on a poor desktop with far too little ram and a 1TB hard drive.
Based on what I did with that, I learnt a lot more than I would have done if I did not even try using what I had and with AWS and other services becoming so cheap now, if you need performance servers, just rent them for a few hours, do a test and then turn them off.
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@Dashrender said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
I think one of Scott's points is that you don't need a decked out box to make a lab happen.
right. my first ever lab was old 486 desktops running Linux. For some people a home lab might only be some juniper switches because they are networking people, not systems. For others it's just having another desktop to work on desktop stuff (probably for people doing desktop support.) FOr some of us it's SANs and NAS and all kinds of stuff because that's what you need to learn storage. It's not the same for everyone.
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@Dashrender said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
I think one of Scott's points is that you don't need a decked out box to make a lab happen.
I had an old 486 running Novell Netware what seems like 100 years ago, and a Pentium running Windows NT 4.0 This was when P II's were the rage, or was it PIIIs?
10+ year old hardware used to be completely usable for most lab setups. now with Virtualization, you need something a bit newer, x64 and supports virtualization, but that started becoming very common 8 or so years ago, so there's that. But real servers aren't needed either. A desktop can run VMWare ESXi or XenServer or Hyper-V just fine (assuming the virtualization hardware is there). Other factors will limit the number of VMs you can run, but hey, this is a lab.
Then today we can get $5/month VMs online - so there are options.
@Dashrender said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
Then today we can get $5/month VMs online - so there are options.
And that's the price to keep it online and running 24x7. You can make scripts and build them when you need them and tear them down when you don't to learn more, cheaper than even the $5 mark!
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@Breffni-Potter said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
@gjacobse said
never had the financial resources to own a decked out server box.
My first ever lab, was virtual box running on a poor desktop with far too little ram and a 1TB hard drive.
Based on what I did with that, I learnt a lot more than I would have done if I did not even try using what I had and with AWS and other services becoming so cheap now, if you need performance servers, just rent them for a few hours, do a test and then turn them off.
If you qualify decades old equipment and desktops, then I suppose in a sorts I have a mini as I have a Dell PE2900 minus drives I want to get back online... and a Dell Optiplex 330 running Linux Mint 17.x which while it mainly runs Pithos for Pandora - I use it (and my NTG desktop) for learning more about Linux and CLI.
But I don't 'rate that' as 'lab level' arrangement.
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Hi,
I used to have a home-lab .. but, no more .. now, with kids , I need all the space ...@ home, I just work from a laptop... The lab is @ the office only ...
Also, I would not discount a candidate just cause she/he does not have a home lab.. I typically hire someone based on their, attitude, real-world experience, real-world skills etc .. ... Infact, most technicians (network, desktop, server) I hire probably did not / or don't have a desktop or laptop, leave a home-lab. Simply, because they can't afford one, or they lack the space... On the other hand, most developers & designers I hire, have atleast a desktop or laptop ..
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I don't have a home lab.
As a single income family, we have other priorities.However, I do have a laptop, a NAS, a desktop and a toy VPS (that I don't talk about).
When I upgrade the CPU/MoBo/RAM in my PC (opted for the graphics card recently), I will be using the Desktop as a lab of sorts with Hyper-V and a VM to play around with... but I'm not intending on having a pile-o-tin sitting in my house to have as a lab. Far too noisy and expensive to run. -
Not hiring someone solely because they don't have a home lab is a bit petty.
I see the value in having one but I still see it as a "nice to have". -
@Veet said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
Also, I would not discount a candidate just cause she/he does not have a home lab.. I typically hire someone based on their, attitude,
That's a key point that I think that a lab gauges, attitude. It shows that someone is really dedicated.
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What about home offices? What about just a computer at home?
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@scottalanmiller said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
@Veet said in Would You Hire Someone in IT Who Does Not Have a Home Lab:
Also, I would not discount a candidate just cause she/he does not have a home lab.. I typically hire someone based on their, attitude,
That's a key point that I think that a lab gauges, attitude. It shows that someone is really dedicated.
umm.... well ... I kind of agree, and disagree ... Yes, attitude matters the most ... But, what if a person has the right attitude, but does not have resources ? I know so many deserving professionals, who don't have access to resources, simply because they just can't afford, lack the space, etc ... I've been there ... When I was starting off, I couldn't even afford a desktop ...
Most IT pros I know of, who have some really fancy knowledge and/or certifications , do so on the company's dime .... They learn and practice, at the office ... That's precisely, why we have a lab @ the office - Work as a team, learn as a team, share the knowledge, bounce ideas, off each other... We prefer that our team-mates, learn and practice @ the office... We encourage this, and provide the resources (whatever we can afford).. .
A home lab is something nice to have , but it's not a must have ...
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Sorry not read all the reply's but to answer the question, depends really.
I can't afford a home lab or even a cloud lab, but that doesn't stop me learning "out of hours". Example if i wanted to learn something new and don't have time at work i'm happy to spin up a VM or two on my laptop with Virtual Box get them working then transfer to the test server at work that i can remote into to carry on testing later.
Would i hire someone yes i would, as long as the are keen to learn and willing to play at home as me even on a Virtual Box or similar that would do for me
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I fall in the "used to have" category. Cut my teeth on my basement lab where I took every scrap PC/Server i could find and made it something. I had an old 486 (back in the day) that became a NT 4.0 machine that barely ran. A Laptop with a broken screens became an exchange 5.5 servers. Network was a scrap barely functioning 3com hub, and i managed to get at the time Proxy server running on the NT box for dial-up "cached" Intenret access. Today i WISH I could have that all back but with wife and 2 kids, I've got a very tiny corner of the garage, so much of my learning is either VM's on my laptop (windows 10 is a GODSEND here with real Hyper-V)or ugh cloudatcost (yes got suckered into that ponzi scheme, never again) and then finding time to play which may only be 1 or 2 hours a week. But the passion to learn new items and do it hands on is still there and I get very excited when I actually get my hour or so to "play". I am in agreement with hiring someone who has at least similar passion and maybe not a true home "lab" but has the for lack of a better term "desire" to have a lab environment. We have an employee here we brought in as a intern. At the time, he asked if we had any broken computers and told us he was setting up (and I quote) "this FreeBsd thing called PfSense because I hear I don't need to buy a router it just works and I want to play with it" I immediately recommended we hire him. he's now our top network engineer with the home lab that I drool over
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I go back to the others who look for attitude. Even bringing in someone greenfield... If you get excited about technology or the prospect of having your own lab (at home or work), I take that as a good sign.
