Is There No Base of IT Knowledge?
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@Carnival-Boy said:
Not really because malicious sites wouldn't be ranked high enough to appear near the top of searches. I may be clueless on DNS but am pretty good on Google
That's generally pretty true. Google does a decent job of preventing that. But only decent, it's easy for things to still slip through.
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@scottalanmiller said:
Maybe part if it was that I came from the era of books.
This. We must have visited the bookstore hundreds of times, and usually walked away with a stack of reading material. I still maintain a fairly large bookshelf. My job as a software engineer requires that I be a master of Google-Fu, but whenever I want to learn a new technology for real, I almost have to get it from a book. There is little deep knowledge that can be imparted by reading a blog article or Wikipedia page.
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@AndyW said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Maybe part if it was that I came from the era of books.
This. We must have visited the bookstore hundreds of times, and usually walked away with a stack of reading material. I still maintain a fairly large bookshelf. My job as a software engineer requires that I be a master of Google-Fu, but whenever I want to learn a new technology for real, I almost have to get it from a book. There is little deep knowledge that can be imparted by reading a blog article or Wikipedia page.
True that.
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@AndyW everyone is coming out of the woodwork today!
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@AndyW said:
This. We must have visited the bookstore hundreds of times, and usually walked away with a stack of reading material.
It's true. We went there like normal people go out for coffee. It was a few times, every week. And that was for a period of years. And we would make the rounds of book stores in town to look for bargains or a broader selection. I will still hitting the local bookstores even after I moved to Texas and that was 2010. I remember trying to find a remaining bookstore to shop at at that point, but there were really none left with any selection.
That era of knowing every author, every series, release schedules, etc. was very different than today. I rarely talk to an IT pro that buys any books, let alone dozens every year.
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Wow hello @AndyW long time no see!
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@scottalanmiller I only use books that are given to me. The last book I bought was how to use Microsoft Access 97. I have several on the shelf now about PhotoShop, and I have several for applications that no longer exist. Friends know that my only computer cert is for Commodore Repair, but I have taken a couple of MCSE courses back in 1997-1999.
I do have a good knowledge of math and object relationships, and I have a good understanding of database structures, and it helps to have a solid base of deductive reasoning which I believe are key to success in IT. -
I forgot to mention that my formal education is in Music (Bachelor of Education) and Educational Administration. I firmly believe the elements of structure found in music lead to success in IT. My interests were piqued by Moog.
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@dengelhardt said:
I forgot to mention that my formal education is in Music (Bachelor of Education) and Educational Administration. I firmly believe the elements of structure found in music lead to success in IT. My interests were piqued by Moog.
Mine too, I went to school for music performance.
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Hey there, @Minion-Queen
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Yeah - so often the articles correct answer is often written by people who just screwed around with it until it works. I remember looking at an article on a Wordpress site that had been marked as the correct answer for allowing you to write to the folder for themes and updates. It was for a Linux box and they said to change the folder permissions to 777, worked every time.
I was like - you do realize that allows EVERYONE on the web to write to the folder? Don't worry about it - just works. I was like I bet it does. Anyone have any hacking problems? Many solutions out there are hacks at best and you really need to read deeper. Or research on your own at least. Many training videos are dated or do not work at all. Although I have come up with my own solutions with people's suggestions. Just remember to take them with a grain of salt. -
As I mentioned, I've never read a book on IT. I have occasionally bought them with good intentions though. The main use they get is for monitor stands
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In 98 I read Fire in the Valley (the making of the personal computer) and a book by Peter Norton, might be called Introduction to computers. These two books gave me the insight to the PC as a whole and much more. I think it was a great base to move from user to tech.
Over the years I read the 2003 Server book and have Googled my eyes off and practicing what I have read when relevant to work. I have not bought many books since. I have allowed hands on training and Google to be my guide, thus my limited knowledge about VPN. But then again I have not needed to know or need to use VPN since I started in 2003.
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I've probably read over 300 IT books and have many more as references. Maybe several times more than that. I've given away many hundreds of books. I have nearly a hundred books in my digital library now which I only switched to about a year ago. So I am still accumulating new ones very quickly. I don't read nearly as much as I used to, but not nearly as much is written anymore either. I still read regularly, though.
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I find Youtube a better learning tool than books. Watching someone doing something is easier to follow than reading about it, especially with GUI interfaces which can be hard to describe with the written word. I watched Jeffrey Snover demo Powershell for over an hour and I really, really enjoyed it, whereas I find reading a book on Powershell pretty hard going. Whether I really learnt anything from the video, I'm not sure.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
I find Youtube a better learning tool than books. Watching someone doing something is easier to follow than reading about it, especially with GUI interfaces which can be hard to describe with the written word. I watched Jeffrey Snover demo Powershell for over an hour and I really, really enjoyed it, whereas I find reading a book on Powershell pretty hard going. Whether I really learnt anything from the video, I'm not sure.
You and I are the opposite then. I can't learn by videos. I can't focus enough on them. I used to be able to learn via instructor, but my ADHD has made that dang near impossible. I learn best usually with a book, a person acting as a guide, and me actually doing whatever it is I'm supposed to be learning.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
Holy Shit! How big are your pockets? o_0
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And this thread is back! Woot!
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I think a big part of the problem with there being no baseline is the lack of clearly defined job descriptions in IT. Companies in so many cases just kind of make up whatever and call it whatever they want. I've seen L1s who were doing engineering tasks, and people called engineers that were L0s. At a company I used to work at, EVERYONE was called an engineer. I tried explaining to co-workers that it was a marketing thing, but that we were NOT engineers and I had guys argue with me. It leaves them delusional and confused when they go elsewhere, as well as hiring parties.
I think that if we're going to create a baseline for knowledge, we need to work to get the definitions of what is L1, what is L2, L3, engineer, etc more clearly defined. We also need to help break the idea that jobs in development are IT.
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I also understand that IT is a relatively new field. If you consider that it's only been about 25-30 years that IT has really been a thing, and especially growing the past 20, the confusion is understandable. Trade skills have been around for thousands of years and the definitions and terms are fairly set. IT, as a career field, is a baby by comparison. Fifty years ago, what fits in the palm of your hand now would have filled a gymnasium, in terms of power, and you have more functionality out of the phone.
But as I see it, we are at a crucial point. Whether it's ITIL or some other organization, we need to define what work goes into what classification as far as what is what. That can be difficult with new products constantly coming out, the size of companies kind of determining the scope of work that someone might be expected to handle, but even though many different companies have solutions for the same problems (Cisco, Pertino, etc are all VPNs), there are categories with general scopes of work that could be used to at least outline what entails your L1 work, L2, etc.
