Posts made by IRJ

@DustinB3403 said in Vulnerability Assessment and Alerting Solutions:

Hey All,

I'm looking for a vulnerability assessment and alerting solution that is going to have to be agent based to alert for any OS vulnerabilities for a remote workforce.

Wazuh is the top item that comes to mind, but I'm not a huge fan of its presentation, likely I just need to sort out the views.

Does anyone else have any recommendations?

The target group is endpoint devices (workstations) and datacenter equipment.

TIA

Have you looked into OpenVAS?

https://openvas.org/

@scottalanmiller said in Project tracking:

@IRJ said in Project tracking:

I've used Jira the past 5 or 6 years at all the places I've worked

I've used it a lot, but I don't like it

I do. It's super easy to use from a user side. I've not done the admin side on it, but it's a great user experience.

I've used Jira the past 5 or 6 years at all the places I've worked

What kind of marketing department is this? A movie firm? It seems insane to have video files average 10-20gb. Even high budget commercials are probably only that size.. Is this a bunch of templates or something?

I would be interested in understanding their work flow, as it seems very extravagant to have such large files and so many of them?

@travisdh1 said in Resume work:

@CCWTech said in Resume work:

@travisdh1 I've been searching on Indeed, Monster, Linkedin, and DICE. But so far I have only had 2 interviews. One went well, made it to final rounds. The other went really well, and they said they thought I deserved more money than the job offered and wanted to see if I was interested in other higher paying jobs with the company...I said yes, but not to count me out for this one. Then I got the "you haven't been selected" letter.

This was from a fortune 500 company so it wasn't "Jimbo's or Pat's". I'm really trying nearly anything really.

I get called by 'recruiters' in India who can barely speak english but not much else. I guess it's a tough market right now.

It's funny, I'm not used to applying for a job and not getting it. In the past if I applied for 3 places I usually had offers from 2.

All job listing sites are going to have more jobs that either aren't real jobs or have already been filled. If you pay attention, you'll find the same job listed on every single one. It's just a mess, without any way to weed out what are actual active listings.

I've mostly had recruiters come to me, but when I was applying I had a decent hit rate.

My advice is stop spamming out a general resume and tailor it towards the position you actually want. Basically apply for less jobs, but tailor your resume towards them. Also study up on anything you may not be familiar with when approached for the interview..

No problem spinning up virtual lab to learn about a product for an interview you want to nail. You could say something like I've used product A, but have also extensively tested X (their product). Then go into detail about some things about X to show you've actually used it. Say something like I'm not super familiar with X, but from my experience with it. It's quite intuitive and easy use. Then state your lab project and some challenges or accomplishments achieved during it.

@CCWTech said in Resume work:

What pay range should I be looking at? So many ranges out there it's hard to know what's real.

What job do you want? If you want to be an IT generalist then pretty low as some others have trouble breaking out of that type of job.

If you want to do something more specialized, you'll get paid quite a bit more on top end. However, you'll have to take a junior role (likely) to get there. Junior roles will probably pay similar to IT generalist, but you won't have the level of power you do as a generalist

@travisdh1 said in Resume work:

@CCWTech said in Resume work:

@travisdh1 What is 'better paying' what range?

And how do you know Spillman?

Pay range depends a LOT on location of the job offering. A couple examples from my life.

1. Cleveland, OH ~$40,000/year. Basically poverty wage.
2. Wooster, OH ~$40,000/year. Living well.
3. Fairlawn, OH ~$60,000/year. Around the same as Wooster at 40k
   Those values get to be hugely different depending on the area of the country, and I'd expect them to be around the lowest in the country because of the cost of living in Ohio compared to most of the rest of the U.S.

I have my CJIS cert and supported Spillman for multiple police departments and a county sheriff at my previous job.

Ii don't know where you are getting this info from, but a quick search on LinkedIn for Cleveland, Ohio Jobs shows this is not the case.

Also, I get contacted for remote jobs on daily basis for well over $100k

@CCWTech said in Resume work:

Here you go!

Here's my constructive criticism. It's gonna sound harsh, but it's needed criticism.

I would throw this resume in the trash and start over from scratch.

1. In my hiring and interviewing experiences, rarely are small business where you are owner even considered as experience. The exception being if you can show decent revenue and/or fortune 1000 customers. Your business was an actual full time gig, and not a side job. I get that. However, that doesn't change the fact nearly everyone puts their own company on their resume and 99% of time it's means virtually nothing.

2. Also, I promise you that nobody cares that you were a cop 15 years ago. Not sure why that is even on your resume, let alone taking up 1/3rd of the page. If you absolutely most list it, make it a single line

What I would do to fix problem 1 is take your 2008-now job and break it up into small pieces (like 5-8 years) and create separate job titles and descriptions that describe projects you were doing at the time. Another thing you could do is add customers themselves (if you have any impressive ones you supported for years). You basically need separate IT job descriptions to make your experience feel much fuller and complete.

Lastly, build the resume for the jobs you want, don't spend so much time worrying about boring things you did or do on your job description. You're trying to sell me on calling you in for an interview. I don't care about mundane tasks...

@Texkonc said in I Cant Even...:

I cant even....Begin to see the breach data and lawsuits coming....
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/godaddy-hackers-stole-source-code-installed-malware-in-multi-year-breach/

Shitty security, shitty hosting, but at least they are expensive

@scottalanmiller said in Helpdesk - PC replacement routines:

@IRJ said in Helpdesk - PC replacement routines:

The Helpdesk team exists to be a human shield for users. Your main job is keep users away from the rest of IT. Customer service and user support is the job. Since your Helpdesk should be made up of entry level with fair turnover, I'm not sure you're gonna ever be efficient nor is that really the goal.

I started in Helpdesk as did many others I've met in higher IT positions. The employees that you have that are really good are not meant to stay there too long. If your company doesn't have the foresite to promote top performers, they will just leave and go somewhere else.

The TLDR is Helpdesk is supposed to be a a human shield for IT. It should be a starting place for aspiring IT professionals, and if they are knowledgeable enough to improve these processes they won't be around long (one way or another).

That said, some people like the interaction and choose to stay there. But that's not the norm. But even then, it's a customer service role for sure and "performance" will always be difficult. In fact, you might dislike performance if it means less human interactions with end users.

Yep. I've seen it. There's one guy that I worked with that just loved everything about Helpdesk. Far more capable than the desk. He could be working with servers, cloud, etc. He just decided he loved what he was doing and stayed there for many years. I kept in touch for many years beyond us working together and he was always there. Big fish in little pond so to speak, and I think he likes that.

@Pete-S said in Helpdesk - PC replacement routines:

@IRJ said in Helpdesk - PC replacement routines:

The Helpdesk team exists to be a human shield for users. Your main job is keep users away from the rest of IT. Customer service and user support is the job. Since your Helpdesk should be made up of entry level with fair turnover, I'm not sure you're gonna ever be efficient nor is that really the goal.

I started in Helpdesk as did many others I've met in higher IT positions. The employees that you have that are really good are not meant to stay there too long. If your company doesn't have the foresite to promote top performers, they will just leave and go somewhere else.

The TLDR is Helpdesk is supposed to be a a human shield for IT. It should be a starting place for aspiring IT professionals, and if they are knowledgeable enough to improve these processes they won't be around long (one way or another).

@IRJ What you say makes perfect sense.

Wouldn't you agree that replacing a PC is at least a two stage process? One where you get the new computer and get it 100% ready for the user. And another where you would handhold the user - if they need help. And only the second one would actually be a helpdesk job.

If I understand correctly, the actual problem that @annalynnetech have is that the PC isn't ready to go when the end-user get it.

Yes it's definitely a two stage process. In most companies it would be separate teams and you'd even have levels at a large Helpdesk like tier 1, 2, and 3.

If I were to walk in a situation and the two things were combined, I would probably split the employees up and assign some to desktop builds and tier 2 support when they aren't doing builds. Then I'd have tier 1 guys reading a script basically and if it goes too far beyond that they escalate to tier 2. I would do these even if I only had 2-5 employees.

The Helpdesk team exists to be a human shield for users. Your main job is keep users away from the rest of IT. Customer service and user support is the job. Since your Helpdesk should be made up of entry level with fair turnover, I'm not sure you're gonna ever be efficient nor is that really the goal.

I started in Helpdesk as did many others I've met in higher IT positions. The employees that you have that are really good are not meant to stay there too long. If your company doesn't have the foresite to promote top performers, they will just leave and go somewhere else.

The TLDR is Helpdesk is supposed to be a a human shield for IT. It should be a starting place for aspiring IT professionals, and if they are knowledgeable enough to improve these processes they won't be around long (one way or another).

@Obsolesce said in Astrophotography:

Happy holidays all!

Jupiter Christmas night, 2022-12-25.
Less than ideal seeing conditions and lots of light pollution, but was still able to bring out some detail!
Jupiter was 456,134,146 miles from earth when I took the photo. It took almost 41 minutes for light to travel from Jupiter to my camera. Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun, has 80 moons, and is large enough to fit about 1,300 Earths inside.

Can you explain your setup a bit?

@Carnival-Boy said in [SAMIT: Should You Provide Equipment for Work from Home

But look, we're getting in ad hominem replies now. I don't see the relevance. I get that this is primarily a forum for US MSPs and I'm a European ERP specialist, but I'm just offering my perspective. But when it gets to the level of replies (IRJ, not you) that say I'm not really IT, or that I don't need any training because I can fall back on Microsoft, or I don't have the commitment of "real" IT people then it's getting pointless.

It's ok for us to hear your perspective, but not mine?

Salary (incentives) and taxes are much different different in US and Europe. I mean that's just fact. There's pros and cons to both. In the US, alot of times its a struggle to get past that first level for many people. People get abused and bullied into lower salaries and insane workloads. It happens every day in the US and the percentage of workers that get stuck in that is higher than you think. You need both technical and soft skills to get out of it. Even then it really is a grind, and external factors surely can make it feel impossible to beat.

You've made it clear the type of work you do, my definition of it may differ from others.

That all being said, Scott's view on company not providing a laptop is extremely unusual in US. I've never come across a position like that.

Although, @scottalanmiller and I would never work the same type of jobs. I prefer to be an employee of a company vs being consultant or contractor. I have my reasons for it, and @scottalanmiller and others on here have their reasons why they like consulting.

I would never consider or accept a job where I had to provide my own computer. I also, think it's ludicrous to be an IT employee and not have your own personal computer. It just shows that computers aren't really part of your passion. If I worked first mate on a fishing boat, I don't need a fishing rod for my job. But if I didn't have one at home, that would be an extremely weird situation. It's not something I'd ever ask in an interview because I could just tell by talking to someone of they are passionate about IT (or fishing). I would never have to even ask them if they had a computer (or fishing rod). As @scottalanmiller mentioned, they would be extremely lucky to make it to first interview, and would never make it to second.

@Carnival-Boy said in SAMIT: Should You Provide Equipment for Work from Home Staff?:

@scottalanmiller said in SAMIT: Should You Provide Equipment for Work from Home Staff?:

It goes almost without saying that the things we value you'd hate as an employee.

Try me

We aren't a "here is the thing that you do" kind of company. We cross train, we constantly do new things, we take on different technology all of the time, everyone spends their days advising non-IT on approaches, options, looking for improvements to process, and so forth

We do all of those things to. I still don't know why you'd think we don't.

As usual, you've just jumped to conclusions about someone based on a spurious metric (they don't own a PC).

Had to catch up on this long thread, but from what I've read I don't think you're really IT. You mentioned you'd fire a client for not using Microsoft products. That seems more like a sales engineer position to me. You don't really need any training because you can always fall back on Microsoft for support. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but it's obviously more relaxed than true IT positions where you HAVE to make things work with what you have, and you actually do analysis of different products. If the answer is Microsoft eveytime, that explains why you don't have to commit to the level of those doing IT.

Also, if I remember correctly you're in Europe. European and American IT have much different mindset. In US, it's sink or swim with incentives to 1-4x your salary. It's built into our heads that we must be better or we will be left behind. From what I've seen in Europe jobs pay more equally so that translates into less incentive. On the flip side, I believe European model is probably easier and less stressful for individuals, but also less likely to unlock full potential.

Please don't take this post as being negative or even taking a side. I'm just pointing out that I believe you and @scottalanmiller are talking apples and oranges. Basically his comments don't apply to you and your comments don't really apply to American job market. Not that one is right or wrong.

@pattonb said in ps2 to usb adapters:

@IRJ sadly, have my "attachments" and a couple of my old keyboards fall into that category, they have worked for "oh so many years" and just keep on working, thus
my attachments.

I get it. I happen to like that style and feel myself. Build yourself a nice keyboard some day. You'll really like it.

@pmoncho said in ps2 to usb adapters:

@pattonb said in ps2 to usb adapters:

Has anybody had success using ps2 to usb adapters ? ( specifically for keyboards)

I have one and can't get the keyboard recognized, I still have a few "favourite" ps2 keyboards. Does it make any sense, to cut off the ps2 end, and replace with usb ?

thanks in advance.

I have had luck with these for my Raritan KVM.

https://www.amazon.com/Belkin-USB-PS-2-Adapter/dp/B000ELSXFY

Then you can convert it to USB C

Do not pay $30 for an adapter. Get a modern USB mechanical keyboard for a few bucks more lol

Just buy a new keyboard, dude. You can get mechanical keyboards with all different types of feedback. I like the super old and loud keyboards with tons of noise.

There's alot of choices for mechanical keyboards that behave like your old ones. Let the PS2 keyboard go... Take it to scrap yard, and set it free️️️

BTW I'm not saying buy steam decks today (you can't even if you wanted, too). I am just saying it would be an interesting play for Valve to make small form factor Linux workstations