[Podcast] Episode #12: Being a Systems Administrator at 37signals Apr 13 2010
7 comments Latest by Sean
Time: 22:50 | 04/13/2010 | Download MP3
Mark, Joshua, and John on life as a 37signals Sys Admin
The Sys Admin team discusses hosting the 37signals apps, working with programmers, helping support, telecommuting, dealing with vendors, improving speeds in Europe, and more.
More episodes
Subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or RSS. Related links and previous episodes available at 37signals.com/podcast.
Spread the word
Like this episode? Please share it with your friends:
Got a web design project in mind? Find a web designer on Sortfolio. Browse by visual style, portfolio, budget, and geographic location.
Over 1 million people use 37signals' simple web-based software to collaborate on projects, track contacts, and organize their business with an intranet.
7 comments so far
Jason 13 Apr 10
What are some of the sysadmin tools you use for automation? You mentioned being about to perform rollbacks with ease. How do you do that?
DL 13 Apr 10
I think it was Josh who said that being a system admin should be more like being a developer than it traditionally is. I couldn’t agree more, I’ve worked for a Fortune 10 company as a DBA and for a much smaller company too.
At the large company it was imperative that each member of the team be scripting/coding minded, logging into 7000+ machines to make a change isn’t practical. In the smaller company scripting wasn’t as important but I did it anyway, as a result I had much more time to work on new projects or tools as I saw the need for.
Be a lazy sys admin and you’ll be loved and respected.
MI 13 Apr 10
Jason: Our favorite tools for automation are Chef from our friends over at Opscode, and Capistrano which was created by our very own Jamis Buck.
Greg Laws 14 Apr 10
Great podcast guys!!
I never would have expected you’d have that much data growth. I hope you’ll be on again soon to share how you’ve dealt with some of the problems you discussed. As a business owner and sysadmin myself, it’s always great to hear how others deal with these kinds of problems. Thanks again for giving me a little look behind the curtain.
Brandan L. 14 Apr 10
Is Mark Greenberg responsible for your podcast theme music? It sounds like the same tune as in the customer case study videos. And can I find his (or whomever’s) music somewhere?
ML 14 Apr 10
Yes, the music is by Mark Greenberg who was a member of The Coctails.
Sean 16 Apr 10
Interesting to hear about your storage challenges.
Have you looked into an application level filesystem like MogileFS? It was built to solve a similar problem for LiveJournal.
Comments are closed