Administration Concepts

The art of systems administration

What is a Systems Administrator?

The role of Systems Administrator is usually summarized as: "Someone who keeps the computers and other technology tools working". For most small businesses, this encompasses network support, server support, desktop computer and application support, possibly even including telephones, cash registers, printers, fax machines etc.

For computers, what is the System Administrator responsible for?

In the realm of computers, an administrator usually takes responsibility for computer security, data integrity, performance, software maintenance, hardware maintenance, and connectivity. Tech. support may also play into the job description. Each of the areas of responsibility may have business policies which help define what the administrator will do to keep things running smoothly. These policies should support business goals and be well documented.

What tasks might relate to these areas of responsibility?

Though the specifics often have much to do with the policies of a particular business, we can still find plenty of common high level tasks which exist accross most businesses. Taking responsibility for computer security, for example, might mean:

• Enforcing a password policy
• Setting up and managing a firewall
• Installing and running an intrusion detection system
• Reading log files for suspicious activity
• Patching the operating system and software to remove security holes
• Training others on security awareness

Tasks related to data integrity might be:

• Setting up a database for data storage
• Running regular backups
• Testing fail-over systems
• Archiving historical data

Performance responsibility may require:

• Monitoring system responsiveness
• Upgrading inadequate hardware
• Setting up load balancing
• Tweaking operating system configuration

For software maintenance we could expect:

• License compliance tracking
• Software installation, upgrading, and removal
• Compatability testing

Hardware maintenance might include:

• Failure diagnosis
• Parts replacement
• Cleaning
• Usage tracking

Tasks related to connectivity might be:

• Network setup
• Network and internet connection monitoring
• Setting up cache and proxy services
• Email and messaging setup and administration

What makes a good systems administrator?

Good systems administrators are knowledgable about their systems, know where to go for help, and automate as much of their work as possible. It is common to see a smart systems administrator start out very busy when working through the policies that help in understanding the job. They often get progressively less busy as they automate more of the day to day tasks and become experts in their systems. (We assume that they will have resources to automate some of their work).