LinuxQuestions.org - This is TOO funny ;)

I read this post @ ExtremeTech a while back and saved it. The whole thing cracked me up, but the reply at the end from another guy was the killer!

A Day in the Life of a Linux Sys Admin

My recent experiences trying to get Linux to do things other than run Tetris have inspired me to write the following short "slice of life"-type saynète.

Dramatis personae:
Sam, sysadmin
Mary, Sam's wife
Linus, Mary and Sam's son
Lucy, Mary and Sam's daughter
Bill, Mary's cat

Sam comes home after a day's work as a Unix system administrator. His wife is already home, back from her office where she is a successful intellectual property rights attorney. Their children are busy doing their homework.

Mary: Hi honey, how was work?

Sam: Today was fun. I migrated all the data in our data center to a new location on new servers. We had a contest to see who could write a script to do it in 7 lines or less, and I won.

Mary: Wonderful!

Linus: Dad! Dad! I changed the light bulb in my room and it's not working!

Sam: You must have forgotten to mount it after you installed it. It's easy. You can figure it out.

(time passes)

Linus: Dad! I did that, but it's still not working. I use the switch and it just doesn't come on.

Sam: Well, which switch are you using? Remember that when I rewired the house last weekend, I added functionality to the lighting system so that you can telnet into the fusebox to turn appliances on and off to ward off burglars. If you want to turn on your light in your room, you just log into the server, telnet into the fusebox, and type lgt -roomname -on/off [-dimmed -dimpercent] [-autooff -autoofftime].

Linus: But Dad, I can't find my computer with the light off.

Sam: Oh well, figure it out. It'll do you good! The new lighting system is way more powerful now, and so easy to use! Today at work I checked the status of the beer reserves in the refrigerator with frgchk -beer [-brand] -shelf1 -shelf2 so I could stop by the store on the way home and get some more in case we needed some.

Lucy: But you could have called me and asked, daddy. I could have told you.

Sam: Actually honey, you couldn't have. You don't have the permissions to check the beer in the fridge (it was a security risk).

Lucy: Oh :( Can you help me with my homework, dad?

Sam: Well, there are lots of user groups and forums online. I'm sure they can help you with your arithmetic assignment.

Mary: Honey, why don't we go to the movies this weekend? They're showing The Last Samurai with Tom Cruise. It sounds like fun.

Sam: Good idea! But I think I'd rather go see Kill Bill again. It's my all-time favorite movie.

Mary: Haven't you seen it 0x5F times already?

Sam: Who cares! Bill can never be killed enough times, if you ask me.

(time passes. Sam reaches for a box in his coat)

Sam: Happy birthday, darling!

Mary: That's so sweet! I thought you forgot!

Sam: How could I ever forget your birthday? Here, I got you a little something.

Mary: You shouldn't have! (opens gift box; tries to hide her disappointment) Oh! A Perl necklace! How sweet of you!

Sam: I hesitated between that, a Ruby ring and a Python purse, but I really liked the understated elegance of the Perls.

Mary: That's very nice of you.

(Bill the cat runs into the room and knocks off the kitchen counter the full tower server that controls the microwave oven, the four hot-swappable coffee makers mounted in a RAID array for maximum performance, and manages fridge permissions)

Sam: Stupid cat! Good thing I outfitted the garage with a fully redundant array of replacement appliances yesterday. I wish I could train that cat to be more mindful, but I just can't change its proprietary behavior. Next time, honey, we should get a free cat from the open shelter, rather than a pure breed. My company just released a white paper on the TCO and ROI of employees' pets, and we found that pure breeds are always expensive, high-maintenance and impossible to modify without hiring consultants that charge an arm and a leg. Street cats raised by the community are invariably less hassle and cheaper.

Mary: That may be true, but they're often sick and dirty, missing critical organs or incompatible with existing households.

Sam: Oh Honey, I hope you're not falling prey to this FUD conspiracy! Street cats are the only way to go!

(all laugh. Tableau).
---Rog

This is the direct reply from another extremetech reader:

Three reasons why this joke was written by a Windows sys admin.

>>>I added functionality to the lighting system so that you can telnet into the fusebox to turn appliances on

Only Windows sys admins use an insecure protocol like telnet. Ssh is much better and you can run commands through it (so with proper authentication it can be automated through a cron job or something similar). So it can be fully automated from the basement grid.

>>>I checked the status of the beer reserves in the refrigerator with frgchk -beer [-brand] -shelf1 -shelf2 so I could stop by the store on the way home

Tipically Windows sys-admins have to check things and see them personally. A real *nix sys admin would cron job the frgchk command and have it at least emailed to him. A script would be made to notify only on no beer situations. Windows sys-admins would have to be notified even if beer exists just to make sure the system is running. A *nix sys admin would also extend the functionality throuh PERL::mechanize and browse the stores web site to place the order and set it on a "will pickup" status.

>>>knocks off the kitchen counter the full tower server that controls the microwave oven, the four hot-swappable coffee makers mounted in a RAID array for maximum performance, and manages fridge permissions

Actually this looks more like the home of the Windows sys-admin. He'll need a full tower server just to install his latest version of Windows 2003 to manage said hardware (microwave, toaster, fridge). A real *nix sys admin would use embedded Linux on low power hardware. Connect it wireless (since security is high you don't worry about burning the neighbors bread or freezing his beer) to the basement grid and have the cluster down there do the administrative job.