Customer Service System Administrator

Jeffrey Watts

abps59@r.postjobfree.com

***** ****** ****

Lenexa, KS 66220

Objective

I am seeking a significant and challenging position in Unix and Linux system

administration with a Kansas City company interested in adding my extensive

experience, proven technical leadership, and excellent communication skills to

their organization.

ProfileProven leader - Able to prioritize and complete projects

without supervision. Able to bring diverse groups of people together to solve

problems and deploy new products.

Expert system administrator - Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Novell

SuSE Linux Enterprise Server, Sun Solaris, SGI IRIX, Hewlett-Packard HP-UX.

Strong Unix and shell scripting skills, experienced with centralized systems

management, authentication, and monitoring.

Skilled troubleshooter - Combines strong analytical and

technical skills to quickly communicate and resolve problems. Delivers

excellent customer service.

Team player - Excellent communication and interpersonal

skills. Hard worker who is dedicated and passionate.

Skills

Unix System Administration, TCP/IP networking, hardware configuration,

technical and end user support, hardware and software troubleshooting,

on-call dependability. Bourne Shell, SQL. HP-UX, IRIX, Linux, MacOS, Solaris operating systems. Dell, HP, SGI, Sun hardware. Active Directory Integration, Cacti, Kerberos, LDAP, OpenDJ, Puppet, Nagios, RHN Satellite, SNMP. Apache, BIND, GlassFish, JBoss, NIS, NTP, OSIAM, PostgreSQL, Sendmail.

Experience

Jun 2010 - Present

Senior Linux System Administrator at Adknowledge.

I work as a system administrator as part of a team responsible for over 600

servers running SuSE Linux Enterprise Server, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and

Ubuntu on a mix of Dell hardware and VMware virtual machines. My major projects

involved:

Overhauled monitoring. I replaced the existing monitoring with

a distributed system of separate Nagios servers using a simplified and easily

maintainable configuration. Wrote new plugins and dramatically increased the

number of different services that were monitored. Used external services

Gomez and CatchPoint to monitor Adknowledge's public services and provide

useful metrics.

Configuration management. Used Puppet to centrally

manage server configurations, significantly reducing the amount of time

it would take to push out configuration changes and provision new servers.

Jul 2009 - Apr 2010

Contractor at H&R Block.

I was tasked with several projects aimed at improving H&R Block's ability

to manage and audit their HP-UX and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) systems.

Drawing on skills gained through the RHCE certification process along with

fifteen years of experience in Linux and Unix system administration, I

accomplished my tasks on time, completely, and without need of supervision.

Here are some of my major accomplishments:

Active Directory integration. I integrated H&R Block's Unix

and Linux user account and access management into their existing Windows Active

Directory infrastructure. This migration replaced a manual, labor-intesive,

and difficult to audit process with one providing centralized management

using familiar Windows tools. My implementation used PAM, Kerberos,

NSS_LDAP (Linux), and LDAP-UX (HP-UX), and relied on tools that were supported

by the OS vendor, avoiding the use of costly third-party software and

streamlining support. Nearly a thousand user accounts were migrated, access

control was tightened, and hundreds of unneeded accounts were removed.

RHN Satellite. As part of an effort to streamline patching and

new server deployments, I deployed Red Hat's server management system, RHN

Satellite. Using Satellite, I created custom server build scripts that allow

new systems to be deployed in as little as five minutes, a dramatic improvement

over a process that usually took a full day. Custom configuration was included,

including deployment during server build of important third party applications

and utilities such as VMware Tools, NetBackup, ProLiant Support Pack, etc are

now able to be automatically deployed. This infrastructure also allows for

rapid patching and rollbacks, enabling H&R Block to patch all of its Linux

systems in a week or two (depending on production availability), compared to

the three months it took previously.

Organizational improvements. While there, I made several

important organizational improvements. First of all, I reorganized and

expanded their server documentation, making note of important information such

as domain, network location, and server status. I also inventoried their

support levels and identified many development and test systems that improperly

had 24/7 support, which will save H&R Block thousands of dollars over time.

Finally, I did a support budget analysis for fiscal year 2011 through 2013,

recommending that H&R Block consolidate its support dates so as to save

approximately $26,000 up front and make its support renewal process much easier

in the long run.

May 1998 - Mar 2009

Systems Administrator III for Sprint Nextel.

I was the lead administrator of two clusters of SGI Origin servers responsible

for the collection and processing of $35 million in billing per day from

Sprint's Nortel DMS long distance telephone switch network. My

responsibilities included resolving hardware, operating system, and application

issues, coordinating developers, managing vendors, and

working with customers to exceed the company's goal of 99.99% availability.

In addition, I was the secondary administrator for three Sun Enterprise clusters

collecting Sprint's ATM and Frame Relay billing as well as a large, real-time

fraud detection and prevention platform consisting of twenty-four diverse Sun

Solaris systems. I also provided key technical leadership for many business

critical projects ranging from application updates to entire system redesigns

in support of new product releases. For example, due to my lengthy experience

with Linux, I was selected to serve on Sprint's Linux Evaluation Team

that set standards and made vendor recommendations for Sprint's ongoing

strategic rollout of Linux into the enterprise.

I was formally recognized seven times during my time with Sprint. In

1999 I received three Sprint Values Excellence awards for my work in

upgrading a critical platform and for moving several applications from

non-Y2K-compliant systems onto supported systems. I received another in 2000

for my efforts supporting the deployment of a new Nortel DMS long distance

switch in record time. I also received an award for my success in recovering

several million dollars worth of lost billing information in 2001. Later that

year, I was awarded a Sprint Annual Award for my successful efforts to

prevent a troubled switch deployment from failing, helping prepare the company

to meet increasing customer demand. In 2007 I received a merit award for

continued, superior performance and customer focus.

Mar 1997 - May 1998

System Administrator for Internet Direct Communications.

Responsibilities included maintaining a dozen Linux and BSD/OS servers that

provided infrastructure and customer services including email, DNS,

Usenet News, and webhosting for this regional Internet Service

Provider. I also provided support for several Cisco, Ascend, and Bay Networks

Internet routers. I maintained positive relationships with vendors and

clients and supervised the technical support department consisting of six

direct reports. In addition, I developed, deployed, and supported a web-based

accounting and administration system (using PHP, PostgreSQL, and Apache),

streamlining business operations through the automation of complex billing and

administrative functions.

EducationUniversity of Kansas

Completed four years of coursework towards a degree in Computer Science.

Courses included: Discrete Structures, Computer Systems and Assembly

Language, Data Structures and Algorithm Analysis, Computer Architecture

and Networks, and Introduction to Automata Theory.PuppetLabsPuppet Certified Professional #PCP0000074Red Hat TrainingRHCE Rapid Track Course (RH300)Red Hat Certified Engineer (RHCE) #805007003329041SGI Customer Education ServicesIRIX Specific System AdministrationIRIX Advanced System AdministrationPerformance Evaluation and System Tuning for Origin2000Sun Educational ServicesSolaris System Administration (SA-237)Solaris System Administration II (SA-287)Solaris TCP/IP Network Administration (SA-387)Sun Certified System Administrator CX-310-200 Exam (Solaris 10)

Organizations

Sep 1996 - Present

Founder of KULUA, the Kansas Unix & Linux Users Association, a large Linux

and BSD users group based in Lawrence, which brings together over 350

professionals and enthusiasts from the Lawrence, Topeka, and Kansas City

areas.

Mar 2009 - Present

Member of the Kansas City VMware Users Group.

LanguagesEnglish (native speaker)Japanese (limited conversational ability - JLPT N4 equivalent)Spanish (limited conversational ability)

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