Network Administrator Career Guide and Counseling

Question: network administrator? Can I make good pay as a network administrator with only MCP certification?

Answer: You cannot make a large salary without experience even with an MCSE. You need to take a part time or internship position with a company, even if you get your MCSE. Without experience, you are what's called a "Paper MCSE". When I started in the IT field, I went to a 4 month MCSE school. None of the students had any IT job experience. I didn't want to get my MCSE and look for jobs as a "Paper MCSE", so I took a part time, low paying job with a small software company as their network administrator while taking the classes. If necessary, I would have worked for free as an intern. By the time I was finished and had completed my MCSE, I could apply for jobs as an experienced MCSE, and the company I worked for offered me a full time position. 7 years later in the field, I am now an IT Manager at a larger software company and earning an above-average salary in this field. By the way, out of the 12 students in my MCSE class, only myself and one other student got hired immediately after earning our MCSE. Both of us had the foresight to take part time/internship positions before expecting a full time position in the field.

Question: Can the network administrator know which web pages I have been to without accessing my computer? Our teachers keep saying that they will know if we go onto facebook or other "illegal" pages. But are they actually able to find out without seeing or accessing the computer? Can the network administrator access a log or something that is not stored on the computer?

Answer: YES! I'm a network engineer with 30 years of experience and this is exactly what I do for a living. I conduct investigations for a government agency with roughly 50,000 employees. Without so much as touching, or accessing a persons computer or any special software on their computer, I can tell every web site they have been to in the last six months. Exactly how much time they spent on every web page, every popup advertisement they got, ever email they sent or received, I can see every chat session they have on Yahoo or ICQ etc. etc. Even if they bypass the proxy servers I can still see it because they go through the firewall and the firewall logs it as well. I repeat, If a computer is a brand new install and has no special software, or hardware, but is connected to the governement agency network then I can get all that information. Is it worth the trouble? It's not any trouble. We let the computers do the work for us. We keep a running list of new porn sites and such all the time. If I was the administrator of your network, I could run a report on "Whitehouse.gov" and see a list of every single computer and user that went to that site and for how long. I could sort it by who was on it the longest, or who went to it most often. It really is not any effort. In governement agencies (and schools), the computers are owned by the tax payers, and so are to be used for official reasons only. There is no assumption of privacy on public owned computers period. Corporations have similar views. It is their computers that they pay for so employees can do work, and most have the view that you should not be using it for personal reasons.

Question: What does a network administrator need besides kknowing router application? Well I will need to know this from all the network administrators. I'm a fresh graduant and all I know is network administration.I haven't began to work as yet,neither do I know anything much about network security or administration. How best ca I become a network administrator besides having my degree in network administration, network design and infrasructure? Help please.....Tnx!!

Answer: You'll need to know TCP/IP back to front. You'll need to know how to install setup and administer OSes and software for those OSes like Sendmail, Apache, POP3/IMAP, NFS, SAMBA, DNS and learn all about how DNS works. You'll need to know how to setup logs, log rotation, encryption (of logs, filesystems etc), know how to read the logs and what it means. You'll need to learn about IDS, how to scan networks, how to write code in perl, C/C++, java. How to compress and send data. Learn Berkeley sockets and that's just for starters. Basically, you need to become a super hero and be everyone's savior when things go wrong. Your their Mr. fixit and they all rely on you to fix it. You won't get much more than a thank you when things get fixed, you'll get nothing if you keep them running smoothly but they'll want to hang you if you loose their email or the Net goes down. All part of the job. That's why there's a Sysadmins Day. We deserve it!!!

Question: What certifications would I need to become a network administrator? I'm thinking about coming a network administrator and I'm about to get a bachelors degree for IT-Network Administration. However, I wonder what would be the best certification for a network administrator position?

Answer: Network Administrator is a very generic role, you can be a Windows Network Admin, Linux Network Admin, Novell Network Admin, CISCO Network Admin several combinations. But i would classify them into two OS Based Network Admin and Network Devices Based Network Admin. If you want to manage a Network OS you should consider doing the certification in the platform you like i.e windows or linux or novell. If you want to manage Network Devices like routers, firewalls or wireless devices you should consider doing a CCNA followed by specilizations...... If you need further information please get back to me.

Question: How did you become a network administrator? I was wondering what career path did you take to become a network administrator? Also what certifications/degrees did you need/have at the time?

Answer: All depends on the network - Cisco, Juniper etc? Basically get certified in whatever network they run or you are interested in, Cisco would be my guess as the most popular. It is quite hard to get a position as an network admin without credentials, especially in today's climate. Got to start from the ground up if you haven't done it before - help-desk - Junior admin -senior admin . My advice, get a CCNA - start applying. You may even find that once you are in and show promise that they will pay for you to continue to CCNP or branch towards CCDP etc (probably not CCIE though!) :)

Question: What is the difference between a systems administrator and a network administrator? Wikipedia.org states that a network administrator is the same as a systems administrator except he/she is working on a network. But when would a systems administrator be in demand. Princetonreview.com says there are 100,000 unfilled systems administrator jobs in the US. Why can't network administrators fill these positions? Please help.

Answer: In many cases, there is no difference. Many HR departments don't know the difference between those two job titles, so they are used interchangably. If you are looking for a job in one of those categories, I would look in both just to make sure that you don't limit your possibilities. In general though, the systems administrator is focused on servers, whereas the network administrator is focused on routers and switches. There may be overlap where a network administrator will also repair servers, and vise-versa.

Question: How do I block a network administrator from my computer? My brother is the network administrator and he likes to shut my computer down at random times, and I lose most of my work. There is no way I can talk him out of this (I have tried a lot). Is there any way I can block him from my computer? Or at least stop him from shutting down my computer?

Answer: try this..in the system properties>remote>uncheck allow remote assist

Question: How do I get into being a Network Administrator? I'm currently taking an A+ class and have decided I might like to get into Networking. I thought I'd start with Network Administrator and see where I go from there. What's the best way to become a Network Administrator for someone with little experience & best place to start?

Answer: Network Admin implies working for a company maintaining all of their PCs and software. That is very different from actual networking. The best certification for net admin is MCSE (Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer). This is the most sought after for the net admin position. You can study for the MCSE on your own but it's very tough to do that way. Most colleges (even JC's) have course work in this field.

Question: What is the best way to become a NetWork Administrator? What is the job market looking like? What is the best career path for a network administrator? What is the best to learn? CISCO?

Answer: Network Administrator: Bachelor of Science degree in a computer-related field, preferably network/systems administration. You'll need to decide if you want to be a Solaris, UNIX, or Windows network administrator. Once you've decided, get the network administrator certification for that platform (e.g. MCSE for Windows). Since network devices like gateways, routers, switches, firewalls, and whatnot are used on all sorts of networks, then it's always good to add a Cisco cert as well (CCNA). .

Question: What are some of the common problems a network administrator would run into? Also, how would they solve them. I'm writing a story about a hacker, of which I at least know some. The Network administrator will catch him through keyboard logging. My hero has a speaking part where he is having a typical conversation about his work.

Answer: Actually the most common problems are rather boring and are user related. Network administration, for the most part, is really not as glamorous or exciting as you might think. Probibly the number one issue that I deal with on a daily basis is that users tend to forget their passwords. Corporate policy dictates that users change their passwords every 45 days and when that happens they can't remember what they changed it to. Other issues include: Users needing access to a particular network resource. Users accidently deleting files Printing problems, usually the printer needs ink or toner Email issues, can't send, can't receive, recipient didn't get the email that I sent to them, etc Hardware failures, hard disk, monitor, power supply, etc As far as hacking is concerned the threat is extremely low. We use file encryption software and my network is well firewalled. Intrusion detection is in place so if anyone attempts to break into my network I can detect and identify the culprit. I guess the biggest problem that I would be faced with would have to be viruses. I have antivirus software in place but sometimes new viruses come out that the anti virus software can't handle. Viruses normally enter the network through email. Email is the one weakness that networks have. You cannot stop email and it's like an open window into your otherwise secure network. When that happens it's hell because the virus spreads through the network like wildfire. I could probibly write a book about network administration but the space here is limited so I only listed a few of the most common issues that I deal with daily. Hope this helps, Captain Computer