Overview | Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday | Friday | By Instructor | Series

Who should attend: System administrators and architects who are interested in deploying a VMware vCloud. Experience with VMware vSphere, VMware Chargeback,and Distributed Virtual Switches is preferred, but not required.

VMware vCloud is a suite of VMware technologies used to stand up cloud computing environments (public/private/hybrid and on/off premises). VMware vCloud provides multi-tenancy, resource elasticity, segmentation of resources, and provisioning mechanisms through the use of VMware vCloud Director, vShield, vCenter Chargeback, vCloud Connector, and other technologies. This is a vendor-specific class.

An overview of the technology, design, implementation, and management will be covered concisely. Demonstrations of various aspects will be given. This class will focus on vCloud 1.5–based technologies.

Take back to work: The knowledge needed to deploy a VMware Cloud for use as an enterprise private cloud.

Topics include:

• VMware vCloud core concepts and features
• vCloud architecture design considerations
• vCloud architecture design patterns and best practices
• Demonstration of features

S2 DNS: A High-Speed Introduction NEW!
Alan Clegg, Internet Systems Consortium

Who should attend: Sysadmins and network engineers who are tasked with providing DNS services.

In this half-day class, we will give system administrators an understanding of the DNS protocol based on real-life experiences and real-world needs. We'll cover configuration of BIND from the basics of serving zone data to topology recommendations aimed at providing network resilience.

Take back to work: What you need to know to maintain or upgrade your site's DNS configuration; how to set up DNS from scratch for a new domain or network.

Topics include:

• Zone file contents
• What makes up a good zone (including "Do you really need PTR records?")
• Server configuration "gotchas"
• Resilience recommendations
• Debugging the beast
• Special topic: Oh yeah, IPv6!

S3 OpenVPN: Your Next VPN Solution NEW!
Rudi van Drunen, Competa IT

Who should attend: System administrators involved in designing or managing networks using VPNs.

VPNs are fairly standard technology nowadays, but they create plenty of headaches for the system administrator, especially around interoperability.

OpenVPN offers an open and easy-to-deploy NAT-safe VPN solution. OpenVPN is an SSL-based VPN solution that can compete with IPSEC and proprietary (and commercial) solutions. There is wide server and client support, and it is easy to integrate. This course introduces you to OpenVPN and discusses standard and not-so-standard VPN set-ups using OpenVPN.

Practical, directly applicable examples will be given and demonstrated.

Take back to work: Ideas and ready-to-use recipes for immediate, effective deployment of OpenVPN in your network; how to explain to management why to choose OpenVPN and to demonstrate its ease of use and integration.

Topics include:

• VPN technologies overview
• Setting up OpenVPN
• Host-to-host
• Host-to-network
• Network-to-network
• Authentication and authorization
• Using a PKI
• Connecting to an IDM
• Using hardware tokens/cards
• IP vs. Ethernet operation
• How to set up servers, clients, and routing
• Integration with OSes: Windows, Linux, Mac OS, UNIX
• Integration with GUI clients
• Common errors and how to avoid them

S4 Databases: What You Need to Know
John Sellens, SYONEX

Who should attend: System and application administrators who need to support databases and database-backed applications.

Databases used to run almost exclusively on dedicated database servers, with one or more database administrators (DBAs) dedicated to their care. These days, with the easy availability of database software such as MySQL and PostgreSQL, databases are popping up in many more places and are used by many more applications.

As a system administrator you need to understand databases, their care and feeding. This course provides an introduction to database concepts, use, and implementation, specifically aimed at system administrators.

Take back to work: A better understanding of databases and their use and of how to deploy and support common database software and database-backed applications.

Topics include:

• An introduction to database concepts
• The basics of SQL (Structured Query Language)
• Common applications of databases
• Berkeley DB and its applications
• MySQL installation, configuration, and management
• PostgreSQL installation, configuration, and management
• Security, user management, and access controls
• Ad hoc queries with standard interfaces
• ODBC and other access methods
• Database access from other tools (Perl, PHP, sqsh, etc.)

S5 RRDtool First Steps
Tobias Oetiker, OETIKER+PARTNER AG, Switzerland

Who should attend: Scripters and programmers who would like to create a custom monitoring application with great presentation tools. Attendees are expected to have some scripting experience.

Over the past few years RRDtool has become the standard method for handling time-series data in the networking area. RRDtool takes care of all the work related to data storage and presentation. Many users only access RRDtool through some front-end application like Cacti or Cricket.

In this half-day class you will learn how RRDtool works from a programmer's point of view and how you can use it to write your own custom monitoring applications. An emphasis will be put on presentation aspects. The best data is worth only as much as your bosses and customers understand and appreciate the graphs you create with it.

Take back to work: Ideas for building the monitoring application of your dreams.

Topics include:

• RRDtool overview
• Problems to be solved
• Round Robin Database setup
• Data acquisition
• Graphing
• Programming with RRDtool
• The command line interface
• The pipe interface
• The Perl API
• In-depth graphing
• Concepts
• Simple graphs
• The joy of RPN
• Graph disassembly
• How to make graphs talk
• Scaling RRDtool
• The RRD file format
• Optimizing OS interaction
• Tweaking Linux for speed
• Latest developments

S6 Time Management for System Administrators  
Thomas A. Limoncelli, Google, Inc.

Who should attend: Sysadmins and developers who need more time in their day, who have problems getting projects done because of constant interruptions, or who want more control over their time and the ability to schedule work instead of working at the whim of their users.

If you agree with any of these statements, this class is for you:

• I don't have enough time to get all my work done.
• As a sysadmin, I can't schedule, prioritize, or plan my work.
• I'm spending all my time mopping the floor; I don't have time to fix the leaking pipe.
• My boss says I don't work hard enough, but I'm always working my ____ off!

Take back to work: The skills you need to get more done in less time.

Topics include:

• Introduction
• Why typical "time management" books don't work for sysadmins
• What makes "to-do" lists fail, and how to make them work
• How to eliminate "I forgot" from your vocabulary
• Managing interruptions
• Preventing them from getting to you
• Managing the ones you get
• Sharing the load with co-workers
• To-do lists
• Achieving perfect follow-through
• The Cycle System for recording and processing to-do lists
• Prioritization techniques
• Scheduling your work (for a sysadmin? really?)
• Task grouping: Batching, sharding, and multitasking
• Handling the most difficult days
• The day before a vacation
• The day a big outage disrupts your perfectly planned day

S7 DNSSEC Implementation Overview: It's Not That Scary If You Do It Right NEW!
Alan Clegg, Internet Systems Consortium

Who should attend: System administrators and network engineers who are knowledgeable about DNS and have been asked by their managers to deploy DNSSEC.

This class will provide an overview of planning, implementation, and deployment of DNSSEC. It will give the attendee the basic knowledge to deploy DNSSEC signed zones on authoritative servers and to configure validating recursive servers.

Take back to work: A thorough understanding of what you need to know and do to deploy DNSSEC in your organization.

Topics include:

• Determination of needs
• Hardware overview
• HSM (key storage) vs. crypto acceleration
• Evaluation of existing infrastructure and processes
• Deployment considerations
• Evaluating signing requirements
• NSEC vs. NSEC3
• Key length
• Key rollover periods
• Testing the system
• Quality assurance

S8 Sensors and Sensor Networks: An Introduction NEW!
Rudi van Drunen, Competa IT

Who should attend: Administrators who want to monitor their machine rooms and are interested in designing a sensor network.

In addition to all the logical activities you monitor on your systems, you should be monitoring the physical environment as well. You might like to build a system that tracks environmental changes in your racks, datacenters, etc, and connect that to your monitoring solution, but it seems that many off-the-shelf systems are either too complex, too expensive, or just plain physically too large.

In this class the basics of building a small sensor (and even actuator) network is covered, using small Arduino-like boards that communicate using RF. We will discuss physical parameters, some basic electronics, and how to go about programming the sensor nodes.

Take back to work: Knowledge of the innards of sensor networks and a recipe for integrating sensor nodes into your monitoring environment.

Topics include:

• Measuring physical parameters
• Some basic electronics
• The sensor node
• RF communication
• Software
• Networking
• Connecting to a back end
• Power considerations
• What to do with the data

S9 RPM Packaging for Sysadmins NEW!
David Nalley, Cloud.com

Who should attend: System administrators with a modicum of experience who have an interest in further automating their environments and advanced sysadmins who have little or no experience with packaging.

Packaging software is a must for consistent and automated system provisioning and maintenance, yet very few people do so. This class explores why sysadmins should package software, what additional benefits accrue to software packagers, and how to do it.

Take back to work: An understanding of the benefits of packaging and the ability to use the techniques learned to begin packaging immediately.

Topics include:

• Why package software?
• Automation
• Consistency
• How to package software
• Tools to make packaging less painful

S10 RRDtool Advanced Topics
Tobias Oetiker, Consultant and author of RRDTool

Who should attend: Sysadmins who may only have accessed RRDtool through some front-end application such as Cacti or Cricket and would like to get a look under the hood. Attendees are expected to have some scripting experience.

Over the past few years RRDtool has become the standard method for handling time-series data in the networking area. RRDtool takes care of all the work related to data storage and presentation. In this half-day class you will see RRDtool in action: many examples will be demonstrated and explained live.

Take back to work: How to use RRDtool directly to handle timeseries data in the networking area.

Topics include:

• RRDtool overview
• Rundown on components of RRDtool
• Update on new functionality in version 1.3
• The RRD database format
• How RRDtool stores data
• Interaction with the OS cache subsystem
• Linux tricks
• Fixing "bad data" after the fact
• How to set up an RRD performance test
• RRD graphing
• Simple graphs and autoconfiguration
• Alternate scaling
• Working with transparency
• Creating gradients
• RPN magic
• Putting it together
• Scripting interface
• The graphv, updatev, and info interfaces

S11 Advanced Time Management: Team Efficiency 
Thomas A. Limoncelli, Google

Who should attend: All sysadmins who want to collaborate efficiently within their team and with others (even solo sysadmins will benefit!).

Attendees must bring a laptop for in-class exercises. Techniques will apply to any wiki or collaborative document system, but the labs and demos will be done using Google Apps.

Take back to work: Techniques to help your IT team work better, faster, and more transparently.

Topics include:

• Meetings and email
• Making meetings not suck
• Handling meetings that can't be fixed
• Stopping incoming email overload
• Making sure your email gets read
• How to get your co-workers to go along with your awesome ideas
• Working better together using collaborative documents
• Buy vs. build: How to get a team to agree
• Common sysadmin uses of collaborative documents
• Uncommon sysadmin uses of collaborative documents
• Communicating a new design before you build it
• Tracking loaner resources
• Doing surveys
• Assuring consistent results no matter who does the task
• Making sure everyone on the team can share the work
• Quick and easy way to document each service (and why you should)
• Quick and easy way to document procedures (so others can do them for you)
• Pager-duty tips for creating a feedback loop to assure constant improvement
• Template for a simple IT department home page

M1 Configuration Management Solutions with CFEngine 3
Mark Burgess, CFEngine, Inc.

Who should attend: Anyone with a basic knowledge of configuration management who is interested in learning the next-generation tool.

Following a complete rewrite of CFEngine with its popular new syntax and powerful pattern matching capabilities, this full-day class presents an introduction suitable for new users, as well as for users of CFEngine 2. The class is peppered with configuration examples, which can now be self-contained and modularized to an unprecedented degree in the new language.

Take back to work:An understanding of the new features of the completely rewritten CFEngine 3, including its new syntax and benefits.

Topics include:

• Moving from ad hoc scripts to automation
• The importance of convergence
• The Promise model
• Templates and data types
• Quickstart configuration
• Creating configuration libraries
• Upgrading from CFEngine 2
• Example configurations and demos
• Achieving compliance with standards and regulations
• CFEngine on Windows and the Registry
• Monitoring and self-healing
• Brief overview of the community and commercial CFEngine roadmap

M2 Securing Linux Servers 
Rik Farrow, Security Consultant

Who should attend: Linux system administrators and security managers familiar with Linux sysem administration, whether you manage a handful or clusters of Linux systems.

Linux servers start out very secure: it's what you do with them when you use them that can create insecurities. A straight Linux server install runs minimal services and has few users and a very restrictive firewall, which is a great security posture but is pretty useless for most purposes. As users are added, services enabled, and holes punched through the firewall, the security can deteriorate quickly.

This class will show you how to maintain a strong security posture through careful configuration and proper use of Linux tools and services. Linux contains tools and software that can be enabled to slow brute-force attacks against user accounts, can notice when your accounts have weak passwords or are under attack, can keep services and software up to date, and can sandbox applications to prevent even zero-day attacks. The class will focus on attacks most recently seen, including attacks on mail and Web servers.

Take back to work: Techniques for securing and maintaining Linux servers.

Topics include:

• Minimizing risk with appropriate restrictions
• Managing and tracking application vulnerabilities
• Sandboxing to prevent attacks
• Monitoring logfiles
• Updates and configuration management

M3 Workplace Presentations 101 for System Administrators NEW! 
Adam Moskowitz

Who should attend: All sysadmins and IT professionals.

Whether you are a new sysadmin or an IT team leader, presentations are an important part of your job. Need to convince your boss and work team that you have the right solution to a problem? Be sure to address the issues that are most important to them. Want to go to that conference again next year? Give a great report to your group when you get back. Hoping for that next promotion? The better you are at explaining your work, the clearer it will be that you are the right choice!

This class will introduce participants to an array of tools and techniques to give them confidence in planning and giving presentations to their peers, colleagues, managers, and maybe even the corporate executives. Attendees will learn and practice essential skills such as designing a talk to fit your audience, subject, and available time; effective use of software tools for presentations; and what to do (and how to feel comfortable) when you are finally in front of your audience.

Take back to work: An introduction to basic speaking techniques, an overview of presentation tools and how best to use them, and a solid understanding of the most common mistakes presenters make.

Topics include:

• Analyzing the requirements for your presentation
• Preparing your content
• Preparing your materials
• Practicing your talk
• Giving your talk
• Common mistakes and problems

M4 Nagios: Advanced Topics
John Sellens, SYONEX

Who should attend: Network and system administrators ready to implement or extend their use of the Nagios system and network monitoring tool.

Nagios is a very widely used tool for monitoring hosts and services on a network. It's very flexible, configurable, and can be extended in many ways, using home-grown or already existing extensions.

This class will cover the advanced features and abilities of Nagios and related tools, which are especially useful in larger or more complex environments, or for higher degrees of automation or integration with other systems.

Take back to work: The information you need to immediately implement and use the advanced features of Nagios and related tools for monitoring systems and devices on your networks.

Topics include:

• Theory of operation
• Configuration for more complex environments
• Plug-ins: Their creation, use, and abuse
• Extensions: NRPE, NSCA, NDOUtils
• Add-ons: Graphing, integration with other tools
• Abuse: Unexpected uses and abuses of Nagios

M5 Perl 5 Update NEW!
Tobias Oetiker, Consultant and author of RRDTool

Who should attend: People who would like to update their knowledge of Perl to include all the goodies that have been added over the past few years.

Have you checked the Perl version on your server recently? Chances are high that it is Perl 5.8 or maybe, if you are lucky, 5.10. Perl 5.8 was originally published in 2002, more than nine years ago. The current version of Perl is 5.14. It's high time you updated both your Perl setup and your Perl knowledge.

While so much attention, excitement, and disappointment have been focused on Perl 6, Perl 5 has continued to flourish. For the past two years there have been regular scheduled releases, with one major release each year. There has been talk about Enlightened Perl and Modern Perl. CPAN, the Central Perl Archive Network (where most of the extension modules for Perl are hosted), sees up to 200 package updates and releases every week.

In this course you will learn about core features that have been added to Perl since 5.8, and you will get to know some popular extension packages that bring even more fun to working with the only programming language that adapts to the style of its users.

Take back to work: The ability to use new Perl 5 features for implementation efficiency and hacking fun.

Topics include:

• How to install Perl 5.14 on your system without breaking the existing Perl setup
• How to install extra Perl modules in a separate tree without changing the installed Perl setup
• What this Modern and Enlightened Perl talk is all about
• New Perl 5 features
• Perl 6 features already available in Perl 5
• Object-oriented Perl programming with Moose and Mouse
• Writing Web applications with Mojolicious

M6 Prerequisites for the Cloud NEW!  
David Nalley, Cloud.com

Who should attend: Sysadmins who don't have a plan for the cloud but expect to need one.

"The cloud": yet another wonderful IT buzzword that has come to dominate IT media and is suddenly on every IT-buzzword bingo card. This has forced many into rapid coalescence of a "cloud strategy." This class will begin with a discussion of what "the cloud" really is and will give students an understanding of what is really needed to harness the power the cloud can provide.

Take back to work: How to deploy the cloud without undue pain and which additional tools to use to reduce your work.

Topics include:

• What is the cloud?
  • SaaS
  • PaaS
  • IaaS: Computing, networking, storage
• Benefits to be accrued from cloud computing
• Tools to have before you start
  • Monitoring
  • Provisioning
  • Configuration management
• Where your clouds live
  • Private
  • Public
  • Hybrid

M7 The Limoncelli Test NEW! 
Thomas A. Limoncelli, Google

Who should attend: Sysadmins working on teams or solo; junior sysadmins aiming to be senior sysadmins or team leaders.

Tom's books total over 2,100 pages of advice. In this class he'll narrow all that down to 32 essential practices. Tom will blast though all the 32 practices, explaining what brought him to include each one on the list, plus tips for incorporating the practice, policy, or technology into your organization. You'll find some great ideas for providing better service with less effort.

Take back to work: How to identify and fix your biggest problems, cross-train your team, strengthen your systems—and more!

Topics include:

• Improving sysadmin-user interaction
• Best practices for working together as a team
• Best practices for service operations
• Engineering for reliability
• Sustainable Enterprise fleet (desktop/laptop) management
• How to figure out what your team does right, and where it needs to improve

M9 Building Appliances for Fun and Profit NEW! 
John Sellens, SYONEX

Who should attend: System administrators and architects who are interested in building and deploying self-contained appliance-style systems, using virtualization or dedicated hardware.

The increasing use of virtual and cloud computing, the availability of small computing platforms, and interest in single-purpose devices have led to the rise of appliance-style computing. This class provides an introduction to the OS and software side of building compute appliances.

While virtual machines can be deployed as fully loaded standard OS installations, deploying lighter-weight virtual appliances can reduce hardware, memory, and licensing costs, as well as the administrative overhead of managing fully loaded systems.

Take back to work: The knowledge needed to design, implement, and maintain appliance systems for your applications.

Topics include:

• Advantages of appliance-style computing
• Typical applications
• Virtual platforms
• Hardware platforms
• Tools for building small single- or limited-purpose computers
• Configuring for light weight and resiliency
• Considerations for package and system updates

M10 Perl 6 for Perl Users and Sysadmins NEW!
Tobias Oetiker, Consultant and author of RRDTool

Who should attend: People who work with Perl and would like to try their hand at working with a real implementation of Perl 6.

Perl 6 was conceived over ten years ago. The long gestation time has prompted many eulogies and second-system-syndrome remarks. All the while, Larry Wall and a bunch of die-hards have been working at designing and implementing a new language called Perl 6. Perl 6 is heavily inspired by Perl 5, but it also introduces many new concepts on all levels.

For years Perl 6 existed mainly on paper. With Rakudo, we now have a real implementation of the language at our disposal. This class is based on actual working Rakudo code, focusing on upgrading your Perl knowledge to Perl 6.

Take back to work: The ability to harness Perl 6 to solve problems with less effort and more fun than ever before.

Topics include:

• Getting Rakudo up and running
• Perl 6 basic concepts
• Perl 5 to Perl 6 feature match
• Object-oriented programming in Perl 6
• Perl 6 one-liners
• Lots of actual running Perl 6 code
• Cool Perl 6 features you can use to impress your friends and frighten your enemies

M11 VMware vShield and Networking Deep Dive NEW!  
Carlos Camacho and Mahesh Rajani, VMware

Who should attend: System administrators and architects who are interested in digging into VMware networking technologies, with a specific focus on the VMware vShield suite.

VMware vCloud is a suite of VMware technologies used to stand up cloud computing environments (public/private/hybrid and on/off premises). VMware vCloud provides multi-tenancy, resource elasticity, segmentation