My boss is a F*** idiot.

My boss is cool, im with the networking department, where 5 and he know his stuff.

I just see all those login/pw as a security risk hehe

Asus P4P800DX, P4C 2.6ghz@3.25ghz, 2X512 OCZ PC4000 3-4-4-8, MSI 6800Ultra stock, 2X30gig Raid0

I wouldnt sayy it too loud in a thread with a this kind of tittle...

Asus P4P800DX, P4C 2.6ghz@3.25ghz, 2X512 OCZ PC4000 3-4-4-8, MSI 6800Ultra stock, 2X30gig Raid0

We have over 1200 users, 45-48 locations (no one seems to know since we don't have records of it and purchase locations 2-3 times a year).

We don't use a domain. When I took this f'ing job my boss said "yeah, we use active directory, run a domain, we're really efficient" etc.

Half the servers have AD deployed. No such thing as imaging computers here. Nothing is the same, all locations vary. All users names are first name, last initials. Any idea how many MikeH users there are?? But that's cool since we don't use a domain, people can only log into 1 PC at a time..

I don't see how my boss got to where he is.. he's like 32 and making around 85,000 a year.. he's been here for 10 years.. 5 years ago there were only 5-8 locations.. now we have 40+.

And he's making a [-peep-] ton of money and has no clue how to do anything except put bandaids on everything.. and when I make suggestions he doesn't like it.. I push for a domain.. he thinks they a waste of time and too much of a problem to "connect a pc to the domain takes about 2 hours."

95% of my day today has been spent installing printers on computers, setting up new users locally to PCs.. I had a nice old hub get fried by a power outage.. so that was exciting.

Talk about a crappy job. I can see why the guy they hired before me quit after 3 weeks.. he went back to his old job.

Just have to rant.. seems like every IT department I go to, the person who is supposed to know what's going on is an idiot two times over.

I'm the 3rd and latest to our Network Department.

There's me, the network analyst.. I have a strong background in AD/Windows 2k/2k3 & domains.

We have a network engineer, who does all the cisco configuration.

Then the network manager. He's been here from the start though... everything has grown but since windows 2000 came out, he thought it was too hard so he moved from a 98 domain to ME/2000/XP workgroups.

We're way too far involved now to easily switch over to a domain.

1200 users, around 75 servers, all of our switches are unmanaged (don't really need anything more extensive for our needs though) and we just moved to these 1760 cisco PIX/VPN boxes at each location.

It's just a pain because I have an entire database with most people's username/passwords for most things.. which is not how things should be done.. I shouldn't know anyone's password.. but we have Lotus Notes, so I need to know their password to setup Lotus Notes (which I also find to be a POS program, I much prefer Exchange/Outlook).

We mainly use AS400s here, so the computer systems are definately last for what is really needed for the core business.

So, we don't run log in scripts, in 10 years this company has never done a mass upgrade.. or any type of upgrade.. it's all on a per computer basis.. or they're advised to buy a new PC every 3 years..

We do as400 terminal emulation.. it doesn't require but 2% processing power and 128mb of RAM. yet we're buying these 7000 dollar servers to host DHCP and WINS (no, no we don't use DNS because he doesn't understand that either.. and it's really good on domains. Yes, we keep a somewhat updated HOST file too.)

It's a shithole here. If I keep speaking up, I'll be finding myself traveling all over the place upgrading to a domain, but since no one knows the benefits, no one wants to do it. Even if I show them, they think it's not broke, lets not fix it.

1200-1300 users, each location has about 8 printers.. so I have to manually configure these each time. I've been setting up print servers.. but since rolling out Win2k3 servers, the security doesn't always mesh well on the older systems so that causes me a huge headache. Back to creating alocal TCP/IP port.

Even if we did switch to a domain.. it's really hard to figure out how do start the switch.. there are so many bandaids over the past 10 years.. we still have win 95 computers out and running in the company.

Nothing is really documented except for the stuff I do.. but even then, it's only good for my reference since no one else is on the same page as anyone else.. haha.

it's a shithole but it pays well.. I'm using the job to get my certs paid for and free training seminars.

speaking of which, anyone going to the Serious Security Seminar in Detroit this Thursday? I'll be there.. haha

That's bound to be 3 good stories. Come on now...

<pre><font color=red>A64 3200+ Winchester
DFI Lan Party NF4 Ultra-D
1GB Corsair 4400C25PT
WD740GD, WD2000JB, WD1200JB
ATI X800XL
Dell 2405FPW</pre><p>

dude, that is so freaking bad.

go tell your alien brothers, that ronnie cordova says they're gay!!! <A HREF="http://sockbaby.com" target="_new"> sock baby </A>

Not really. It's all politics, after you work at a place long enough you find out who likes who and who hates who. You just casually mention incrimination things to certain people and then the wheels start turning. People always do things to screw themselves when they try to build their "empire". They just need help exposing their idiotic methods from time to time.

A watched store never defrags.

Background on my boss.. He's 32. He went to college for .. no one knows. He lacks personality and the ability to hold a conversation that isn't about: WWF, muscle cars he likes, wihch totals about 5, and stripers.

He was 22/23 when he was hired from Anderson's (which is based out of Ohio.. one of the largest grain producers, turned big business, etc.). He used to work in the produce section.. stictly lettuce. He can tell all lettuces apart from one another.

Think I'm kidding? I wish.

Originally he worked in 1 plant soldering Twin Ax cables when they'd break on the old AS400 systems. The company expanded and bought 3 locations. All other locations were not using any kind of computer system. Everyone here works in factories and aren't really computer savvy, so instead of hiring someone, he was given the job.

Fast forward from 95 to 99. The company now owns 5-7 locations, he's the IT guy, along with 2 AS400 people. Another person is hired to help with network portion, assigned to Cisco equipment and nothing else. 2001- we're up to 13 locations.. 2003.. 20 some.. 2005, 40+ locations.

It expanded fast and the first time outside consultants were brought in were to help establish VPN tunnels between all locations.

We have no standing LDAP database for usernames... no documentation.. no one around here questions him because only a few people in the company are really computer savvy, to which he sucks up to and they don't care or realize how bad things are.. them being the CEO, CFO, and others.

I don't know how much worse things can get around here though. The best thing I've seen is the cisco brought in, but that's because other locations were upgrading to T1s from the ISDN lines he wanted them to use. Some locations have some smart people who step up and do what they want.. upgrade their phone systems to digital, upgrade their network connection, etc. Then my boss wants to do it everywhere..

The problem is he's been here from the start and knows everything about what was set up.. he remembers, but doesn't document or keep good information on it.

Each location has it's own $120,000 AS400/i520 system.. which 1 is powerful enough to run our entire company.. but because of our current setup, they decided spending $13 million to upgrade all those systems instead of switching to a handful was easier.

The second best thing to happen was when I repackaged all the software into an MSI format so we don't have to keep pushing next or manually configuring every damn piece of software.

As far as anyone is aware, he's 32/33, a virgin, lives in a small house, has a 1994 red dodge viper, a new truck, and he likes being home by 9pm to watch WWF. He doesn't have any formal education outside of a farm country high school and no certifications.

Most people who meet him, don't really care to talk to him.. our consultants look at him funny behind his back because he'll tell them, or even myself, things that are completely wrong and he'll argue them to the death that he's right.

He believes that proper subnetting is 10.11.1.1/255.255.255.0, 10.11.2.1/255.255.255.0, etc. He thinks that the actual way to create a subnet on a network to divide traffic. And I know a lot of people don't understand subnetting or how it works, but come on, look it up or something.

Luckily, each location is remote and has it's own router so it basically works like proper subnets.

But then again.. we have $15,000 router/pix/vpn combos at each location that are plugged directly into the wall and not a battery... but I must be the idiot.

Every time I do something that he doesn't understand or that might be going the right direction, he wants to confront me on it or he waits for a time to try to bring it up in front of mutliple people to try and make me feel stupid.

Problem is, he basically holds the most power and sway in the department because no one else has a clue on what's going on. If I piss him off, he could easily just send me on my merry little way.

I hate to say this because it's a bad thought.. but a few months back in the winter he had a kerosene heater heating his garage and putting off a lot of CO2.. he almost ended up in the hospital.. while that sucked.. I was thinking "finally, i can get this network to where it should be and he'll be out of the way.." .. thinking that he almost died.. but hey.. it was only a thought and some of you think worse..haha

But I've never heard of a system that is done this bad with a huge IT budget.. at the end of each year, out department gets about $50,000 to buy "whatever" we want. So, this past year, we bought everyone in the department new computers for work, 1gb pen drives, new office furniture, and redid our decorations in our office. Not including the $8,000-$10,000 15 of us spent going out for our "christmas/end of the year party." We reserved one of the fanciest restaurants in our city.. we took the 2nd floor, had the thing fully catered, full bar with anything, etc.

It's mainly the perks that balance things.. we also get a 15% bonus at the end of the year..

But we don't get a domain.

heh.

haha Haven't ya noticed? haha I have to kill time..

The manager is in Florida this week, the other guy is in South Carolina.. I'm stuck in Ohio. But I'm slated for St. Louis next week. I'll take Florida and it's 15 minutes from South Beach.

Its not who you know, its who you blow!

<pre><font color=red>°¤o,¸¸¸,o¤°`°¤o \\// o¤°`°¤o,¸¸¸,o¤°
And the sign says "You got to have a membership card to get inside" Huh
So I got me a pen and paper And I made up my own little sign</pre><p></font color=red>

Pure luck and the ability to tell lettuce apart.

Consultants come in and they're just in shock.. our firewall is a software program called Raptor.. it's a really old, outdated, crappy firewall. He doesn't think we need to upgrade it.
He doesn't think we need someone to test out security..

because everything is basically blocked.. up until the Cisco equipment was put in, I couldn't ping anything outside of my office because it was blocked. I still can't ping websites. He thinks that's a huge security problem and unnecessary.

He doesn't believe in a domain. He doesn't believe in imaging software. His motto is whatever Southwest airline has.. where they only have 1 type of plane.. he always talks about standardizing.. but nothing is standardized here. We have a variety of printers, PCs, network equipment, every location is different from the next. Usernames are different, names of servers are all different..

The best part was when he was trying to deploy active directory on a server.. using the exact same name as a previous name (deployed, but not used because he didn't know AD is for domains and he still doesn't know what it does).

We had a location, domain name: eve-2000.(mycompanyname).com, fqdn for the server was eve-nt.eve-2000.(companyname).com. this was already deployed.. so he tried to do it again and it kept kicking back.. he was trying to do eve-2000.eve-2000.(companyname).com.. it wasn't accepting another domain on the same network of eve-2000.(cn).com .. I had to explain it to him and all he could say was "well that's stupid."

haha yeah I know what you're saying there..
this case is definately different though.

I'm all about checking into new technologies, checking to see if it's beneficial, and then going ahead to learn it. I like going back for seminars and courses to learn new stuff... it makes me more valuable and my life easier..

But honestly, the closest thing to knew technolgoy we have is an outdated Windows SUS server.. 1. for the entire company.. no repositories anywhere else.. you'd think we'd have at least 3-4, one in each time zone so everyone isn't hitting the same server for a the 1-2 weeks it takes for 800 computers to get updated. I can't wait until something like the SQL slammer or the old ILoveYou virus to come out.. our network will crash..

If a serious flaw came out in anything on our software, we have no way of mass updating it.. it'd take us MONTHS to get most of the computers. The majority of our windows XP computers are running off pre SP1 or SP1 still.. very few have SP2 installed.. we don't have the ability to deploy it out to people.. especially with only 1 server to do updates over a T1 or 768k frame.

We have no current technology.. except Windows 2000 & 2k3 server, but they're just expensive OSs and computers to us. The only reason we need T1 lines at each location is to increase people's browsing speeds for surfing then net when they're bored and copying sofware from a CD over the network to their location so we can install it.

I created a list of scheduled tasks that run each night to copy about 400MB of software to select locations each night.. I have all of our software repackaged to MSIs and under 400MB.. before, it was over 2GB they'd transfer to a location for a software install. Normally they'd just have people ship computers back to this location.

Look at the money I saved by spending $1400 to repackage software.. just wish I had a way to mass deploy it..

Our network is a prime example of what 1997 networks looked like.

I'm honestly tempted.. haha. that way, he'd look really stupid.. I mean, we're a glass business, how many people really want our info? haha.

ROFL!


Asus P4P800DX, P4C 2.6ghz@3.25ghz, 2X512 OCZ PC4000 3-4-4-8, MSI 6800Ultra stock, 2X30gig Raid0<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by labbbby on 07/21/05 02:39 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

WHats the version of it hehe? patched? cuz of <A HREF="http://secunia.com/advisories/7722/" target="_new">this</A>

Asus P4P800DX, P4C 2.6ghz@3.25ghz, 2X512 OCZ PC4000 3-4-4-8, MSI 6800Ultra stock, 2X30gig Raid0<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by labbbby on 07/21/05 02:44 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

Rofl Sounds like fun!
1000+ pc you say? Would make a nice zombie army to sell rofl!


Asus P4P800DX, P4C 2.6ghz@3.25ghz, 2X512 OCZ PC4000 3-4-4-8, MSI 6800Ultra stock, 2X30gig Raid0