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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051

    [FOR HIRE] Sr. Sys admin/L3, programmer & support tech since 1992.

    Greetings all,

    I will be available for hire as of January 1st, 2008. I've given notice at the web host I currently work for, HostGator.com, LLC., letting them know that I will be leaving at the end of November, and will be available for hire after the first of the year, as I'm taking a vacation before I get into another long term contract. After two years of working at HostGator, where I've acted as a Level 3 administrator and developer, which I've enjoyed having worked with a lot of good people I consider friends, I've decided to move on and am currently looking for a position with an established web hosting provider that can utilize my services and knowledge. I can fit well into many positions and have been either contracting for or working in the web hosting, server admin, support and programming areas of the online industry for 15 years now.

    I can handle everything from customer service and phone, live chat and email support, to higher levels (1-3) of support or admin tasks. I am comfortable with all various forms of communication, be it email, live chat, helpdesk, phone, or instant messenger. I have played various roles in my work history, such as Sr. administrator, COO, CTO, lead developer/programmer and project team leader, to HR & PR positions, support team lead and management, to just about any aspect of this industry. I work very well unsupervised or in a team, or as a team leader. Primarily, my experience is with Linux operating systems, being Linux Redhat, Redhat Enterprise (RHEL), Fedora and CentOS and the like. Most web hosts I've worked with use Cpanel, though I am very comfortable in environments that have no control panels.

    I've performed everything from initial configurations and setups with servers, to more involved performance enhancing modifications, to security, to server auditing on a server performance level, user level or security level. Tracking abuse issues, spam, malicious users and files, to creating monitoring scripts and enforcing resource limits, logging and acting upon various issues that arise. This also entails coordination with data centers for hardware issues, OS installs, and so on, from the initial desired partition scheme to full chassis swaps or server mirroring in case of hardware failures.

    I have created custom solutions for fellow staff members and companies, to creating new features and custom modifications for client side aspects. Everything from admin scripts, to automated tasks and custom client and server applications to work across a server farm/cluster, to creating and implementing customized Cpanel modules for the Cpanel frontend interface (offering a more feature rich and secure and stable environment over default Cpanel features in some cases). I have created everything from custom DNS clusters that were complex, to creating different types of backup and restore solutions (and interfaces for those) for several of the company's I've worked for. I am able to offer the ability to create new, exciting and interesting features to add to or replace existing functions in many types of interfaces, using various protocols as needed. I am also able to create solutions, rather than be limited by what existing work-arounds and softwares may or may not exist or be exactly what a company needs.

    I am experienced with many interfaces, tools, programs and protocols and am familiar with all of the common and general softwares and services regarding web hosting. Everything from kernel compiles to configuration modifications to have services such as FTP, HTTP/Apache, MySQL, SMTP/POP3/IMAP perform better and be more secure. Of course, troubleshooting issues on the server side, network or client end with configurations, scripts, and so on. I have created FAQ's for clients as well as staff, tutorials and so on, to both act as an aid as well as guide or information library to primer staff or client's seeking information or general fixes. I've provided training, performed interviews and did the hiring, as well as overall management tasks involved to keep things running smoothly with staff and operations, to designing infrastructure, to future planning and disaster recovery issues and how to handle them.

    I am seeking a full time and long term position. I am interested in anything that's in the work hour range of 6:00 AM to 10:00 PM PST. In other words, I'm not interested in working a shift in the graveyard hours. I am able to also work in sales and billing, as well as tech support (levels 1 to 3), admin tasks, programming/development, management and so on. I am in the United States. I am over 18 years old. I am well spoken and am very proficient at writing and grammar, and have a desire to make the company and all of their clients satisfied. I have a very high client retention ratio of clients I deal with and am always professional and courteous when dealing with customers and fellow staff members. If you are interested in my services, please email me at tim@chatbase.com or contact me on AIM at the username "Linux Soup", or call me at 530-722-0271. Below is a short summary of my last three jobs, along with some references. My resume is available upon request. Thank you for your time.

    HostGator.com, LLC. (HostGator.com) - August 2005 - November 2007 (current).
    Reason for leaving: Not wanting to relocate to Texas. Didn't feel my skills were being utilized to their full potential.

    For over two years, I have primarily acted as a Level 3 server administrator, developed scripts and software, backup and data management solutions and interfaces (including clients and servers, which is actively in the final stages development as I type this), L1, 2 and 3 tech support, abuse team member, etc. Tasks involved over 2,000 shared, reseller, semi-dedicated and dedicated servers. The details and specifics and projects and overall tasks are too varied and great to go into detail here. This is only a very short summary, it would be worth while to ask for more detail. Please inquire further if you are interested.

    Site5 Internet Solutions, Inc. (Site5.com) - April 2002 - May 2005.
    Reason for leaving: Was looking for a change and wanted to work on other projects.

    For over three years, I had acted as Sr. Administrator, handling issues from front-line tech support to complex/involved level 3 issues. While with Site5.com, we retained a stellar reputation in the web hosting industry, with promised 15 minute (or less) support ticket response times, were in constant development of new features and services and were seen as one of the industry's cutting edge web hosting providers. Here, I performed everything from support to high level administration tasks, to being involved in development of customized and new control panel features we developed in-house. This included our own brand of control panel front end with greater control and security.

    One of several projects that comes to mind, is a clustered DNS system across the server farm, where all additions, deletions and modifications to any zone files were parsed through a client end module, checked for safe and correct syntax, passed over the network to a master (primary) DNS server, where it was further checked and parsed. From there, once verified, it would update the secondary (slave) DNS server with the new zone's content. This prevented DNS poisoning on the local system and network, where it was an issue before later Cpanel developments to help prevent it. This also kept a vital service running on systems soley dedicated to the task of domain resolution for on and off network queries, and prevented a server crash from showing a DNS request as the site being non existent.

    We had developed many such services and programs, too many to list here. My responsibilities also extended to support via the ticket system, forums, email, etc., as well as provisioning and coordinating new servers, IP management, server migrations and upgrades. Overall, much of the daily tasks were general systems administration, updates, upgrades, rolling out our own custom kernels, troubleshooting issues, performing security functions, audits (I wrote a script to perform audits to check our billing database against all user accounts and plans, on each server, to report any invalid accounts, non owned databases, mailing lists, crons, old data, etc.) It's fair to say that my tasks and responsibilities at Site5.com were greatly varied and covered a lot of ground, pretty much anything a web host could need one or more people to perform. The details and specifics and projects and overall tasks are too varied and great to go into detail here. Please inquire further if you are interested.

    Jaguar Technologies, LLC. (JaguarPC.com) - March 2000 - March 2002
    Reason for leaving: I was going to start a web host and ended up taking an offer from Site5.com (see above).

    Over my time at JaguarPC.com, I had acted as a lead systems administrator, working closely with the owner, Greg Landis, where this involved support queues of all levels, administrative duties, custom scripts for admin tasks, coordination of many tasks, as well as several aspects of development. The details and specifics and projects and overall tasks are too varied and great to go into detail here. Please inquire further if you are interested.

    Contact me:
    Tim Greer
    Redding, California
    530-722-0271
    tim@chatbase.com





    Technical references:

    Timothy S. Waibel
    1370 Parkway Road
    Pittsburgh, PA 15237
    H: 412-348-8125 C: 412-417-0184

    Andre Ricardo Faca
    Applied Innovations Corporation
    andre@andrefaca.com
    +351912658516

    David Collins
    CTO - HostGator.com, LLC.
    davec@hostgator.com

    Shashank Wagh
    Level 3 Sys Admin - HostGator.com, LLC.
    shashank@hostgator.com

    Suchandra Thapa
    University of Chicago OSG/Argonne National Laboratory
    s-thapa-11@alumni.uchicago.edu
    773-450-3064

    Robert Rice
    Optiquest Internet Services
    780 Westridge Rd 77386
    281-364-0539

    Urban Weigl
    Avara.net Ltd, Managing Director
    uw@avara.net
    +353 87 2435747

    Matt Johnson
    mjohnson82@bellsouth.net
    (954) 410-0456

    Non technical references:

    Curt Micthell
    Created 90+ DVD/VHS lesson series ("In the Style Of" and "Learn to Burn").
    curt@curt-micthell.com
    (I can not post his phone number here in public due to his celebrity status).

    Stephen T. Maloney
    Maloney Wealth Management
    Owner/Branch Manager
    (530) 244-0225 / (800) 545-5020
    Last edited by Tyler; 11-09-2007 at 07:50 PM. Reason: Edited as requested.
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  2. #2
    Join Date
    May 2006
    Location
    San Francisco
    Posts
    7,325
    That is a very impressive resume! I believe I saw you over at Site5 a few years ago. Best luck to you!
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  3. #3
    I've known Tim for years and he lives in the same area as me. One of the best admins I've ever known! He's too humble (and should have added me for a reference). Sorry Tim, but I've got to say it. Anyone that doesn't have interest in him are missing out.

    Not that he needs this reference, but he didn't mention that he's a technical reviewer for O'Reilly books that deal with Linux, systems administration, programming. He didn't mention that he's created patches and worked on PHP and Perl modules that people use from repositories, or anything else. He didn't mention the Cpanel root exploit he found:

    http://news.netcraft.com/archives/20...mass_hack.html
    http://it.slashdot.org/article.pl?si...18254&from=rss
    http://hostingfu.com/article/cpanel-...loited-in-wild

    I could go on. Anyone's welcome to contact me as a reference, too.

    Robert McGregor
    rob2132@charter.net
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  4. #4
    I have also worked with Tim personally over the years, both coding and systems administration. I can elaborate on projects we've worked on. Also, contact me, I'm interested in discussing an idea with you.
    Last edited by Rob2132; 10-25-2007 at 02:15 PM.
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  5. #5
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051
    I'm on a lunch break, but just wanted to thank you guys. Also, Rob, you are a great reference and anyone is welcome by me to contact him. Speaking of, I also have a lot more references, both for other people that currently work at Hostgator, as well as some people that used to. Also, a few people from Site5 that used to or do still work there. I have other technical and non technical references, but I think the current list should suffice regarding references. Finally, I wanted to say that I've had some people contact me saying "I wish I could afford you." and giving up hope before they talk to me further. Why do people think they can't afford me? :-) Talk to me and see! Thanks. :-)
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  6. #6
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051
    Please be aware, I've got 30 more days at my current position w/ Hostgator, and I'm in no rush, so contact me even if you don't see this for a month or two. I've actually made this thread a sticky for two months to ensure no one misses it. If I agree to a position with a company, then I'll update this thread and say so, just so no one wonders if I've found something. Otherwise, I'm taking my time and looking for the right company and am available. Thanks for your time.
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  7. #7
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051
    Hi all,

    My private messages inbox was full, and I had to empty it, so please re-send any inquiries.

    Also, for those of you that have inquired, I want to be clear that I'm not accepting any per job/project offers, only a full time position at an established company. Sorry.

    I have a few offers I'm considering, but haven't decided for sure as of yet, but again, when I have time and if I definitely get into a position, I will update this thread. So, keep the offers coming. Thanks a lot.
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  8. #8
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051
    This is just an update, as I've had several people and companies inquire further.

    I'm not looking to relocate at this time, as I own my home and have an established life here. Again, if I feel there's job security, enough to justify selling my home in this market and it looks like a long term, good future at the company, then relocation is a possibility. Please understand that it wouldn't be wise to simply sell and move and hope things work out in the long term without a good rationalization.

    That is, most people in this day and age do everything remotely, and while being in an office physically with other staff does have its advantages, the majority of those advantages would be the ability to physically execute tasks like hardware swaps, setting up networking and the like -- and those are (usually) primarily left to people in a low level than someone with my skills anyway. The overhead, insurance, workman's comp, and equipment costs (to name but a few) that are unnecessary in most of these cases, and in this day and age, just isn't a compelling or wise reason sometimes.

    As for other additional and possibly relevant information, I am married and have no kids to take me away from work or create some problem. I have a dedicated office with my systems and a good, reliable (and fast) Internet connection. I do not do drugs, I don't even drink. I live a healthy life style and work out and eat well (a healthy worker is a productive worker). I remain professional at all times with the company, client or otherwise. I hope that provides some clarity and maybe saves some people time. Thanks again for your time in reading this.
    Last edited by Tim Greer; 11-01-2007 at 03:16 PM.
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  9. #9
    Join Date
    Oct 2003
    Posts
    9,264
    I'd just like to mention (whether Tim likes it or not!) that Tim was exceptional at every task he assisted with at Hostgator during my own time there. I can't imagine any team that wouldn't be made complete without him, he's great to work with & is very reliable.

    Best of luck with the new endeavors Tim.
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  10. #10
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051
    Hey thanks a lot. :-)

    I just am updating this post to make it clear that I'm NOT in PA. My first reference listed is "Tim Waibel" and I'm "Tim Greer". Sorry for any confusion that caused. I'm in Redding, California, for the record.
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  11. #11
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051
    Just an update (as I'm on a lunch break), I've decided to take a month off after I'm done with this current project. Therefore, I will not be available until January 1st, 2008. I can really use those 30 extra days to relax before I get into a long term contract with a company.

    I've had several offers and some that I can take. One of them I'm very interested in, and am just waiting for the final word, as another couple are also interesting to me. However, until something is finalized, I'm still available. I've been too busy to really make much of an effort to seek a position, but have enough offers, of which one will surely work out by the first of the year.

    I'll leave this post sticky until that time, and I thank everyone for the offers for references (I have about 50 more, if anyone's interested in hiring me) and I'd also like to thank everyone for their well wishes and for contacting people they know that might be hiring. This has all been a very positive experience for me.

    Finally, I've coded for many years and coded complex functions, etc., and I am willing to submit code samples to anyone that's interested, so you can see this first hand I know what I;m doing, rather than trying to explain what a function does over the phone (for example -- I'm not always good at explaining things like that). As always, thanks for your time.
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  12. #12
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051
    Regarding my new start date of Jan,. 1st, etc.; I've had the WHT moderators make the relevant changes to my original post to reflect the current available date, and asked them to bold a few things to make the job history and my own contact more immediately clear and easy to find. Thanks guys.

    Please contact me for my resume or schedule a chat (AIM) or phone interview. Thanks.
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  13. #13
    Join Date
    Jun 2007
    Posts
    1,238
    Tim, that is one hell of a resume! I would like to talk to you one day when you have a moment, not about a job inquire. I want to ask some questions about this career field, and I think you would be perfect. I will be going on to college soon and I think I need to make my career choice fast.

    -Dan
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  14. #14
    Join Date
    Jun 2006
    Location
    Amex & Amex
    Posts
    1,291
    Tim,

    All I can say is that if I was looking to hire: I would hire you in an instant. Your resume is outstanding and you seem to be very respected by your peers. The world's open to you, only take something that really suits you.
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  15. #15
    Join Date
    Apr 2000
    Location
    California
    Posts
    3,051
    Hi all,

    This is just an update on the situation, as I'm still being contacted by a few companies even as of today (so this should save people time and wonder).

    I've recently decided to turn down all of the offers I've had, even after deciding on what company to go with as of a few weeks ago, to just bankroll my own web host, instead of working for someone else. I've talked to some really good people, and some hosts that I'd have loved to be part of over the last month or two, and I regret that I'm not going to be.

    I believe that I can create a workable formula for a stable hosting business with a stellar reputation and create something special and unique, especially as time goes by. I have about $150,000 to sink into the venture over the next year and I believe I'll be able to create that fan base of clients and I've already got staff picked out, and things started.

    I believe that if I'm going to truly excel in this industry to my full potential and be completely happy and see the revenue I want, I'm going to have to simply do for myself what I've made a career out of doing for others over the last 15 years, and spend time growing a company of my own rather than making other people rich(er).

    It wouldn't be fair to any company I'd be working for to not have me in it 100% regarding motivation and where I want to be in the future. I thank everyone for their time and the opportunities they have offered, and getting to know some people recently that I've gained respect for. Some of these companies and people truly made this a difficult decision for me to say no to. I wish them all the best!
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