Karsten M. Self
San Francisco, CA 94127		(650) 815-9730
http://linuxmafia.com/~karsten/		karsten@linuxmafia.com
LinkedIn		Email contact preferred

Availability & Geographical Preference

I am interested in permanent or consulting (W2) engagements in the San Francisco, northern San Mateo, and western Alamedo counties, only.

Objective

Managing large Linux instalations: "Systems guy with a data head". Specialization is administering 100s to 10,000s of nodes for external Web/LAMP or internal resources, ensuring availability, reliability, security, and cost-effectiveness through optimization, automation, monitoring, and troubleshooting, as well as database support and queries.

Skills

Computer/Programming

• Systems Administration / Platforms
  • Website configuration & administration: general LAMP stack, Perl/Python/PHP/Java, Apache, Linux, MySQL/Postgresql/Oracle. 40+ million users.
  • Troubleshooting, networking, security, services, reporting, monitoring, database-backed management, capacity planning, strategic planning, documentation.
  • GNU/Linux: Debian, Red Hat / RHEL, CentOS, Ubuntu, Novell / SuSE / SLES, , others.
  • UNIX: OS X, Sun/Solaris, HPUX, SVR4, BSD. FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Cygwin.
  • Storage: LVM, NFS, SAN, NAS, RAID (0, 1, 5, 10), SCSI, SATA, ext2, ext3, reiserfs, backups.
  • Monitoring: Nagios, Cacti, Ganglia, SNMP, IPMI.
  • Virtualization: VMWare Workstation, VMWare GSX Server, Xen, User-mode Linux, qemu, Parllels.
  • Datacenter: racking, light cabling, lights-out/ILOM. Hardware: Dell, HP, Sun, IBM, Genstore, Rackable, others.
  • Enterprise tools: Platform LSF, Cacti, SAS.
  • Legacy: VAX/VMS & AXP OpenVMS, MVS TSO/ISPF, Microsoft Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows 2000 Server, Windows XP.
  
  
• Programming
  • Scripting: Very strong: sh, bash, ksh, csh, sed, awk. Lighter: Perl, Python, R.
  • Development tools: Mercurial/hg, SVN, CVS, RCS, GNU make.
  • Web: HTML, CSS.
  • SQL: Postgres, MySQL, Oracle, MS SQL Server, Informix, DB2.
  • C/C++: Build/debug, troubleshooting, minor coding.
  
  
• Cluster Monitoring & Management: Nagios, Ganglia, Cacti, Kickstart, FAI, Xen, DSH.
• RDBMS: SQL, application and database development with Oracle, Informix, DB/2, Sybase, SQL Server, Postgres, and MySQL.
• Networking: TCP/IP, SMTP, NNTP, DNS, BIND, DHCP, NAT, NFS, NIS, HTTP, SSH, apache, firewalls, Samba, X11.
• Hardware: SCSI, RAID, DAT, SATA, Cat5 cabling, hubs/switches.
• Document/Content: HTML, CSS, SGML, XML, DocBook, LaTeX, Wiki, TWiki.

Industry experience:
Agriculture, biotechnology, consumer credit, energy, engineering, finance, healthcare, insurance, Internet, e-commerce, pharmaceutical, social networking, and software.

Selected Accomplishments

Systems & Network Administration

• Operations team member for 40+ million user social networking website running Linux, Apache, Java, Oracle. Monitoring, troubleshooting, maintentance, upgrade, & architecting.
• Monitoring, troubleshooting, and assessment on 10,000 node server farm, utilizing automount, NFS, LDAP, Cacti, OpsWare, and Platform LSF for leading EDA software provider.
• Systems and network administration for regional webhosting & design firm. Over 600 websites, 30 internal users, 17 servers.
• Administered heterogenous environments comprising Red Hat Linux, Debian GNU/Linux, HPUX, SunOS, Solaris, and other Unix.
• Administered, installed, and supported services including: exim, qmail, BIND, spamassassin, iptables, ipchains, apache, Mailman.

Data Analysis, Software Development & Quality Assurance

• Developed test plans, test cases, coverage matrices, documentation, systems, and execution of QA/QC tasks. Opened, verified, monitored, and resolved QA/QC issues with tracking tools including Bugzilla, Remedy ARS, Trac, Jira, and others.
• Developed internal and external documentation and documentation systems. Authored numerous frequently referenced Linux and applications references.
• Responsible for community development, establishing and communicating licensing policies, liaising with sales and business development teams on free software issues.
• Internal tool development and recommendation, build/buy decisions for: database, software revision control, documentation systems, and other systems.
• Data analysis for pharmaceutical, investment services, consumer credit, and biotech devices clients. Projects included phase III/IV FDA submissions, 100 million record data validation, and biomonitoring development support, utilizing SAS and other tools under Unix and other platforms.

Employment

Operations Engineer, Mainz Brady Group (contract) April, 2010 - July 2010

Ops liason for engineering group at a large entertainment/media online site. Weekly build/release, on-cal pager, site maintenance and monitoring, working closely with engineering colleagues and operations staff with ongoing development efforts. Stack: Red Hat/CentOS, Apache2, PHP, MySQL, Cassandra, Nagios, awk.

Sr. Systems Administrator, AOL, LLC (Bebo) December, 2008 - November 2009

Member of the operations staff for social networking site Bebo, managing infrastructure for 500+ hosts serving 40 million users. Coordinating issues with engineering/development, Akamai, system upgrades and maintenance, spam, and content management issues. Linux (Debian/RHEL) infrastructure, running Apache, lhtttpd, Oracle, Java.

Systems Architect, Spherion Corp, on site at Cadence Design Systems, Inc., October 2006 - September 2008.

Contract services for leading EDA software provider, leading team in monitoring, troubleshooting, and remediating large-scale server farm running Linux (RHEL 3/4/5 & SLES 9/10), and UNIX (Solaris 8/9, AIX, & HPUX). Developed tools to monitor and evaluate system performance, identify and resolve issues, and increase overall farm reliability, availability, utilization, and efficiency.

Sr. QA Engineer, PGP Corporation, March 2006 - September 2006.

Performed QA for leading encryption solutions company on Linux server products software, including UI and functional tests involving SMTP, IMAP, POP, PKI, HTML, SSL, and other functional aspects, interfacing directly with developers. Additionally perform test case development and execution, bug reporting and validation, and documentation of tools and procedures.

Sr. QA Engineer, XenSource, August 2005 - February 2006.

Highly technical QA for the leading Open Source enterprise virtualization company, performing QA on multi-platform systems and Linux kernel software, including compile/deploy, building and running automated functionality, stability, and performance testing on a 40-node cluster.

Technology Director, Boys & Girls Clubs of Napa Valley, March 2004 - December 2004.

Oversaw youth & teen programs in both programmatic and technical aspects of running a safe, educational, and kid-friendly network for over 200 users. Legacy clients on a GNU/Linux back-end utilizing Apache, Samba, Squid, Dansguardian, and other technologies.

Contract Sr. SAS Programmer, Quality Planning Corporation, January 2003 - July 2003.

Database design, process clarification, standardization, and capabilities enhancement of insurance policy data quality improvement system utilizing multiple third-party data sources resulting in insurer revenue recovery as contract position for San Francisco client.

Consulting Designer, Kuro5hin.org, http://www.kuro5hin.org/ , January, 2000 - 2003.

Provide design input on the collaborative filtering engine of a popular "technology and culture from the trenches" discussion site, including moderation and user-ranking "mojo" systems, running on a LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl) stack.

Sr. Systems Engineer, Freerun Technologies, Inc., January, 2002 - November, 2002.

Provided systems administration, systems support, internal and external end-user support for regional webhosting & design firm. Over 600 websites, 30 internal users, 17 servers. Red Hat Linux, Debian GNU/Linux, qmail, bind, apache, perl, Java, HTML, bash, shell scripting.

Director of Evangelism, Zelerate, Inc. (formerly OpenSales, Inc.), San Mateo, CA, 11/1999 - 1/2001

Served several business and technical roles in a rapidly evolving e-commerce software Internet startup environment, encompassing technical, business, and legal tasks, for a product running on a LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl) stack.

Statistical Programmer, Trilogy Consulting, San Mateo, CA, 8/1997 - 11/1999

Providing systems solutions to clients utilizing SAS, UNIX, and PC tools, in pharmaceutical, investment services, unsecured consumer credit, and biomedical devices sectors. Clients: Roche Pharmeceutical, Visa International, Charles Schwab, Vital Insight.

Analytic Programmer, PM Squared, Inc., 3/1996 - 8/1997

Technical SAS lead for managed healthcare consulting firm.

Independent Consultant, San Francisco Bay Area. 9/1995 - present

Periodic consulting engagements with corporate, non-profit, educational and SOHO clients, including GNU/Linux administration and deployment, website development, SAS consulting, and on-site systems support.

Sr. Analyst, HealthCare COMPARE Corp., West Sacramento, CA. 12/1994 - 8/1995 (now Coventry Health Care, Inc.)

Developed reporting and analytic solutions for internal and external clients using SAS in a VAX/VMS, AXP, and MS Windows environment.

Healthcare Analyst, HealthCare COMPARE Corp., West Sacramento, CA. 4/1993 - 12/1994

Consultant, Calgene Fresh, Davis, California. 2/1993 - 4/1993 (now Monsanto).

Intern, Davis Energy Group, Davis, California. 6/1991 - 9/1992.

Intern, Sacramento Municipal Utility District, Sacramento, California. 6/1990 - 6/1991.

Publications & Presentations

• "CIDR House-Rules: Use of BGP router data to identify sources of Internet abuse", presented to the Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group, 6th General Meeting, March 1, 2006.
• "Open Source Software Licenses" Intel Developer's Conference, Presented in Santa Clara, CA, September, 2000
  
• "Open Source Business Licenses -- Choosing the Right One for Your Project" O'Reilly Open Source Conference, Presented in Monterey, CA, July, 2000
  http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/e_sess/786 (Internet Archive)
  
• "T. Bollinger, R. Nelson, K. M. Self, and S. J. Turnbull, "Open- Source Methods: Peering Through the Clutter,", IEEE Software, Vol. July/August, no. 4, 1999, pp8-11.
  
• "Data Know Thyself: VV - a macro to tell you Evverything You Need to Know About Data Set Characteristics" Western Users of SAS Software, Proceedings of the Fourth Annual Regional Conference, p 14, (c) 1996. Presented in San Francisco, CA, September, 1996.
  
• "UNIX Large file Processing Secrets", SAS Institute, Inc., Proceedings of the Twenty-Second Annual SAS(r) Users Group International Conference, p1468 (c) 1997. Presented in San Diego, CA, March, 1997.

Education

BS University of California Davis, Agricultural and Managerial Economics.

Interests

• Sculler, backpacker, cyclist, and competitive swimmer.
• Classical, jazz, and blues.
• Conversational German.
• US Citizenship

This document available in text, HTML, MS Word, Postscript and PDF formats, as well as specifically targeted versions on request.

Last updated: 2010/08/30 08:01:58