Introduction or: Why Bother?

I've been working in the Internet Service Provider business a long time. Since 1999 (in those prehistoric days when dialup was the only game in town, and if you were lucky, you had an access number that was not long distance), I've been learning how to get things done in the network. Almost always, this was learning The Hard Way, with nobody to ask but manuals, Google, and practice.

I did not go to school for any kind of CS or CIS degree (I actually went for Physics, but never finished). Almost everything I've learned to do, I've had to teach myself. In many cases, I've learned how to do something, forgotten how, and then had to learn it again at some point in the future. Which brings me to the point of this blog: this is a place for me to document some of the things I've learned The Hard Way. With any luck, this will be a place that others like me can go when they have some network task that needs to get done, and no idea how to do it. More likely, I can use this as a resource for myself at the next ISP I work for. Welcome!