Today I upgraded the host server of this blog website and also the blog framework, WordPress, to the latest version, as I planed in my last article. While I was doing such data backups, updates and other management work from the admin console, it became stronger to me that I should treat what I am doing more seriously, not just as hobbies or interests or for fun.
When I first did all these things, first setting up a server with my home computers and then purchasing cloud servers, learning Linux management for the server configurations, settings, backups and upgrades, etc., learning back-end programing and then front-end programing to have the website created and running, etc., it was purely out of curiosity. When I kind of decided to go deeper with my career, to become more professional as IT administrator, everybody was talking about Linux and coding because it’s said that pure and traditional IT admin work within Microsoft environment was not promising and we should spend more time and energy on Linux and try to become a developer or DevOps if possible. The saying itself might be true to some extent because if you can only do one specific filed of work, you might not be that competitive unless you are doing quite well or become kind of expert in that field. Otherwise, you need to learn new things as technology itself is changing, quickly, though the new ones always inherit something, more often than not the core concepts, from the old ones. So, with a few more years in this industry, I know better how true and untrue of this saying or many of similar sayings.
But back to the topic today, I still like doing all these things: setting up and improving home network and system infrastructure to make myself and the family more comfortable with the network and computer/mobile phone using and also make it less time consuming to back up data and transfer data, like videos, among different home devices, like from data server to TV; managing cloud servers and also a few on-premise servers to test some technologies I am not familiar with yet but willing to have a try; getting a better understanding of how popular and hot technologies work, like cloud, AI, etc. If I like these and I invest some time and energy in them, I think I’d better to treat them seriously and professionally, because if not, such time and energy spent would mean nothing and I could have spent them being with the family, friends or traveling, reading etc. which kind of will give me something meaningful back, whether it’s relation, friendship, or new thoughts, etc.
So how to do them professionally? Well, I think the easiest and most direct way is to copy how I do things I care most and want to do well, like the relation with family members and friends, health, work, some competitions I want to win, etc. If I really want to do them well and really treat them seriously, I will find the specific way to do each specific thing. And by the way, another truth I have noticed, if we want to do all tasks with one universal way, that probably means we are not ready yet. Things are different from each other and the way to do them separately should be different as well though some concepts and philosophy might be universal.