Hello,

TL:DR Atmospheric scientist with knowledge of cli, python want change to a SRE job

Let me explain my background, I am M.Sc in atmospheric science with a few publications in the field, during my studies I work most of my time working with cli tools so I am confident with shell and cli tools, pipelines, stdout, stderr, tmux, etc. I worked using numerical model that you need to compile, this teach me tools like makefiles, modules and cronjobs to did it operational. I have experience with python and other scientific languages like R, Matlab. During my free time took some course of docker. Even I set up a Nginx webpage that I leave to die for lack of time or setup a raspberry pi to download “linux isos” using docker.

I really enjoy the automation of process, and help other colleagues to setup and install the environment to work.

I know my lack of networking, monitoring, and I’m not sure if my self taught skills (science standards) are comparable with a CS worker.

I want to learn or get the certification needed to get a SRE job to mid 2024.

Any advice, course or certication to help me to get in the road?

  • @drazzkalOPEnglish
    2•1 year ago

    Thank you so much, you did a fantastic job finding my weakness.

    what would worry me if I were considering hiring you is that you don’t really have any exposure to Software Development Lifecycle concepts.

    Yes, I’m aware of this, I need to take some time to learn it and get familiarize it.

    but particularly understanding design patterns and telemetry would be the thing I’d be most nervous about for you. Scalability as well - although that’s hard for almost everybody.

    Also true, hope some of these topics have an overview in a cloud cert.

    I joke that reading logs is my superpower

    I have similar experience with my colleagues when I was able to compile climate models, the difference was I spent some time reading the logs and look what’s dependencies are missing or the path is wrong

    Still, AWS Solutions Architect is a pretty good

    Thank you I’ll take this one

    Another obvious thing that I didn’t see in your background - VCS

    I have some experience using git and svn, but really never work in collaboration with others, in my current work we used but only git without external service. Just to keep track of the personal work.

    I’m a big fan of hanging pretty much all your personal projects on GitHub.

    I need to use it more, I only use it for “more” important projects, Now I think is bad approach

    Finally - you might expand your search a little wider (SysOps instead of SRE off the bat? DevOps as well?

    For sure, I’ll try a wider search, I always have troubles to find a job offer where I could met the requirements, thank you for suggest 2 jobs :)

    Maybe going straight stick software dev, with your background, at a company where your science background would be a real value add is something to look at.

    I have a “software engineer” job in a research institution, is only the title because I’m a research assistant most of the time with some dev time. The problem is there is no grow and the founding is through a international project, so the time is fixed.

    and also be prepared to ‘take a step back’ if you do jump. I’d definitely hire you to see how things go, but I’d want you to come in as a Junior, and based on what you wrote above, that’s probably a bit of a paycut for you.

    My pay is not so high, is a EU salary in a semi-public institution, tho the pay is lower that the equivalent in the industry, but I’m above the average of at county level, I’ll consider a paycut at least I could still pay the rent and past time with my family.

    Best of luck to you!

    Same to you, you are very kind with extranger a little lost about his future, I’m appreciate a lot the effort of you reply.

    • @bignavyEnglish
      2•1 year ago

      I have some experience using git and svn, but really never work in collaboration with others, in my current work we used but only git without external service. Just to keep track of the personal work.

      No this is great in and of itself - what I would tell you is to treat your github projects, even if you’re the sole contributor, like you’re working on a team. Checkout a feature branch, complete your code, then PR it into main/master/release/whatever, even if you’re the one doing the code review for yourself. Even if you don’t get to experience other devs (inevitably borking what you’re working on) in the codebase at the same time, it’ll give you a better idea of what the workflow should look like.

      I have a “software engineer” job in a research institution, is only the title because I’m a research assistant most of the time with some dev time. The problem is there is no grow and the founding is through a international project, so the time is fixed.

      My pay is not so high, is a EU salary in a semi-public institution, tho the pay is lower that the equivalent in the industry, but I’m above the average of at county level, I’ll consider a paycut at least I could still pay the rent and past time with my family.

      This all makes the SRE part more understandable and more within reach. I wouldn’t lead with, “I don’t have any dev experience”; I would lead with “I’ve been a software engineer for x years, specializing in atmospheric modeling.” Whoever is interviewing you will probably dig and figure out that you were a solo developer, but…you were still a software dev, and the first job in this industry is way harder than the next couple. Lean into that - you have the job title, you have the resume, you’re looking to take ‘the next step’ into SRE/DevOps, because as a solo-dev, you had to handle all that stuff yourself, and you figured out that you liked it and were good at it.

      We’ve all been the new guy trying to break into the field - pay it forward after you land that first SRE gig.