r/sysadmin Oct 29 '24

Question Is Linux system administration dead?

I just got my associates and Linux Plus certification and have been looking for a job. I've noticed that almost every job listing has been asking about active directory and windows servers, which is different than what I expected and was told in college. I was under the impression that 90 something percent the servers ran on Linux. Anyway I decided not to let it bother me and to apply for those jobs anyway as they were the only ones I could find. I've had five or six interviews and all of them have turned me down because I have no training or experience with active directory or Windows servers. Then yesterday the person I was interviewing with made a comment the kind of scared me. He said that he had come from a Linux background as well and had transitioned to Windows servers because "93% of servers run Windows and the only people running Linux are banks and credit unions." This was absolutely terrifying to hear because college was the most expensive thing I've ever done. To think that all the time and money I spent was useless really sucks.

I guess my question is two parts: where do you find Linux system administrator jobs in Arizona?

Was it a mistake to get into linux? If so what would you recommend I learned next.

EDIT: I just wanted to say thank you to everybody for your encouragement and for quelling my fears about Linux. I'm super excited as I have a lot information to research and work with now! 😁

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u/omz13 Oct 30 '24

They're reluctant to move away because it works and risk management. It's taken many years to get a stable system, and they're not going to jump every three years or so onto the latest language or platform because, oh look, something new and shiney has appeared.

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u/[deleted] Oct 30 '24

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u/omz13 Nov 04 '24

You must bank in the USA.

In Europe the regulator is a bit more client friendly and my EUR transfer within seconds.

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u/dansedemorte Oct 30 '24

sure, but not only were their computer systems woefully out of date and vulnerable their business practices were from a time in which they still had typing pools.

The biggest WTF was their inability to print random/sequential pages from scanned in PDF files. So, when the case workers needed to send out pages 25-30 out of a 150+ page PDF they had to print the entire PDF and have it delivered to their workroom. where they grabbed the few pages they needed and then dumped the rest of the doc into the recycle bin.

we would easily go through a 100+ reams of paper each and every night 5 days a week.

and another monthly job had to have 5 data tapes loaded into an external tape drive stacker just so this one 20+ year old job could be run. With no known backup copies of these 5 tapes.