Hi everyone! I'm a soon-to-be BSc graduate in Computer Science with a focus on Electronics and Mathematics, and I'm aiming to become a Linux Admin or DevOps engineer. I've been teaching myself these skills, but I'm starting to feel a bit overwhelmed and uncertain about my progress. I've been working hard on various projects, including setting up home labs and logging my commands on GitHub while studying for the RHCSA EX200 exam. However, I'm concerned whether I'm genuinely learning or just going through the motions without a clear goal.
I'm facing some financial pressure as I have limited resources to pay for the RHCSA exam, and I want to find an entry-level job that will help me gain experience while also supporting my family. I'm actively applying for intern and junior-level roles but haven't had much luck with interviews yet.
I would love your input on whether my path is realistic, what specific skills or labs I should focus on to enhance my job prospects, and where I might find these roles. If anyone has personal stories about breaking into the Linux field after self-studying, please share! Thank you for your help!
2 Answers
One suggestion is to turn your old laptop into a Proxmox host. This way, you can create, snapshot, and back up virtual machines (VMs) freely. If something goes wrong, you can easily roll back and try again without wasting too much time. You could set up different VMs to play around with services like DNS or NFS servers and see how they interact. The hands-on experience you gain from working with VMs is invaluable and often more effective than just following tutorials. Keep in mind that building solid Linux skills takes time, so don't get discouraged—I've been doing this for over a decade and I'm still learning new things every day!
That's great that you're already experimenting with VMs! Even if your old laptop isn't the best, it's still a great way to learn. You can always optimize configurations for better performance. Keep pushing yourself to try new setups and you’ll only get better!
Honestly, buying a Raspberry Pi or a used laptop might accelerate your learning. Nothing beats the hands-on experience. Set everything up from scratch yourself, and you’ll absorb so much more than by just watching tutorials. Make sure to apply what you learn by creating real projects or configurations to deepen your understanding. Good luck!
I have an old laptop, but I'm skeptical about how it can beat the tutorials I’m already following. Can you explain how the hands-on approach really helps?
Sure! When you set everything up yourself, you face real problems that require critical thinking and troubleshooting. You learn not just the steps but also why things work, which is crucial for a career in tech.
I looked up Proxmox and it's a KVM-based hypervisor. Do you think my old laptop with just 4GB of RAM can handle virtualization? I'm using VMware Workstation Pro to run a couple of VMs (RHEL 10 and CentOS) for practice right now, so I’m curious how well Proxmox would work for me. I also set up a Pi-hole server with my old laptop, but I want to explore more and get practical experience with hardware like a Raspberry Pi.