James T. Dennis
(408) 374-7623 (home)
(650) 279-4059 (cell)
(800) 938-4078 (voice mail)
job@starshine.org
____________________________________________________________________________
Objective
I’m interested in a position where I can apply my experience in programming, quality assurance,
systems administration, training and technical writing to help your organization be more pro-active,
productive, and effective.
Experience
I’ve worked in the technical support, quality assurance, and information systems departments at three
of the largest software publishers in the industry. I’ve also run my own consulting service, taught
programming (part time) at the college level, written a book on systems administration and played
key roles in a couple of “start ups.”
Bradford Learning Inc.
Instructor and Courseware Developer (contractor) 9/2002 to
Present
- Taught Linux (LPI compliant) classes to strategic customers like Cadence Software and Well Fargo
- Revised and updated LPI 101 and LPI 102 courseware.
- Customized content and scheduling to meet customer needs:
- Fitting two five days courses into one (Well Fargo)
- Customizing material to emerging desktop and helpdesk needs (from the traditional server, and systems
administration focus)
- Currently working on new courseware for the advanced LPI 2 certification market.
Quantum Storage Systems Group
Developer (contractor) 1/2002 to
7/2002
- Developed Linux kernel device drivers and patches (MTD flash, custom info, and watchdog drivers).
- Monitored, merged and maintained various kernel patches (especially XFS and ACL enhancement sets).
- Provided code reviews and recommended bug fixes throughout the GuardianOS (NAS turnkey/embedded system)
code base.
- Reviewed and revised their build system and all software requirements and enhancements.
- Ported GuardianOS to a new platform (with only two assistants).
- Provided developer support for all Linux programming APIs from system calls and kernel through libc functions
and up to shell, Perl, and Python scripting.
2Wire Inc
Senior Systems Administrator 6/2001 to
11/2001
- Supervised junior system administrators. Interviewed and selected for IT positions.
- Provided deployment and testing architectures and infrasture for custom clustered n-tier Java servlet and MS SQL
CRM application suite.
- Recommended and implemented all UNIX/Linux systems security measures and policies.
- Provided senior support for all Linux and UNIX applications, utilities, and programming APIs
- Automated software distribution and cluster management processes and scripts (including fullly automated OS
installation and configuration using custom enhancements to Red Hat KickStart).
AXIS Personal Trainers & Spa
Manager, Systems Analyst 10/2000 to
4/2001
- Implemented recovery (backup) plans and procedures.
- Recommended and implemented data integrity and security systems.
- Helped design and maintain client management, billing and scheduling software.
- Maintained PostgreSQL databases and servers.
- Managed systems and network administration staff.
- Built the corporate data center from scratch.
- Managed desktop (client) systems and support.
- Responsible for routers and desktop (point-of-sale) systems for three facilities and approx. 100 users.
- Recruited, interviewed and helped select IT staff
- Recovered corrupted databases (legacy application)
Linuxcare
Senior Consultant 2/1999 to
10/2000
- Consistently brought customers back for additional business.
- Provided highest point of escalation for technical support issues for our call center
- Perform training of internal technical support staff.
- Manage and participate in professional services contracts for key strategic customers such as Motorola and Transmeta
(usually supervising one to three associates).
- Compose and edit training materials and present classes in various technical Linux and UNIX topics to Linuxcare
customers and partners such as Hitachi and SGI.
Starshine Services
Consultant 8/1996 to
2/1999
- Co-wrote and published Linux System Administration (New Riders Publishing, 2000).
- Provided system administration training and support services for customers ranging from small business (SOHO)
through the U.S. Postal Service (San Mateo Data Processing Center). (customer references available upon request).
- Built custom servers (primarily routers, firewalls, mail and FTP/web and intranet servers).
- Wrote articles for Linux Journal and Sysadmin Magazine.
- Maintain “The Answer Guy” column and other articles for the Linux Gazette.
- Prepared and presented tutorial/seminar for LinuxWorld Expo (Security for System Administrators).
- (Part-time instructor at Mission College: UNIX Shell Programming)
McAfee Associates
System Administrator 1/1995 to
8/1996
- Prototyped e-commerce system (used in production for several months - handling over $25K/month in sales and
used as model for later production releases “almost line for line”)
- Managed their Internet routers, DNS zones and restructured their namespace to provide near infinite scalability.
Created secure private zones.
- Increased their FTP capacity and web capacity by an order of magnitude by implementing “round-robin” DNS
load-balancing.
- Improved network security by configuring packet filters on the border routers and deploying the Internet Junction
IPX to TCP/IP gateway. Recommended RFC1918 “private net” addressing for some departments (for additional
security and IP address conservation and lower maintenance effort and costs).
- Upgraded them from a single T1 to four T1’s and an OC-12 with redundant service providers.
- Designed and installed intranet which became focal point for all intra-departmental communications and automated
“paperless” workflow.
- Completely revamped Internet mail services, installed and maintained Majordomo and Smartlist automated mail
list management packages. Managed 100,000 subscriber announcement lists.
- Wrote procmail automated response “mailbots” and automated mail dispatch and sorting.
- Designed regression and competitive analysis scripts for all anti-virus products.
Symantec’s Peter Norton Computing
Support Analyst 2/1992 to
12/1994
- Provided all training for new members of this team Designed and presented training materials on the Internet (as
it related to Symantec reps at that time) Helped design and refine training materials on DOS Data Recovery.
- Primary SysOp: CompuServe Network Products forum (SYMNET).
- Secondary WizOp: All Symantec and Central Point CIS forums.
- Primary SysOp: Symantec and Central Point BBS.’
- Provided technical support for all “Norton” DOS and Windows Products.
- Tested products under development, reported problems and suggested enhancements. Also responsible for technical
review of documentation.
- Prepared and delivered employee classes in:
- PC architecture and DOS memory management concepts
- Data recovery and low level disk structures
- Internet services and acceptable use
- Fundamental Unix skills
Education
Santa Monica College
Santa Monica, CA (Part-time) Computer Programming (C, C++, x86
Assembly)
Portland Community College
Portland, OR (Part-time) Computer Software Technician’s program
(Pascal)
Professional Affiliations
I’m a member of USENIX (Open Systems Professionals) & SAGE,
LPI (Linux Professionals Institute) Advisory Council
BayLISA (Bay Area Chapter Large Installation System Administration, board member: 1998 - 2002),
and several local UNIX and Linux user’s groups.
Certifications
Also available in PDF