

Ask HN: Rent a SysAdmin? - lionheart

My startup's team is 2 developers and a designer and we usually can get anything figured out that we haven't done before.<p>But we don't have anybody that is a real systems administrator and that is starting to cause some issues.<p>Is there any service that lets you rent a system administrator for a couple hours?<p>We could use some advice on a few issues as well as some actual system setup work but don't know where to look.<p>Any advice?
======
jfricker
I don't think you want to "rent a sysadmin" (that sounds real low brow to me).
Instead look for a contact sysadmin but first make a list of the tasks you
want to hand off. If it's a logical grouping you may find that a managed host
can take care of you (like SliceHost or DreamHost). If not, then use that as a
job posting a la 'Seeking Linux Contractor' and screen carefully. Your best
candidate will likely have a couple long term clients they take care of a
little room for a new one.

~~~
jfricker
Also, plan on a long term relationship. "Rent" sounds like you'll toss the
sysadmin away and when new work pops up you'll just fetch another one. Don't
do that. Establish a relationship as you may grow into needing a lot of work
done.

------
jpluscplusm
I suggest you stay away from any of the elance/rentAcoder type sites, even if
some of their customers seem to offer the skills you want at a price you find
acceptable.

I gave them a try a couple of years ago to earn some beer money (I'm a
sysadmin), and the rates that people went for were /so/ damn low that I
literally couldn't see the point and just negotiated a raise instead :-)

I somehow doubt the genuine expertise and experience you'll derive most value
from during a couple of hours session /won't/ be found at those low, low
rates. Sysadmin are _expensive_ ;-)

~~~
byoung2
I see that you are based in London. I'm guessing that's why your rates are
much higher than the Elance crowd. There you'll find lots of sysadmins in
India/Russia with rates from $5-10/hour. There's no way you or I could (or
would want to) compete with that (I'm based in Los Angeles, US). I wouldn't
doubt their expertise just because of the low rate...it's just that the cost
of living is much lower there. That said, wherever you find someone, you would
want to do a certain amount of vetting before you give them access to your
server and network, and once you invest the time finding someone, you want to
keep them around more than a few hours.

------
cpt1138
Wearing the sysadmin hat has been the hardest part of my startup. I just don't
have the smarts or bandwidth to do some of the stuff I know I need. But on the
other side I'm super paranoid about security and insider threats. So rent-a-
sysadmin would be intriguing but there'd have to be some chicken and egg
rating system in place to vet them.

------
joshkaufman
Mario Danic is a freelance sysadmin, and is quite good: <http://vpsbuddy.com/>

------
ewams
Put contact information in your profile.

------
zoowar
You are wasting money on a designer. Contract the design work and hire a
system admin with broader skills.

~~~
jfricker
Without any context about the nature of the start up, the product line and
business, this advice is simply nonsense.

