Archive for the ‘aol’ Category

MySQL DBA (Database Administrator) Opening at AOL

Monday, August 31st, 2009

Full details: http://bit.ly/19Ea7I

Contact: Carl.Coppadge at corp.aol.com or AIM: carlcoppadge11

Location: Dulles, VA

MySQL Database Administrator

AOL’s People Networks Operations, which operates AIM and ICQ, has an opening for a Sr. MySQL Database Administrator. This position would be responsible for managing large, highly scaled production MySQL databases as well as pre-production (QA/Dev/Staging) environments.

Key Responsibilities:

  • All aspects of MySQL deployment, operation,and design to ensure high reliability and performance
  • Collaborate with developers and architects to create high-performance, cost-effective designs
  • Participate in an on-call rotation as part of a 24×7 operations team to resolve urgent production issues
  • Ensuring data integrity with good process and a keen eye for detecting errors and misuses of data

    Desired Skills for this Position:

  • Knowledge of database architecture concepts as well as MySQL-specific implementations
  • Significant experience with MySQL in a high-volume production environment
  • Experience with open source ETL packages and methods for large scale data migration
  • Diverse technical background with awareness of concepts in networking, Linux, and storage
  • Bachelor-level degree in Engineering, Computing, or Sciences orequivalent experience
  • Replication: managing replication delay, scaling replication throughput, and designing resilient systems
  • Configuration: tuning InnoDB, managing memory usage, and tuning file systems for maximum throughput
  • Reliability: backups under load, failover strategies, and recovery from replication issues
  • MySQL: familiarity with Percona and Google patches

    Our perfect candidate can manage many rapidly changing projects while maintaining professionalism and poise. Our environment is both highly exciting and highly demanding — those who thrive here adopt a “work smarter, not harder” attitude.

Posted in Job, aol | No Comments »

Be nice

Tuesday, October 16th, 2007

It’s been well-reported that AOL made cuts today. While I wasn’t among those affected, naturally with any event this large, quite a few people I knew and worked with were amongst those impacted. (more…)

Posted in Navel-Gazing, aol | 3 Comments »

Really Big Data Centers

Wednesday, April 11th, 2007

While most of my time these days is spent contemplating software and application considerations, I’d like to take a moment to address a topic which only occasionally gets the attention it deserves: the role of a high quality data center. While a few folks may think that networking and data center infrastructure are dead arts, I’m quite confident that there is still significant work going on in this space. Case in point: Yahoo, Microsoft, Google, Google, and (shockingly) Google are building massive new data centers taking advantage of all of the latest features to increase density and automation and reduce cost. At the end of the day, scale wins, and these facilities (which have price tags in the half-a-billion dollar range) have scale. Not to be outdone, incidentally, AOL has built a few big data centers — and sold them too. (more…)

Posted in Data Centers, Infrastructure, Internet, aol | 1 Comment »

Do Apple Users Just Have Stockholm Syndrome?

Wednesday, February 28th, 2007

One of the more interesting questions in technology is how to know when it’s time for it to change. David Habib writes today about a concept he calls Technology Vendor Stockholm Syndrome, which occurs when technologists have worked so long with a vendor that they develop what he calls an unhealthy partnership with them. I’d argue it goes even deeper: there’s such a thing as a Technology Stockholm Syndrome that can develop around any sort of technology, even in the absence of vendor advocates.

(more…)

Posted in Technology, aol | 1 Comment »

You fix computers, right?

Sunday, January 21st, 2007

A surprisingly high number of the people I know who work in Technology Operations roles around the industry have parents who think they fix broken Outlook installations for a living. This is a not a reflection on their parents, per se, but rather it represents the challenge of distinguishing an Operations role from an IT role. Most people who work in any modern organization have interactions with IT staff, making the identification quite easy (Oh, that’s what little Johnny does). The problem with this identification is that it is probably wrong.

DISCLAIMER: This is also not a negative reflection on IT staff. Certainly, there a distinction between the roles, but I mean absolutely no disrespect of any kind to the helpful and hardworking people who keep computing systems running everywhere.
(more…)

Posted in Technology, Web Technology, aol | No Comments »

Mauled by Wolves

Thursday, December 28th, 2006

I was listening to the radio and heard that President Ford had passed away. Of course, the first thing I thought of was the 1996 Saturday Night Live episode featuring Dana Carvey as Tom Brokaw pre-taping obituaries for every possible way Gerald Ford could perish (e.g. “mauled by wolves”). Thanks to, let’s face is, the weird values of the internet at this point, I knew I could find it for free somewhere online.

(more…)

Posted in aol, video | No Comments »

The Hero with a Thousand Faces

Thursday, December 28th, 2006

The Hero with a Thousand Faces advances the theory of a monomyth. This is a prototypical structure which stories and myths have all grown up around for a thousand years. Obviously, this blog is unlikely to discuss comparative mythology, however I’m working on working out a reasonable monomyth for the web. Here’s what I have so far.

(more…)

Posted in History, aol, netscape | 1 Comment »

Predictable?

Sunday, December 17th, 2006

While I’m sure I’m not the last person at AOL to blog about our ongoing reorganization, plenty of other people have gotten their thoughts out there, so I thought it might be helpful to some tips for navigating the 5 stages of receiving bad news.

(more…)

Posted in aol | 2 Comments »