Green Windows Keyboard

Windows 11: How to Install WSL2 and Linux Distros

I’m not going to lie. Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) is a helpful technology. It’s supposed to have made getting a Linux environment on Windows easier. However, having just tried getting it up and running on the lone Windows box I own, I can confirm it’s a pain to install unless you’re a Windows system administrator or know what you’re doing. The hype for WSL2 appears to have overlooked the user experience....

August 18, 2022 · 4 min · Chris Short
eBPF

Intro to eBPF

This introduction to eBPF is adapted from the beginning of DevOps’ish 278 I occasionally ask for writing prompts from folks on Twitter for DevOps’ish. Sometimes asking on social media works well. Other times it’s giving someone a good URL and still scratching my head about what to write. But for DevOps’ish 278, the people have spoken. They want to learn more about eBPF. What is eBPF? eBPF (which is no longer an acronym for anything) is a revolutionary technology with origins in the Linux kernel that can run sandboxed programs in a privileged context such as the operating system kernel....

August 4, 2022 · 5 min · Chris Short
Three images that represent who Chris Short is

A getting to know you exercise

In November, I went down to Raleigh to meet my team for planning meetings and team building. For a few of my teammates, this is our first face to face interaction with each other ever. My boss wisely gave us a relatively simple assignment. Create a slide sharing what we’ve done this year and want to do next year (which I’ll share to an extent in a later post). Create another slide listing three things that make us who we are (born in a unique place, grew up on a farm, etc....

December 20, 2019 · 4 min · Chris Short

Joining Ansible Team at Red Hat

tl;dr “It is with great pleasure that I announce I am joining the Ansible team at Red Hat as Principal Product Marketing Manager.” In The Beginning… In 1998, I was working at a dial-up ISP in Hickory, NC. We were heavily invested in Windows and needed to reduce costs and increase speed. My CEO at the time had the foresight to know that Linux was the future. She hired two engineers to transform the business into a Red Hat Linux based ISP....

June 25, 2018 · 5 min · Chris Short

Microsoft Has Come a Long Way

Microsoft has come a very long way in its fight back into the graces of all technologists. There will be some die hards that will never forgive Microsoft for what it attempted to do to open source software. Like there will be some die hards that won’t embrace PowerShell, WSL, and future Microsoft improvements. But, there is no denying that Microsoft has changed as a company in a way that is beneficial to the open source community and beyond....

April 16, 2018 · 7 min · Chris Short
Recording device used to record this extensive interview

North Carolina Veterans Oral History Interview Part 1

As part of a North Carolina State Archives initiative to obtain oral histories of veterans I volunteered to be interviewed for the North Carolina Veterans Oral History Collection. I was interviewed by Matthew Peek, Military Collection Archivist for the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources (later referred to as MP). The interview was well worth the time it took to coordinate and conduct it. I would encourage all North Carolina veterans to contact Matthew and provide their unique story for preservation....

August 17, 2016 · 40 min · Chris Short

Tangible Intangibles: Questions to Ask While Being Interviewed

A few weeks ago a co-worker and I were discussing some things we really enjoyed about our work environment. It reminded me of a few key questions I ask (or things that I look for) during an interview that typically indicate whether or not a job is going to be a good fit or not. What do you use for e-mail? It is a simple question but the answer tells you a lot about a company....

May 10, 2016 · 4 min · Chris Short

Linux Directory Structure

For more information about the Linux directory structure see the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS) which is part of the Linux Standard Base (LSB) which is a workgroup of the Free Standards Group. / The root directory (not to be concerned with the root account) is similar to a drive letter in Windows (C:, D:, etc.) except that in the Linux directory structure there is only one root directory and everything falls under it (including other filesystems and partitions)....

January 5, 2005 · 4 min · Chris Short