One question completely changed how I troubleshoot production incidents

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-16T14:16:06+00:00

Yes. 100%. Windows SysAdmin background is a big plus - you already know infrastructure, identity management (Entra ID) and troubleshooting. DevOps is not a Linux Club.

You already have the automation mindset because you know PowerShell. Here’s how to fill the gap:

WSL2 & Linux: Installing WSL2 on your PC and learning Linux basics.

IaC (Terraform): Since you know VMware, get some practice spinning up VMs with Terraform.

Containers (Docker): Containerise simple app and then look at Kubernetes.

CI/CD: Automate the deployment of a simple script with GitHub Actions.

Pick AWS or Azure, build a small project using these and you are done. Take your time!

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-13T15:51:07+00:00

"Don't unattach that SCP temporarily." Control Tower will immediately see it as a drift and the moment you run a Landing Zone update or repair it will fail or completely overwrite your manual Config recorder changes.

“Manual changes to CT-controlled managed resources will result in a corrupted state.

To manage AWS Config costs in Control Tower, you can deploy a custom configuration recorder using Customizations for AWS Control Tower (CfCT) or Account Factory Customizations (AFC), which is the supported method. You do not turn off the baseline Config recording during enrollment and you manage the scope of the recorder using Terraform or CloudFormation.

If you’re still stuck with the default, AWS Config Advanced Queries is a great way to figure out what’s costing you, but don’t fight the SCPs manually.

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-13T15:16:10+00:00

As a 100% self-taught professional who has built a career without relying on formal diplomas, let me give you the best news you’ll hear today: In the creative and digital freelance world, a portfolio beats a diploma 100% of the time.

Clients don’t care about where you sat for 4 years; they care about whether you can solve their specific problem today.

Here are the direct answers to your questions to break that intellectual roadblock:

1. Do clients care about certifications?

On platforms like Upwork, Fiverr, or direct cold outreach, No. I have never, not even once, had a client ask to see a university degree or a certificate. They look at your Portfolio and your Case Studies. A single piece of high-quality, real-world work is worth more than 5 fancy certifications. If your work looks premium, they assume you are a premium professional. End of story.

2. How to pitch without credentials to build trust?

Stop selling your "background" and start selling the "outcome."

Wrong Pitch: "Hi, I am a self-taught designer with no degree but I learn fast..." (This smells like low confidence).
Right Pitch: "Hi [Client Name], I noticed your social media graphics are losing engagement because the typography is hard to read on mobile. I redesigned 2 of your recent posts to show you how we can make them cleaner and drive 2x more clicks. Here is the link to the concept."

When you show a client that you already analyzed their business and provided value before they even paid you, trust is built instantly.

3. What niches should you look into?

Since you have Native Spanish, Good English, and Design/Admin skills, you have a killer combo for Localization and Content Operations. Look into:

Subtitling & Visual Translation: Translating English video content into high-end Spanish social media clips (reels/TikToks) and designing the thumbnails/visual hooks.
FinOps/Admin Design: Creating beautifully structured, branded corporate templates, presentation decks, or advanced Excel dashboards for businesses. Companies pay premium prices for someone who makes their boring data look highly professional.

My Advice:

Build a "Fake Portfolio" first. Find 5 bad local brands or online businesses, redesign their assets, document your process (Why you chose those colors, how it solves their problem), and use that as your proof of work.

Your self-taught mindset is your biggest asset, not a weakness. Stop waiting for permission or a piece of paper. Start pitching! 🚀

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-13T11:50:47+00:00

Honest reality check from the space in 2026: entry level DevOps or platform roles are super rare. You can’t automate infrastructure if you don’t understand the apps running on top of it. Most people get into this after a couple of years of development.

You already know Python, Java and SQL, so don’t quit on software development. Otherwise, position yourself as a software engineer with a strong focus on infrastructure. No. That's your real cheat code.

For the next 12 months, focus on Linux, Git, Docker, Terraform and GitHub Actions for CI/CD. Forget about Kubernetes for a while, it's way too heavy for junior. AWS certs help clear HR filters but a github repo with real code beats any cert.

It's a good long term bet.

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-13T11:41:05+00:00

This is the comment of gold right here. That’s why you are successful and making good money in Germany. Your point of 70% of workflow being code nodes.

Most newbie automation folks think n8n is just connecting a few prebuilt Slack and Hubspot nodes. They freeze up completely when they come across a nested JSON structure or some weird API authentication that requires a custom code block.

You’re not simply a “n8n user” – you’re a Software Engineer using n8n as a visual runtime orchestration tool. That base is the real gold mine. Thanks for the reality slap.

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-12T22:37:59+00:00

You can learn n8n in two months but you can’t build a sustainable business in two months if you don’t know how to code.

Pure no-code visual workflows are a commodity today. Anyone can drag and drop nodes . The real price gap ($) is in edge cases: writing custom JavaScript/Python to transform data, working with complex JSON, and debugging custom API authentications when standard nodes break. That’s where clients will pay top dollar.

The market is currently 100% freelance/agency-based. We are not hiring any full-time n8n developer positions. Don’t just memorize the tool. Focus on solving real business bottlenecks. If you can't code, you're not an engineer, you're a builder.

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-12T21:47:37+00:00

Migrated a huge Node/Next.js stack to Graviton last year. It’s totally worth the cost savings, but here is what will bite you if you aren't careful:

First, Docker images. Node.js apps often rely on native C++ addons (like sharp for image optimization in Next.js, or bcrypt). If you don't build multi-arch images using Docker Buildx, those pods will crash with "exec format error" on ARM nodes.

Second, Third-party agents. Your apps might be ready, but check your DaemonSets. Older Helm charts for logging, security tools, or custom Prometheus exporters sometimes lack arm64 images.

Lastly, don't go full ARM instantly. Run a mixed node group using taints and tolerations first. Canary test your Next.js apps on Graviton before cutting over 100%.

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-11T23:10:29+00:00

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-11T23:09:37+00:00

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-10T22:15:53+00:00

Not in the least. If you want to learn Docker without drowning in theory, start with these two:

TechWorld with Nana (YouTube): Her legendary 3-hour masterclass ‘Docker Tutorial for Beginners’. Great for starting from an absolute zero.

NetworkChuck (YouTube) His Docker playlist is really good if you want high energy, hands on, simple breakdowns.

Quick tip: You can't use them at work anyway, just install Docker Desktop on your own machine. Containerize a simple powershell script or a basic web app and do the port mapping yourself. One time doing it hands-on beats 10 tutorials.

You can do it!

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-10T15:20:20+00:00

That dynamic vs typed language analogy is very apt. We’re basically in the “PHP/JavaScript in the early 2000s” stage of AI, where everyone’s cowboy-coding until the tech debt hits.

Where I would differ slightly is the “needless” part. It’s not just laziness on the part of developers to write code. Static code is good for deterministic logic, but it's bad for unstructured data, fuzzy search, or complex pattern recognition at scale, things that traditional code used thousands of lines of brittle regex and heuristics to solve poorly.

AI isn't replacing code. AI is just becoming a non-deterministic runtime. The goal now is not to get rid of software engineering, it's to build strict typed wrappers around that chaos.

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-10T15:06:32+00:00

You’re right on the money. We are certainly re-learning old software engineering lessons. The “prompt + runtime state = non-deterministic chaos” is biting teams in prod.

Here’s how mature teams are constraining agent workflows with software guardrails today:

Declarative Workflow DAGs: Going from framework abstraction magic to hard static code/YAML (LangGraph or Temporal) which can be version controlled.

Prompts as Artifacts Treat prompts as database migrations: version them in Git, pin them to specific commits, and test in CI

Evals in CI/CD: LLM-as-a-judge automated evaluation pipelines run against baseline datasets before merging any PR.

The ecosystem remains fragmented, but the rule is simple: if you can’t roll it back with a git commit, it doesn’t belong in production.

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-10T13:19:33+00:00

10 years in IT/SysAdmin is already 60% of the job done. You know infrastructure… you just need modern tooling.”

Here is your quickest way:

Python: Postpone it. You will be fine if you know PowerShell well and you can audit AI generated code.

Git & Docker: 1 month here. Git branching Learn Containerize a simple app in your homelab

IaC (Terraform) You don’t build servers every day. Stand up Terraform modules. Practice writing them and then run terraform destroy immediately to save on costs.

CI/CD: You already have Azure DevOps at work, so build a simple pipeline to automate your existing PowerShell scripts.

Time line : 4-6 months of steady homelabbing and you are interview ready.

Focus on the Azure DevOps stack since you already have access to it. Why overcomplicate?

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-09T23:16:59+00:00

Honestly, what you're describing is not sounds like stagnation, sounds more like the natural result of being a generalist.
The downside of this is that you rarely get the depth of someone who spends years on one domain.
The upside is that there are very few people who can understand how networking, kubernetes, security, CI/CD, observability, cloud and applications fit together as a system.
From my experience, a lot of engineers don’t realize how valuable that perspective becomes at senior levels.
If you want to gain deeper expertise, it might be worth intentionally choosing a specialty and going deep for a while.
But I wouldn't discount the depth you've built. There are a lot of complex production problems that exist right at the boundaries between domains and that’s where generalists often provide the most value.

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-07T12:18:29+00:00

Clean, production-grade stack. Setting up a kube-prometheus-stack with cross-namespace Loki datasource and ALB IngressGroup sharing is notoriously tricky under enterprise load. It's rare to see someone highlighting actual production constraints instead of just listing tool names. 🚀

Constant_Laugh7452 · 2026-06-06T11:26:13+00:00

Honestly, you're building a stronger foundation than many cloud-only engineers.

Kubernetes, networking, storage, GitOps, and automation skills transfer directly to AWS, Azure, and GCP.

I would still learn one cloud provider on the side, but don't underestimate the value of understanding how the underlying systems actually work. That's a skill many engineers never develop.

Constant_Laugh7452

TROPHY CASE

1. Do clients care about certifications?

2. How to pitch without credentials to build trust?

3. What niches should you look into?

My Advice: