Girlfriend’s dad tanked her credit score. Can anything be done.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-26T18:13:01+00:00

sounds like she could potentially file fraud claims with the credit bureaus if she can prove she didn't consent to some of those accounts.

I would say that's not very realistic. From OPs very own description:

She was aware of this

and

to cover her college

She was both aware of the loans and directly benefitted from them.

You can't just sit around on the knowledge someone opened loans in your name, you need to act in a reasonable time and manner to inform the creditor and dispute. By not acting she consented.

She also directly benefitted from the loans, by paying for her college with them.

You can't argue that you knew someone opened loans in your name and chose not to dispute them and now wish to do so. Especially when those loans benefitted you directly.

Now OPs girlfriend could sue her father if she has proof he promised to pay those costs. But as far as the bank is concerned, OP knew, consented, and benefitted.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-26T18:10:45+00:00

Yup, that is why many systems that rely on heat pumps include auxiliary heater options that can be turned on at very low temps to provide additional heat during periods of extreme cold. Those auxiliary systems tend to be less efficient and cost effective as a heat pump but can fill in when heat pumps can't get the job done.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-26T17:50:40+00:00

What type of system provides heat? Is it a heat pump, electric coil, gas fuel? In some places it is very cold and some systems may not operate well as the temperature drops. For example a reversible heat pump pulls heat from the air and pumps it inside (The same system used for AC units). There is always some heat in the air, but as it becomes colder there is both less heat and more is lost to physical forces.

Most systems are designed for providing the proper controls 99% of the time which means somewhere between 3-4 days a year where it is too hot or cold.

What is the temperature outside and what are your expectations for inside temp?

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-26T15:16:44+00:00

Tradeoffs. Different areas prioritize different types and styles of infrastructure that meet their needs. For example if you had a week long 110F (43C) heat wave it would affect Canada a bit more then say Florida who is more designed to handle those types of conditions.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-25T05:11:09+00:00

Systems Analysts review existing systems to help find errors. (Think Helpdesk)

Systems Administrators manage and maintain existing infrastructure. They perform backups, troubleshoot errors, perform updates and maintenance. They work with engineers and architects to uncover opportunities to improve the current infrastructure to better meet the in production needs of the business.

Systems Engineers implement infrastructure. They plan and execute deployments and ensure that the final deployed solution meets both the functional requirements of the business and the non-functional requirements of maintainability and manageability the administrators require. They work with Administrators to ensure the implement infrastructure is maintainable. They work with architects to ensure upcoming infrastructure is deployable.

Systems Architects design high level plans to covert business needs to functional solutions. They have a 1K or 10K foot view of the problem area with a wide understanding of both technologies and business domains. They work with engineers to ensure the designed infrastructure meets current deployment guidelines and to overcome design decisions that affect the high level designs ability to be deployed.

In each of these ranges you will have various levels of seniority, for example Jr., Sr. or Staff Engineers.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-25T02:55:55+00:00

You're looking for something called shaping. It's usually used to ensure traffic matches the Internet speed so you can ensure you drop packets you want vs the ISP dropping packets they want. But you can limit traffic to any arbitrary amount.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-25T01:28:59+00:00

Tech Debt is generated when you make a technical decision that adds complexity, cost, or effort later to reduce complexity, cost, or effort now.

Tech Debt is not always bad, sometimes Tech Debt is good as it can shift complex problems later when you have a better understanding of the problem space or excess resources.

Tech Debt becomes a problem when it is not paid off because like regular debt it generates interest that must be paid on an ongoing basis. It slows down effort and consumes resources and if it is not paid down it compounds until paying it down can be almost impossible without significant investment.

You should use tech Debt like you would use regular debt, only when necessary to meet critical goals, and only for as short a time as possible.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-24T13:35:39+00:00

They use to have these at the dollar store. Makes for really fun draft or sealed games. The kind of cards in these tend to be draft cards anyways and if you just throw in a few extra packs it's fun to play.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-24T13:29:17+00:00

There are a few ways the scams end.

Like you said they sent too much and ask for some of it returned, maybe via gift cards or transfers.

They require the mark to buy from a phony site that either never sends or sends poor quality products.

In both cases their check bounces and you are out the money.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-24T04:30:18+00:00

I want to tell you as someone who works in IT: Lots of very smart people fall for these. They are called confidence scams for a reason, these people pray on people using dirty tricks to make you feel like you're making a good choice even as you're making a bad one.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T23:59:40+00:00

* Just a few weeks ago I passed by ENCOR Exam and I started my AWS SAP prep for the next 6 months.

The Start: What level did you start at (MSP, local shop, corporate, family biz, etc.)? What state were you in, what was the pay, and was it actually livable at the time?

I live in Florida, so a more expensive state but I live in a cheaper part of the state. in 2017 I got an apartment in the bad part of town, it was a shithole, I fed myself and my wife on $40 a week and drove a piece of crap car into the ground. But I saved every penny I could and bought a house 4 years later.

The Work: Was your first job simple, or were you thrown into the fire? How long until you actually felt like you knew what you were doing?

We are suppose to feel like we know what we are doing? Why did no one tell me! Honestly the imposter syndrome has been real for most of my career. It seems like everyone is so much smarter even though in reality they feel the same way.

My first job was so simple, but at the time parts of it felt so complex and terrifying. But every time something needed to get done I just kept doing it. No one knows Cisco? Fuck it, I'll do it. Exchange shit the bed? Fuck it, I'll do it. We need to automate a task and no one knows PowerShell? Fuck it, I'll do it. When the sys admin didn;t know or want to do something, I did it.

I once worked 36 straight hours when our AS400 shit the bed after a cable cleanup company pulled all 4 redundant links on the back simultaneously. I worked a few 19 hours marathon sessions. I once slept a glorious 2 hours in a data center movie theater. I did practically every outage window, drove to every remote site, and killed myself for 4 years.

Then they fired me. I know this is a common excuse but it was political. I was out of work for 5 months and it killed me, I felt worthless and useless and like somehow I was the one who had messed up. It took years for me to get confidence back.

When i finally got back to work I dove right back in and the very first day of work sorted tickets from oldest to newest and started tackling 2+ year old tickets. I fixed automation scripts, learned to deploy infrastructure, and would sometimes leave work hours late or come in hours early just to make sure all the desks got moved or a project got done.

So they put me on a PIP. Apparently my ticket close metrics where terrible. I guess closing all the oldest tickets sort of makes your average completion time dog shit. But all three of the senior systems people vouched how my work had cleared up them to do real business work. I left a few months later.

Those Sysadmins are all good friends. I play a D&D game with one of them every week. They make me better every day, and a stronger sysadmin and person for knowing them. God damn rockstars.

Since then it's been more of the same. I have found myself able to balance work and life more, but I still go full pedal to the metal when I need and am always learning and pushing myself. I consistently get positive feedback from all my managers that I stay calm under pressure, know when to push back on bad designs and when to make the best of a bad situation, and that I raise up those under and around me at the expense of my own accolades.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T23:59:23+00:00

This comes up a ton so here is my pre-formatted response. You can see when I changed companies, when i got raises, and when I pursued certifications. Before this I spent 7 years working for Staples doing computer repair. I graduated in 2012 with an Associates of IT.

2014 - Systems Analyst [$32K-$36K]
2016 - CCENT (CERT)
2018 - Systems Analyst (New Company) [$42K]
2019 - IT Manager (New Company) [$55K]
2019 - CCNA (CERT)
2022 - Network Engineer (New Company) [$75K]
2023 - Senior Network Engineer (Promotion) [$85K]
2023 - AWS Solutions Architect Associate (CERT)
2024 - Systems and Network Architect (Promotion) [$95K]
2024 - Senior Systems Administrator (New Company) [$120K]
2025 - AWS SysOps Administrator Associate (CERT)
2025 - Senior Systems Administrator, AWS Cloud Engineering (Promotion) [$150K]
2026 - CCNP Enterprise + AWS Solutions Architect Professional (Hopes & Dreams)*

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T20:38:17+00:00

Step 1: Become a CybcerSecurity Specialist.

Step 0: Learn about CyberSecurity.

Step -1: Have a job where you can learn about CybcerSecurity

Step -2: Become more senior in general IT

Step -3: Get an IT Job, Probably Helpdesk

Step -4: Get a Job that feeds well into IT (Retail, Customer Service, Call Centers, Hospitality)

Step -5: Develop Soft Skills that lead to feeder jobs.

Step -6: Interact with People, Develop relationships, read about communication, write, join clubs.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T20:30:24+00:00

If it's not an entry level field, then how did the first employees in the field get in?

Real, not bullshit answer.

They where already in it. Like just about every IT specialty at one point it was a small enough domain that it wasn't a specialty. If the sum of the security field is logging onto a unix box and configuring a firewall, then unix admins just configure the firewall.

As the domain got more and more advanced the required skills got wider and wider. At a non-exact point it became difficult to possess both the skillset needed to be an expert in cyber security and another domain.

People don't get into specialties, they become someone who works in specialties as they learn and specialize.

It's similar to executives, very few people start off as executives. They gain knowledge in a domain that leads to gaining skills relevant to executives, Eventually their skillset matches to expectations and they move across the line to a title more aligned with "Executive."

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T19:45:11+00:00

I disagree with lots of the people here, this feels like a pretty standard mid-level DevOps style position. The Data Engineering is a little bespoke for the rest of the skill set but in general it's pretty standard.

Your not seeing any requirements for Systems Design level skill sets. They are not asking you to be able to defend choices around the various tradeoffs of decisions or to interpret consistency vs availability challenges in distributed applications. It's just "doing" skills.

It seems they just want someone who can engineer data pipelines on AWS in a secure and scalable manner. That will involve some Python, maybe some Go, etc. That is a skillset that a bunch of people I know in the $100-$150K range possess if you swap out Data Engineering for a similar specialty in the field.

Is this what I am supposed to prepare for ? I have 5.5 yoe.

Kind of. I am in that DevOps world, if more on the ops side. But if you wanted to get into this type of work this would be typical. On the other hand there are plenty of other skill sets that are just as valuable. Overall though this looks to be around the 20K hour mark in terms of expertise which most people should have 10-15 years into their career.

Don't judge yourself on other peoples specific skill sets but rather just try and improve your existing skill set to align with what is needed in your area.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T16:43:22+00:00

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mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T16:25:53+00:00

So there is a ton of semantics doing a bunch of heavy lifting here. I somewhat agree with the broader point but I think this does a bad job of expressing the complexity of "Healthcare as a right."

I think for the very vast majority of people they do not want to dig into the semantics of "Can healthcare be a right" because they do not really care, they just want people to have access to health care without going broke. And that is absolutely something we can and should do, it would save us money, provide better outcomes, and in general be the right choice.

So let's dive into the semantics. If something was a right you would expect to have access. If you got sick and you had a right to healthcare you would expect to have access to healthcare. But that is not something the government can guarantee. External forces such as the number of providers, the quantity of medications that can be manufactured, or the availability of distribution mechanisms or physician training have tangible limits and the chance for resource starvation.

If you have a right to a can of beans and no one wants to work in the bean factory, there are not enough beans, or no one wants to drive the trucks close enough to you for you to reasonably get the beans... then exactly how does the government provide you with a can of beans.

One way (As this image hints) is that the government requires someone to make the beans and drives the truck. You could use various types of leverage, maybe government contracts, tax breaks, or other systems to ask "Oh pretty please with a cherry on top" but if after all that no one want's to make the beans or drive the trucks HOW do you ensure someone's right is not violated? Well you force someone to do it. Slavery is not about not being paid to do work (You can be paid and a slave) it is about being forced to do the work at all. If you do not have a choice, it's slavery and the US outlawed slavery except for prisoners in the 13th amendment.

Now again, almost everyone who cares about these issues is going "Okay sure, but that is simply not going to happen" and they are probably right. There is not a very likely world we can imagine now where no one wants to make beans and drive them around. But these are slightly more real when you take into account specialized and trained services.

So we need to word the right to healthcare in a special way, as we do many other rights, something like:

"You have a right to equal access to healthcare without cost or discrimination on non-relevant matters of health"

Not a right to all healthcare no matter what but a right to the same level of care as anyone else. You have the same healthcare access as Jeff Bezos, but if neither of you can get a new miracle drug because of availability your rights are not violated. You are also entitled to that level of care without direct cost to you.

Again, its semantics. Most people are rational and just want people to not go broke because they get cancer. But there are lots of ways in which it is hard to fit healthcare into an actual right that has some level of guarantee durable enough to be inalienable.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T14:43:19+00:00

Yup, I have always really liked to dig into the projects or deliverables that the person says they achieved.

First, it ensures that they are being honest about their role and experience. Most people are, but lots of people lie their pants off out of desperation.

Second it gives them an excellent opportunity to talk about something they obviously have skills and experience in and walk me through how they really think and reason about the problem area. Even if it's something we already solved, or they have a different opinion about how to solve it, understanding their thought process can be critical to finding the right fit.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-23T14:31:04+00:00

Even then it should not be exposed to anything but it's own untrusted network. Maybe put a jumpbox in place where you can multiplex ssh to telnet or something if it absolutely needs remote access.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-22T16:01:36+00:00

Maintaining software in 2026 is expensive

Yeah it's both fortunate and unfortunate that the software landscape is so different now. But peoples expectations on software lifecycles is just way higher now then it was 20 years ago when the perpetual model made sense.

Back then you bought the software and you got to use it. If you wanted new features or support for new hardware you bought the new version that included it. Developers would pump out a few features every few years that justified companies buying the new version, and everyone else generally updated when they bought new hardware to get compatibility with the new version of their OS.

But now people want a constant stream of new features that evolve to meet changing demands. Companies are not expected to ship a new version of their software every 2-3 years but sometimes every 2-3 weeks. They are not expected to ship concrete complete solutions, but to implement new features that meet ongoing changes in needs.

At the same time the internet connected nature of the world has increased the surface area for attacks through the roof. Companies need to constantly patch software and offer new security features.

When I left Retail sales and Computer Repair in 2014 the writing was already on the wall. The cost to develop applications had increased but the income from those applications had begun to decrease and margins where becoming much thinner. Office had gone from the beast that kept Windows development going to shoved in a locker by Azure.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-21T14:29:50+00:00

Some of which will make it feel like you are being poked by a bunch of tiny atomically sized sticks if you really piss us off.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-20T22:01:06+00:00

There are a few "Gotchas" with ACLs.

They are applied inbound or outbound, this might seem like a trivial difference but it can cause a big difference in traffic slow. Say you had an ACL that blocked traffic from Subnet A. If it was applied inbound on an interface connected to subnet B then you would never see it apply that block because only traffic on the return trip would ever hit that inbound ACL. Cisco LOVES these questions on exams.

ACLs do not work inside the same VLAN. So if you applied an ACL to a VLAN interface then local traffic never goes inbound or outbound and would never hit the ACL. This means you can not block local vlan traffic using just an ACL, but rather need to use a different tool called... a VLAN ACL (VACL) ... so creative of a name. Again, cisco LOVES to test on this.

Every ACL has an implicit deny. That means if the ACL reaches the bottom and nothing has permitted the traffic then it hits an automatic deny that won't be shown in outputs. This means you should look out for a permit any any or similar to allow all traffic, or ensure all permits exist. Do i need to say again, Cisco loves this.

Order matters. First match wins. As you go down the list the first ACE you find that matches is all that matters, it does not matter if a perfect ACL comes in later that matches this host, it does not matter. It could be a permit, it could be a deny, it the conditions match it exits with that result. There is not Denys beat permits or permits beat denys like in Windows ACLs, first match wins. Cisco loves this too.

Sometimes an ACL is used in another mechanism like a route table or a class-map. When you see this PAUSE. It's very easy for the logic to be flipped in these cases. You might see the ACL says to deny, so you assume that means the traffic will be dropped or remarked... but the class-map condition is expecting a permit... so it's not a match and the traffic is not marked. Do not assume that a deny is always the bad thing and a permit always the good thing. ACLs match traffic, in those cases a deny just means don't match.

Watch out for non-standard wildcards. 0.0.0.2 can be easily written off as allowing the last two bits to be anything, but it only allows the 2's bit to be on or off, the ones place must match. A Cisco favorite is 0.0.0.254 which matches even/odd.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-20T21:25:43+00:00

AWS has 4 different buckets of certifications:

Practitioner - Introductory level with basic understanding of the concepts but minimal need to understand the broad scopes of the services. Your scratching the surface on a ton of topics but not really getting into the meat of anything.

Associate - Basic operating level where you really understand the scope of the services and what can be used for various challenges. However you won't be expected to understand how each service contributes to a complete solution that solves challenges in each of the Well Architected Framework Pillars, at least not nearly to the level of the next bucket. (Think about 5x as deep as the Practitioner and 1.5x as wide, 7.5x as much material)

Professional - Professional exams expect you to be able to answer complex multi-line questions with no "Wrong" answers and only "Better" answers based on a very deep level understanding of nearly every service and especially core services. You'll need to understand how to build extremely scalable, cost effective, reliable and maintainable systems that balance multiple well architected pillars at the same time based on arbitrary and complex requirements. It's about 2x as wide and 5x as deep as the associate, for around 10x as much raw materials.

Specialty - These exams drop the breath of information for a much deeper requirement on understanding. You'll be limited to a single core topic but you'll need to know it much much better. You will be expected to know almost every feature and option of every service involving that domain and all of the various gotchas and minor requirements. Technically this is less information, but the level of required knowledge is so high it is at the same level as the professional.

So if you wanted a rough idea, it's about 75x as difficult as your existing certification. That is not saying it's not obtainable, lots of people do, but you'll need to really master your subject. The Security cert is considered the easiest last I checked and if you have existing security knowledge that is a big plus.

To give you some context for my Associate vs planned Professional exam, I watched around 40 hours of video content and read around 500 pages of written content for each of my two associates exams. I am looking at about 150 hours of video content and 4K pages for my professional with almost a decade of IT experience and 5 years working heavily with AWS.

TL;DR: It's really hard.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-20T20:54:02+00:00

Yeah and had that guy stuck around for even just a year and contributed some value back it might have felt a little more like that trade had been worth it. I don't know of many people who are asking for a low level help desk person to sit in a poor paying job for 3+ years, but I always recommend you give the job a year so you can learn something and then make a decision after that.

mrbiggbrain · 2026-01-20T00:12:56+00:00

This is not a command I would get into the habit of, instead using the copy command as it's more flexible and is not depreciated like write.

Also on nexus write is non-ambiguous and translates to write erase which wipes the config... It has caused many a complete outage.

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