After taking an extra day for Labor Day(ie day off work to do chores) I’m back with an article inspired by a Youtuber talking about terminals(the computer kind). This got me thinking about the amount I used the terminal along with scripting to do my job and for fun.
Starting a few jobs ago, I signed up for, and completed a course, from Microsoft on Powershell scripting. Taking that further there was also a discussion on YouTube(will try to find a link to that video) talking about viewing Powershell scripting as tool making. the basic premise is to break down the pieces you’d do over and over and make them into pluggable tools that you add to your kit, and then build a management script to run those tools for a specific job. Think of it like the bits in a bit set, or sockets in a socket set, you might need a specific extension and handle, but the bits are the part doing that job.
If you’re going into the IT field I would strongly recommend getting a GitHub repo started and learning something like Powershell, Python, Bash, etc, and building up a set of tools. A good example is my last job, though I had a set of downloaded tools/software to clean up systems, creating a set of modules and scripts(along with built-in verifications) helped to make my job more efficient and smoother.
Just like a mechanic buys their own set of tools, or many other service jobs, the ones you create to make better use of what you have will help you and add value to you as an employee. They don’t have to be complex, as long as they make up for the time invested and/or give you a little more sanity.