cz20xx

I'm tired of being loosely familiar with a great deal of concepts, and yet a master of none. Of knowing at an "enthusiast" level how traffic works, but not having the knowledge to attack a scalable problem. For instance, I could network the hell out of my home, but anything larger than that? A small business? A large corporation? A neighborhood, a government, a nation? How do I scale theoretically and apply those concepts pragmatically? What are the fundamental questions I should be asking myself and researching when I think of some hypothetical question like, "How would I manage email for a company with 50,000 employees?" Where does one even begin to tackle that kind of problem?

Furthermore, how would I acquire an intimate knowledge of networking beyond such a local scale. How do I learn the inner workings of the Internet's infinitely complex design without having to (without a clear plan of attack regarding importance) read the RFC cover-to-cover with a dictionary and Google within arm's reach?

(Actually, I wouldn't mind a kind of top 100 RFCs to know like the back of your hand.)

How do I scale my own research?

Sorry, I know this is a big, fat, somewhat nebulous question, but this is what I want to do with my life. I want to build networks, and I want to use that knowledge to add value to the world. I don't want to get some certificate that says I know how to do something. I want to start reading the vast amount of free information out there and actually start doing it. Maybe after that I'll get a certificate.

I'm a FreeBSD user, though I usually carry a MBP around. I know my way around tcpdump, and can throw up some fancy filters if given enough time to read through the man page. I can even script a little bit in perl and bash. Emphasis on 'a little'. I'm self-taught in all aspects of computing, and I went to school for English.

I'm 27, and I want to be a desirable piece of talent by the time I'm 30.