Best System Administator Podcasts (2025)

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Synology Reverses Drive Policy (EP 910) 49:51

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10h ago49:51

49:51

This episode opens with a bombshell: Synology finally reversed its drive compatibility policy for NAS units, allowing IT pros and businesses to use third-party drives again—a move that’s sent shockwaves through online forums and social media. I discuss the implications for MSPs and what it means for client storage setups. Next, DattoCon coverage re…

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Sarvenaz Heirani Moghaddam (Kinesiology) – Human Nervous System Adaptations in Novel Environments 28:50

19h ago28:50

28:50

Join Sarvenaz Heirani Moghaddam (Kinesiology) for a discussion of her PhD research on how the human nervous system is able to adapt and learn in novel environments using robotics and virtual reality environments. For more information check out the Grad Chat webpage on Queen’s University School of Graduate Studies & Postdoctoral Affairs website – ht…

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Ambulance Chasing Goes Cyber (EP 909) 22:12

3d ago22:12

22:12

Hear from Bradley Gross, one of the tech industry’s top attorneys and founder of Bradley Gross, PA. With over 20 years representing MSPs, Brad shares what every IT pro must know as lawsuits skyrocket around ransomware events. The conversation covers the specifics of contract language, rising legal standards, and how vendor agreements now shape your…

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Ubiquiti - The MSP Game Changer (EP 908) 1:05:08

7d ago1:05:08

1:05:08

Join Uncle Marv and veteran MSP Tom Wyant as they dive deep into the Ubiquiti ecosystem for IT professionals. Discover real-world tips for replacing SonicWall and Cisco hardware, advanced UniFi management, and transitioning to cost-effective network hardware for MSPs. Whether you’re an Ingenious, Synology, or Cisco fan, get candid pros and cons plu…

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Closing session of All Systems Go! 2025 (asg2025) 2:22

7d ago2:22

2:22

Closing session of All Systems Go! 2025Licensed to the public under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/de/about this event: https://cfp.all-systems-go.io/all-systems-go-2025/talk/DR8ELH/

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OS as a Service at Meta Platforms (asg2025) 25:30

8d ago25:30

25:30

I overview how OS management is done at Meta. We run millions of Linux servers and we have to make sure that OS gets updated on all of them in a given period of time. To do that we developed several products: MetalOS (Image based version of CentOS), Antlir (image builder) and Rolling OS Update (a service that keeps a set of DNF repos in sync with u…

1
One Boot Config to Rule Them All: Bringing UAPI Boot Specification to Legacy BIOS (asg2025) 24:59

8d ago24:59

24:59

The UAPI Boot Loader Specification defines conventions that let multiple operating systems and bootloaders share boot config files. So far, only systemd-boot implements it - and it’s UEFI-only by design.As a result, hybrid UEFI/BIOS images require maintaining (and keeping in sync) two sets of bootloader configs: one for systemd-boot, and one for a …

1
What's up with test.thing (asg2025) 25:20

8d ago25:20

25:20

`test.thing` is a VM runner which targets guests using an API defined by systemd. It started after a conversation at devconf about turning `mkosi qemu` into a library. A quick intro.~~composefs is an approach to image-mode systems without the disk images. Files are stored in a de-duplicated content-addressed storage with integrity guaranteed throug…

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Yocto's hidden gem: OTA and seamless updates with systemd-sysupdate (asg2025) 26:33

8d ago26:33

26:33

Updates are a critical piece of managing your fleet of devices. Nowadays, Yocto-based distributions can utilize layers for well-established update mechanisms. But, did you know that recent releases of Yocto already come with a simple update mechanism?Enter systemd-sysupdate: a mechanism capable of automatically discovering, downloading, and install…

1
UKI, composefs and remote attestation for Bootable Containers (asg2025) 42:50

8d ago42:50

42:50

With Bootable Containers (bootc), we can place the operating system files inside a standard OCI container. This lets users modify the content of the operating system using familiar container tools and the Containerfile pattern. They can then share those container images using container registries and sign them using cosign.Using composefs and fs-ve…

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A terminal for operating clouds: administering S3NS with image-based NixOS (asg2025) 34:54

8d ago34:54

34:54

S3NS is a trusted cloud operator that self-hosts Google Cloud infrastructure in France, targeting the SecNumCloud certification, the most stringent Cloud certification framework. SecNumCloud includes strict legal and operational constraints. To manage these systems securely and reproducibly, we’ve built a family of dedicated administration terminal…

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Introducing ue-rs, minimal and secure rewrite of update engine in Flatcar (asg2025) 24:20

8d ago24:20

24:20

Introduce ue-rs, a fresh project that aims to be a drop-in reimplementation of update engine, written in Rust.The goal of ue-rs is to have a minimal, secure and robust implementation of update engine, required by A/B update mechanism of Flatcar Container Linux. Just like the existing update engine, it downloads OS update payloads from a Nebraska se…

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Leveraging bootable OCI images in Fedora CoreOS and RHEL CoreOS (asg2025) 25:51

8d ago25:51

25:51

In last year's ASG!, bootc and bootable containers were introduced. In this talk, we'll go over what changed since last year, and how Fedora CoreOS and RHEL CoreOS are leveraging bootable containers to reduce maintenance and increase sharing.Licensed to the public under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/de/about this event: https://cfp.al…

1
Shelagh Rogers and Colette Steer – Communication Skills 34:07

8d ago34:07

34:07

Join CJ the DJ for a very special episode with Queen’s University Chancellor Shelagh Rogers! The show focuses on the importance of strong communication skills, storytelling, and being a good listener. Chancellor Rogers also shares about her career in radio and TV which all started at CFRC. For more information check out the Grad Chat webpage on Que…

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container-snap: Atomic Updates from OCI Images using Podman’s Btrfs Driver (asg2025) 22:46

8d ago22:46

22:46

Traditional package updates using tools like RPM or Zypper can introduce risks, such as incomplete updates or accidentally breaking the running system. To overcome these challenges, we developed **container-snap**, a prototype plugin designed to deliver atomic OS updates—updates that are fully applied or rolled back without compromising the system'…

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Dirlock: a new tool to manage encrypted filesystems (asg2025) 26:27

8d ago26:27

26:27

In the Linux world there are several tools and technologies to encrypt data on a hard drive, most falling into one of two categories: block device encryption (like LUKS) or stacked filesystem encryption (like EncFs or gocryptfs). This presentation will introduce Dirlock, a new tool that belongs to a third category: native filesystem encryption, usi…

1
pidfd: What have we been up to? (asg2025) 39:28

8d ago39:28

39:28

File descriptors for processes on Linux have been available for quite some time now. Userspace has adapted them widely.Over the last two years or so we've extended the abilities of pidfds significantly. This talk will go over all the new features and deep dive into their implementation and usage.Licensed to the public under https://creativecommons.…

1
Forget zbus, zlink is the future of IPC in Rust (asg2025) 38:14

8d ago38:14

38:14

Last year, Lennart Poettering of the systemd fame, [gave a presentation](https://media.ccc.de/v/all-systems-go-2024-276-varlink-now-) at this very same conference, where he introduced Varlink, a modern yet simple IPC mechanism. He presented a case for Varlink, rather than [D-Bus](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D-Bus) to be the future of Inter-proces…

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CentOS Proposed Updates: Bridging the Gap between development and production (asg2025) 25:32

8d ago25:32

25:32

CentOS Stream is especially suited for production deployments. In these environments it's often common to develop improvements to distribution packages and want to contribute them upstream. Unfortunately, until very recently that required one to then maintain their own build and deployment pipeline for the packages, at least until the changes made …

1
Privilege delegation for rootless containers, what choices do we have? (asg2025) 21:43

8d ago21:43

21:43

Going for minimal containers with restricted system calls and unprivileged users is the usual Kubernetes approach these days, and it works great for most web apps. However, the development of more complex infrastructure extensions frequently hinders application functionality.While looking for a solution to deploy virtiofsd in an unprivileged contai…

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Modernizing GNOME (asg2025) 31:54

8d ago31:54

31:54

GNOME has collected some very old code over the years. During the recent GNOME 49 release, we've made some drastic cleanups. Most visibly, we've dropped support for X11 and gained many dependencies on systemd. Let's explore some of the what and why for these changes!Licensed to the public under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/de/about t…

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New Linux Kernel Coredump Infrastructure (asg2025) 41:04

8d ago41:04

41:04

Coredumping on Linux has long been a nightmare. Currently two modes are supported:(1) Dumping directly into a file somewhere on the filesystem.(2) Dumping into a pipe connected to a usermode helper process spawned as a child of the system_unbound_wq or kthreadd.For simplicity I'm mostly ignoring (1). There's probably still some users of (1) out the…

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GNOME OS' prêt-à-booter image (asg2025) 26:05

8d ago26:05

26:05

GNOME OS is a distribution based around systemd-sysupdate. This year, we finally created a live installer image using the same /usr partition as the installed OS. The main innovation however is the ability to install without the need to reboot. The user can start working while the installation is happening.This live image is built using systemd-rep…

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Slim device software with systemd targets and nspawn (asg2025) 24:23

8d ago24:23

24:23

It has been 10 years since Axis Communications had a presentation at the systemd conference. Back then, we have shown how we have increased our product quality, stability and boot times by porting our platform to systemd. 10 years later, we had different challenges to keep the resource usages and boot times under control. We have started from botto…

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Shipping Flatpak applications with an image based system (asg2025) 27:58

8d ago27:58

27:58

Flatpak is the de-facto standard for distributing desktop applications across various Linux based systems. It also offers other advantages such as sandboxing. It is particularly useful for image based systems as it installs the applications into a separate location and doesn't try to modify the system.GNOME OS is GNOME's development, testing and QA…

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Unprivileged Containers, with Transient User Namespaces and ID Mapping, but Without SETUID Binaries (asg2025) 41:53

8d ago41:53

41:53

Many traditional container engines make use of the "subuid" concept and the "newuidmap" tool to implement a concept of "unprivileged" user-namespace containers on Linux. This approach has many shortcomings in my PoV, from both a security and scalability standpoint.Recent systemd versions provide a more powerful, more secure, mor scalable alternativ…

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MSP Spotlight: Tech Brews LLC (EP 907) 45:42

8d ago45:42

45:42

This episode explores the journey of Kevin Dutkiewicz launching Tech Brews, his approach to serving underserved small businesses, the struggles with business administration, and the philosophy of running a modern MSP without the typical minimums. Uncle Marv and Kevin debate the realities of break-fix models, Trunk Slammer myths, and community-drive…

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oo7-daemon: One year later – Progress, Challenges, and What’s next (asg2025) 3:08

9d ago3:08

3:08

oo7-daemon is the new D-Bus Secret Service provider that aims to fully replace gnome-keyring. In this followup (continuation of my 2024 talk) lightning talk, I will go through the progress made, the challenges faced and the status of systemd credentials integration.Licensed to the public under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/de/about th…

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From initramfs-tools to mkosi-initrd (asg2025) 6:55

9d ago6:55

6:55

Marco will review the features available in the initramfs-tools ecosystem, the initrd generator used by Debian and Ubuntu, and how they can be implemented (or not) by adopting mkosi-initrd.Licensed to the public under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/de/about this event: https://cfp.all-systems-go.io/all-systems-go-2025/talk/E989ZX/…

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A new systemd container runtime?! (asg2025) 27:25

9d ago27:25

27:25

At Meta, we've been looking to revamp our internal container runtime (Twine). Instead of maintaining all the low level container runtime code ourselves, we'd much prefer having more of this managed by systemd. This talk will go over what we did to make systemd transient units a suitable environment for running system containers (pid namespace suppo…

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isd: interactive systemd (asg2025) 19:42

9d ago19:42

19:42

Simplify systemd management with `isd`! `isd` is a TUI offering fuzzy search for units, auto-refreshing previews, smart sudo handling, and a fully customizable interface for power-users and newcomers alike.If you ever became frustrated while typing:- `systemctl start --user unit-A.service` (manually starting a unit)- `systemctl status --user unit-A…

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Verification of OS artifacts without stateful keyrings (asg2025) 21:40

9d ago21:40

21:40

Many OS artifacts today are still verified using proprietary, stateful keyring formats.With the "File Hierarchy for the Verification of OS Artifacts (VOA)" an attempt is made to rid the ecosystem of this limitation by implementing a generic lookup directory.With extensibility in mind, this unifying hierarchy currently provides integration for OpenP…

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The Future of AI in IT Services (EP 906) 34:09

9d ago34:09

34:09

Uncle Marv sits down again with Jermaine Clark, Sherweb’s Senior Manager of AI Readiness, for a lively discussion about how managed service providers can drive real business results with AI. Jermaine walks through Sherweb’s robust AI initiatives, including training, certification, and hands-on guides for automating onboarding, ticketing, and custom…

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ParticleOS: Why is Lennart still not dogfooding systemd?! (asg2025) 37:46

9d ago37:46

37:46

More than six months have passed since Daan tried to ~~shame~~ gently peer pressure Lennart to actually use the stuff he builds, via a FOSDEM talk:https://fosdem.org/2025/schedule/event/fosdem-2025-4057-particleos-can-we-make-lennart-poettering-run-an-image-based-distribution-/Did he succeed? Is dogfooding standard practice now in the systemd devel…

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A simpler and faster firewall with bpfilter (asg2025) 39:39

9d ago39:39

39:39

For many years, firewall solutions on Linux have grown and evolved, without any major change, until eBPF. While eBPF can allow very fast and efficient packet filtering, the learning curve doesn't make it easily accessible to non-developers. bpfilter aims to bridge the gap between existing tools (nftables, iptables) and modern technologies such as e…

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Sandboxing services with Landlock (asg2025) 25:01

9d ago25:01

25:01

Landlock is an unprivileged kernel feature that enables all Linux users to sandbox their processes. Complementary to seccomp, developers can leverage Landlock to restrict their programs in a fine-grained way. While Landlock can be used by end users through sandboxer tools, there is currently no well-integrated solution to define security policies t…

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Integrating systemd-sysext images in an update stack (asg2025) 26:19

9d ago26:19

26:19

systemd-sysext provides a nice way to enhance a distribution with a read-only root filesystem without the need to reboot. But there is additional tooling necessary to manage the sysext images:* install an image which is compatible with the installed OS version* update installed images to the newest compatible version* rollback images in case of an …

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Look ma, no secrets! - bootstrapping cryptographic trust in my homelab using Nix, UKIs, TPMs and SPIFFE (asg2025) 27:35

9d ago27:35

27:35

All the big cloud providers provide your machines with a unique cryptographic identity that can be used to talk to their cloud services securely without having to manage or rotate any cryptographic secrets yourself. For example GCP has Service accounts and AWS has IAM roles. This ubiquity of cloud identity and the seamless integration with all the …

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Extending Fedora Atomic Desktops using systemd system extensions (asg2025) 25:54

9d ago25:54

25:54

On image based desktops distributions such as Fedora Atomic desktops and Universal Blue, users are expected to run their graphical applications using Flatpaks and their command line ones using containers. But that approach does not work well for some applications that require more privileges, direct access to devices or kernel interfaces.With syste…

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Accessing shadow records via varlink (asg2025) 26:12

9d ago26:12

26:12

Provide a varlink service to access /etc/passwd and /etc/shadow so that no setuid and setgid binaries are necessary for this task.There are two independent "problems" which can be solved with the same idea: all files in /usr should be owned by root:root and no setuid binary should be needed. The first one is a requirement of image based updates of …

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systemd-confext Two Years On: Versioned Overlays for /etc, Reloaded (asg2025) 25:45

9d ago25:45

25:45

systemd-confext is a lightweight overlay mechanism for /etc, allowing you to drop in a configuration extension ("confext") bundle and let systemd make it visible to your service as though it was already shipped with the base image. Building on the same extension magic as systemd-sysext, confext also introduces extra features tailored for the /etc u…

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How I optimized away 94% CPU from zbus (asg2025) 24:03

9d ago24:03

24:03

Haven’t you ever wanted to find ways to make your Rust code the most optimal in the world? I know how you feel. This is a talk, where I’d tell you how easy it is to profile your Rust software and how most often the solutions are trivial.This is a story of how I used a few readily-available Open Source tools to achieve huge optimizations in [zbus](h…

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systemd: round table (asg2025) 28:12

9d ago28:12

28:12

Let's have an open discussion with systemd developers who are at ASG and users in the audience. We will open with the developers saying what they plan to work on in the near future, and then allow questions / comments from the audience.Licensed to the public under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/de/about this event: https://cfp.all-syst…

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systemd: state of the project (asg2025) 21:47

9d ago21:47

21:47

Same as every year, a lot has happened in the systemd project since last year'sASG. We released multiple versions, packed with new components and features.This talk will provide an overview of these changes, commenting on successes andchallenges, and a sneak peak at what lies ahead.Licensed to the public under https://creativecommons.org/licenses/b…

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Linux IPC: Lost between Threading and Networking (asg2025) 25:57

9d ago25:57

25:57

Communication is paramount in modern application development. This applies equally well to the process of writing applications and to the code itself. The complexity of the tasks ahead of us calls for a distributed and coordinated development effort, and this often manifests in our code: We design distributed, communicating systems to split complex…

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BPF Tokens in systemd (asg2025) 23:50

9d ago23:50

23:50

Running **BPF** programs today requires *CAP_BPF* capability, which is an all or nothing BPF capability.But BPF nowadays spans a large area, from simple monitoring to potentially invasive fields like network or tracing.BPF Tokens aims to add fine grained BPF capabilities to systemd units and containers, avoiding to give the whole *CAP_BPF* capabili…

1
Systing: tracing for the lazy (asg2025) 29:24

9d ago29:24

29:24

Systing helps you solve problems in minutes rather than days. Out of the box it gives you everything you could possibly need, combined with perfetto’s visualization you will never be confused again.This talk will introduce systing, a tracer that is built on modern BPF tooling, purpose built to debug large applications with complicated interactions.…

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Why you should contribute to systemd! (asg2025) 23:28

9d ago23:28

23:28

I'll use these 20 minutes to explain why and why contributing to systemd is a great experience. We'll avoid beating dead horses by not discussing git forges and email, but instead focus on the development experience, from building systemd distribution packages from git main, running integration tests against those distribution packages, debugging f…

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A Security Model for systemd (asg2025) 40:31

9d ago40:31

40:31

Linux lacks a coherent security model, and by extension we never defined one for the systemd project either.In this talk I'd like to start changing this, and begin defining some general security design guidelines that we so far mostly followed implicitly, and make them more explicit. After all, systemd to a large degree is involved in security subs…

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How to Quellcode (quellcode25) 10:52

11d ago10:52

10:52

Kurzer Talk, indem ich kurz vorstelle wie wir die Quellcode organisiert haben.https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/about this event: https://pretalx.0x90.space/quellcode-2/talk/QVGLUD/By Hännetz