Welcome! Introduce yourselves and mingle a bit.

[BScott]

Let's start to get to know everyone and introduce ourselves to each other. I'm going to do a longer post to introduce the community team, but I'll go ahead and get started here to kick things off. You can do your intro however you'd like, but we'd love to have you include at least the basics:

Name, dob, ssn... oh wait. That's not it—wrong list. 🤣  Let me try again.

Name, current job title, company
fun fact about yourself

You can add more of course. And if you don't want to share your current company, you can say your industry instead.

Hi everyone! I'm Becky Scott, Senior Manager Technical Community at JumpCloud. You'll see a lot of me around here (sorry in advance) as this is part of my day job. Meetups and social also fall under my team. And a fun fact: if you haven't seen me on camera on the IT Hour yet this will be new to you—my hair is purple and I love it because it's, well, fun. Stick around and I'm sure you'll learn more about me. Like the fact that I abuse emojis and gifs. (Sorry, not sorry.)

[steven]

Hi Becky!

I'm Steven Hodges, Systems Administrator at Webspec. We're a marketing, design, and development agency in Iowa! A little fun fact about myself is that I'll be copying @BScott and dying my hair purple too! I really enjoy 3D printing... even though I don't have an artistic bone in my body and can't model anything lol

[BScott]

It's fun. Dooooo iiiiiiitttttttt. I got it refreshed this weekend so it's nice & bright and have gotten so many compliments already. I 💜 it.

[steven]

I really like your shade, but I want it a tad darker I think.

[BScott]

I am resisting the urge to post a "come to the dark side, we have cookies" meme. 

[rlyons]

Becky, this is JC's chance to set the tone to differentiate themselves from the more established companies.

Here we talk in memes and snark.

[BenGarrison]

I think reddit has the snark and memes corner locked down

[BScott]

But here we'll be nicer about about it. Memes not "menes" (means, get it?).

You can snark all you want but if you get mean about it, especially to new people asking questions—even if they could just google it—I will only ask nicely once. I love snark, I may even live for snark, but only if others involved enjoy it, too. 🙂

[rlyons]

Rob Lyons, IT Director at ABCO Research Associates. I'm the director of one, but hey, looks good on the resume!

I threw myself into the deep end with a pile of Macintosh machines that I've had to learn how to admin from square one. I came to JumpCloud because it did a great job of letting me standup and control my hodgepodge of Linux and Windows servers while keeping the Macs in the same admin environment.

My hobbies include my homelab, video game collection, and dancing with my friend around the grill making caveman noises while waiting for the food to finish.

For some reason, my neighbors are okay with number three....

[BScott]

Welcome, Rob! Good to have with us. And thanks for introducing us to your pets during one of the meetups! We might need a "share your pet" thread soon.

[ScottT_JC]

Hi folks! I'm Scott Thurston. I'm a senior software engineer at JumpCloud, working in our Devices Engineering organization. My focus is mostly on the JumpCloud agent and its back-end infrastructure.

Things I enjoy: cycling (although not nearly enough), video games (mostly World of Warships & Star Citizen these days), reading (primarily SF and also not nearly enough), and taking our new rescue pup for walks (a nearly one-year-old Whatsit).

[BScott]

Hey, Scott — thanks for chiming in!

[Anonymous]

deleted

[BScott]

Hiya, NT. Glad to have you join us. Hope you'll check out our London meetup group if you're close by (we've been having them virtually) and we'll be at MacAD UK next week if you happen to be attending any events in relation to that. Again, welcome!

[pamlefkowitz]

Hi all! Pam Lefkowitz here. After owning an IT consulting firm/MSP for 25 years, I'm now the IT Columnist at JumpCloud. I write about all things IT Admin l, MSP life, and Professional Services life. 

Fun fact: I have the uncanny ability to walk headlong into celebrities - literally - including such people such as Reba, Scottie Pippen, and Steve Jobs (that was weird and uncomfortable and he was really nice about it). Nobody's been hurt in my headlong stumbles. Apparently I am more interested in the person I'm talking with than where I'm walking?

[BScott]

Hi Pam! I'm not even sure I would know a celebrity if I did run headlong into them. I'm not very good at recognizing them when out and about...but then again I haven't exactly been hanging out in places where they tend to be anyway. 🤣

[kelly]

Hi! Or as I'm given to say, howdy-do buckaroosA! I'm Kelly Guimont, I'm the Operations Manager for Technolutionary. However, you might know me from any number of podcasts where I talk about Apple tech, Star Wars, Marvel TV shows, or general nonsense. 

I'll give two fun facts about me: First, I used to work with Tom Bridge, who is now a...JumpCloudian? I don't know what y'all are called but if there is a better title use that. My other fun fact is that I have shaken the hands of all three founders of Apple Computer Inc. 

I look forward to the how-tos on purple hair and (in)appropriate GIF selection!

[BScott]

Kelllllllllly! Welcome to the community. Super happy to have you aboard.

And you nailed it. We do call ourselves JumpCloudians and don't tell @TomBridge but we really like him around these parts. Shhhhh.

What would you like to know about purple hair? It's fun, but high maintenance. Sometimes I forget about it because I leave it pulled back and then someone says "I love your hair!" and I smile because I remember and it makes me happy all over again. I just got it redone last weekend so it's much brighter than it was in the last meetup.

[kelly]

Well as you know, my hair is A Whole Thing so mostly just knowing about maintenance and how to get anything to show up on dark brown. (: 

[BScott]

Ah, well, so is mine! And I tried going violet and other shades and nothing really looked good until I went to someone who specializes in vibrant colors. You're going to have to bleach it a bit if you really want it to show up. My hairdresser uses the brand Pulp Riot and it has been great. Be ready to be there for a few hours (I think it was about 3 last time)...but we sat and watched a ton of Fresh Prince episodes on demand so it was at least entertaining while I sat there. 😁

[pamlefkowitz]

Great to have you aboard Kelly!!!!!!!!! Poke around. I know you'll bring a lot to the discussions!

[kelly]

I look forward to discovering the Knitting section you will inevitably build, @pamlefkowitz 😉

[BScott]

Uh, fiber arts. How dare you exclude crochet. 🤣

[kelly]

I'm primarily a crochet person myself I just know Pam isn't. 😉 

[chadrick]

What's that thing with a sort of hook and you make a rug? I did that when I spent a summer with my grandmother. I want in the fiber arts cool cats club.

[pamlefkowitz]

It's called - brace yourself - a rug hook. Yeah, it really is. 🙂

[chadrick]

[BrettStone]

Hi everyone!

I'm Brett,  a graphic designer who is also admin for a team of 10+. I'm new to JumpCloud and MDM in general, looking forward to reducing time spent maintaining and gaining consistency with tools that we develop and use in our daily work.

I'm working on my second career for the third or fourth time, and I have always enjoyed problem solving, innovating fresh solutions, finding and making tools that get the job done more efficiently. I've worked most of my career in publishing, and as an INTJ with typography experience I'm trying to not cringe when this forum software gets all the apostrophes backward (I hope there are no proofreaders on this forum -- they'd die for sure!)

I look forward to learning from this community, and later contributing as I learn. I'm just as likely to share my mistakes and struggles as I am my victories; I believe both provide opportunity for growth.

[BScott]

Heya @BrettStone and thanks for introducing yourself. You're right about the quote marks (the apostrophe was so small I missed it) and I have it noted as a 'need to fix' along with the default font size. Yes, it bugs me, too! If you find anything else, be sure to let us know. We appreciate you jumping in.

[NVergin]

Hi there!  I'm Nathan and am the IT Systems Analyst & Administrator at AkitaBox based out of Madison, WI.  We've been a JumpCloud customer for a few years now and they have been a great partner for us!

I'm a fairly avid cyclist and bikepacker.  Residing in Wisconsin, I have ridden in temperatures below -30 degrees, not factoring in windchill.  I'm also into camping, hiking, paddling, photography, tech/gadgets, video games and just recently started to dabble in hand-drawn animation on the iPad.   I'm pretty bad at it, but it's still fun!

[BScott]

@NVergin thanks for your many contributions so far. I didn't mean to skip over your intro.

I've been in below 0 temps, having grown up in the midwest, but I can't even imagine willingly being out in anything that cold. I'm into photography as well, but haven't had time to get out much. My camera is sorely neglected as of late.

[chadrick]

Chad Parson. Recently made the shift from a senior project engineer focused on moving everyone's infrastructure from their office to the cloud to working as a full-time consultant. After a decade of clicking things and stuff, I began to find it terribly repetitive and boring and I'm super stoked to be taking those years of experience and putting it to use talking to people all day.

Located in southern Missouri, Subaru enthusiast, spent years as an adjunct instructor of Cisco networking at my local community college, an active member of the advisory board for the IT degree path at said college, unhealthy Reddit addiction, drink White Claws in public with no shame, unabashed Kesha fan. Wish I had enough hair to dye it purple.

[pamlefkowitz]

2018 Forester here. I had to do a battery reset after a gas cap mishap but that broke the window. So I took it into the shop where the service manager was shocked that I knew what to do. So now I know how to recover from the "every single indicator on the dash is on" and I know how to reset the windows. It's like Nintendo game cheats, but for your car. LOL 

[chadrick]

The classic all the lights error! I see it all the time on r/subaru. Thankfully I've not encountered it so far, biggest annoyance I've had is when the car throws a code it turns off cruise control. I have a 2016 WRX, my daily driver that's built and dyno-tuned. That's how I know all about the cruise control shutting off because the exhaust, or lack thereof, will throw a code on the O2 sensors. It's getting traded in for a 2022 BRZ on Saturday (if it ever gets delivered, that's been an adventure). Then my wife drives a 2020 Outback Onyx and my son a 2013 Impreza sport wagon. We're that family. 🙂

[kelly]

I drive an Outback (the khaki pants of Portland Oregon). Somehow when my Mazda died I ended up with the Outback and Mr Kelly got a new car. I still don't know how that happened...

@pamlefkowitz or @chadrick If you all know the cheat codes, what's the secret to getting my iPhone to connect to the Bluetooth reliably? Every time I get a new phone the car hates it in a new way. (I don't know the equivalents of Up, Down, A, or B on a car)

This thread derail brought to you by Pam and Kelly, de-railers extraordinaire...

[chadrick]

My previous employer was based in Portland, and I was out there in November to visit the office and finally meet some colleagues face to face. My wife and I were amazed at just how many Subaru we saw out there. The joke is definitely based on reality. I mentioned I could bring out a trailer and load up to start my own Subaru lot and make a killing here in southern Missouri, where the nearest dealership is two hours away.

As far as trying to get your phone to connect reliably, I honestly have no help there. We're all Android in my house, but the stock head unit in my 2016 WRX was terrible about just not connecting or disconnecting for no good reason. My wife's Outback is a 2020, and it seems to be pretty consistent. It's annoying that a passenger can't add their phone while the car is driving to be able to run the tunes or Maps for you, but in the year we've had it we haven't had issues with already configured devices.

Now trying to control the seat warmers and HVAC since they put all that stuff in the touch screen, and it's an accident waiting to happen trying to adjust it while driving is a whole other battle I hate.

[BScott]

I felt that way about my Honda years ago (the 90s). Dealers were plentiful in SoCal, but not so much when I would drive back to see my folks in SW Mo.

[ScottT_JC]

Welcome, Chad! We drive a 2017 Forester (our 3rd Subie). 

[chadrick]

Awesome! I love that I always find more and more Subaru community in the tech community. 🙂

[pamlefkowitz]

So I had one client where I managed the design dept computers (Mac) while the IT dept handled everything else. It took me 10 years to get them to acknowledge that I had a clue about IT. Pretty sure it was when I bought my souped up red 5.7 v8 Hemi Charger that they all decided I was worthy of respect. When I told them I traded it in for a Forester they were shocked. BUT...turns out that one of the IT staff is an ambassador. I walked out that day with a coffee mug, a bunch of stickers, a tshirt, a keychain...it was crazy. Crazy fun, that is.