Larry Ludlow
Principal Engineer
A Detroit Metro Area senior Global or Enterprise level infrastructure architect setting and implementing direction that encourages new innovation and the pursuit of excellence.
Expert in solution architecture, design, implementation and support of secure, high performance, scalable, globally distributed Internet connected data center environments, private and public cloud server infrastructure.
Unique ability to step into an opportunity, assess the needs, rapidly identify possible solutions taking into account the “Big Picture” and doing whatever is required to accomplish win:win successes. Excels at building intelligent, common sense, loyal teams that exceed expectations. A problem solver and troubleshooter.
Skills
Linux / Unix
- Redhat
- Ubuntu
- Suse
- AIX
- Solaris
Virtualization
- vmware
- vCloud Director
- KVM
- Proxmox
- PowerVM
DevOps
- Puppet
- Ansible
- SaltStack
- Terraform
- Argo
- Flux
- Helm
Languages
- Python
- golang
- PHP
- Java
- C++
- Rust
Cloud
- AWS
- Azure
- Google Cloud
Containers
- K8S
- Rancher
- Docker
- Docker Swarm
Work Experience (13)
Built a highly available, distributed S3 product with streamlined deplyments using CI/CD and Ansible.
Provide Tier 3 support for customers and channel partners.
Wrote training materials and held classes on ansible, gitlab, docker, and CI/CD practices.
Developed ansible good practices to streamline new projects.
Actively work with product team to develop new offerings and improve existing
Mantain a lab to support proliferation of automation within the organization.
Technical lead for our Gen3 cloud deployemnt utilizing vCloud Director.
Maintain CI/CD for all facets of online and mobile ordering
Develop ansible and terraform modules for maintenance and growth of our multi-cloud environment (MS Azure and Google cloud).
Built a modular monitoring and metrics stack utilizing prometheus, influxdb, grafana, alertmanager in a container environment to scale as needed.
Configured federation between monitoring systems in each virtual environment (VPC)
Created predictive algorithms to alert on potential problems before they happen.
Built a container environment to host .netCore applications with auto scaling to provide cost savings over a standard machine deployment.
Built several proof of concepts to manage remote store systems (15,000+). Most of these utilized ansible to perform the configuration with a higher level orchestration (salt, puppet, foreman)
Wrote an ESB consumer and dispatcher in python to replace windows based services.
Committed upstream fixes to several open source products we utilize.
Developed a python based service to scrape metrics from our cloud providers and expose them to a metrics endpoint for prometheus consumption.
Responsible for all Linux servers in a multi company environment. Systems include Ubuntu, CEntOS, and Redhat Enterprise Linux
Managed automated builds and deployments using Stash and Bamboo.
Automated deployments to AWS using bamboo and docker.
Built a configuration management system using Ansible to deploy, configure, and ensure against configuration drift. I have also developed many other ansible plays to perform inventory collection, patching, and PCI remediation. Additionally I wrote plugins to send status of each ef these to our central logging system.
Developed a centralized log management system using Logstash, Elasticsearch, Kabana, and HAProxy to provide a highly available and scalable method of collecting logs from our servers, infrastructure, and applications.
Implemented a server monitoring system and integrated it with our alerting system and slack.
Built a server and application metrics dashboard using Graphite, Grafana, and collectd. This has enabled dev, ops, and support people to see historic system metrics and better troubleshoot servers and applications.
High level responsibilities:
- Plan, organize, and direct activities related to server infrastructure services.
- Manage technology vendor relationships and contract negotiations
- Provide technical process oversight and assistance to a variety of IT projects
- IT Security, Audit and Compliance
- Disaster recovery planning and testing
Directly Managed the following teams:
- *Nix Server Teams (AIX, RedHat, Solaris)
- Microsoft Server Team (AD, System Center, Exchange, Lync/OCS)
- Virtual Server Team (Vmware, RHEV, HyperV)
- Middleware (Apache, JBoss, IIS)
Environment:
- 3 Data centers 2 in Michigan 1 in Florida
- 200+ remote sites (file, print, DC)
- 1000 +/ Linux servers
- 1400 +/ Windows servers
- 80 +/ ESX hosts
Build, Patch, and maintain 1000+ Linux servers
Develop standard operating procedures
Maintain 200+ servers (including multiple HA clusters)
Manage licensing and contracts
Negotiate with vendors
Take an active roll in committees to determine the best practices and technologies
Lead purchasing efforts (RFP/RPQ/etc.)
Systems Security and Management.
Notable Clients:
GE Aerospace
Detroit Beer Company
Henkel
Detroit Auto Dealers Association
Eastern Michigan University
Detroit Opera House
City of Troy
Grid4 Communications
Designed and installed a large JBoss/Linux environment to support finite element analysis for a large aerospace organization.
Wrote and debugged java code for a large scale portal designed to provide reporting and request tracking to engineering groups.
Upgraded 100+ Solaris servers across a global network for a large foreign automotive company.
Lead Engineer on a "Fork Lift" Infrastructure upgrade (Solaris to Linux)
Implemented an internal update server (yum) and custom compiled rpm's from source to meet our specific needs
Compiled RedHat Cluster Suite and GFS kernels from source to provide us with a cost effective method of OS level clustering and shared filesystems
Assist with installation and configuration of Oracle 10g RAC clusters
Implemented a clustered JBoss AS environment (F5 Load balancers in front of an Apache web farm using mod_jk)
Migrated all local users and service accounts to a Highly Available LDAP directory server that synchronizes users passwords with Active Directory
Provide Linux training to DBA and Systems administration teams
Designed an Open source monitoring system that compliments our existing Compuware Monitoring Suite, and displays server health on graphical representation of our network
Lead Engineer on a "Fork Lift" Infrastructure upgrade (Solaris to Linux)
Implemented an internal update server (yum) and custom compiled rpm's from source to meet our specific needs
Compiled RedHat Cluster Suite and GFS kernels from source to provide us with a cost effective method of OS level clustering and shared filesystems
Assist with installation and configuration of Oracle 10g RAC clusters
Responsible for generating quotes, planning projects, and providing training to clients
Provide application, web, email, and database hosting for companies seeking to reduce there IT budget
Engineered and Built a remote Datacenter using Cisco, IBM, Dell, and Sun Hardware
Manage 29 Red Hat AS3 Servers running a mix of Apache, Oracle, Qmail, DNS, DHCP, Tomcat, Zope, Open LDAP, Subversion, and MySQL
Designed an Open source monitoring system that monitors and reports customer SLA, server health, database performance, SPAM, network usage, and web site statistics
Manage 17 Sun servers (Solaris 8, 9, 10) running Sun Java Enterprise, Apache, MySql, Oracle, and Tomcat
Manage 3 Windows 2003 Servers running Exchange 2003, IIS, DHCP, and Netbackup 5.x
Coordinated an interdepartmental project to convert 60,000 customers to new billing system in order to save the company $3 Million
Negotiated contracts with vendors to provide the best possible service yet still maintain profitability
Maintained WAN consisting of 2x OC48, 4x DS3’s, 15x T1’s, and Multiple Cisco routers and switches
Administered 5 RedHat 7.x Linux servers (Bind, Apache, Radius, Sendmail)
Provided 24hr tier 3 support for Collocation, dedicated IP, and remote customer base of 500 users
Designed and implemented a medium sized office LAN (under 100 users)
Responsible for day to day system administration tasks in a Windows NT 4.0 environment
Installed, configured, and administered Windows NT4 with DHCP, MS Exchange Server 5.5
Evaluated and recommended new software and hardware, both on the desktop PCs and the servers
Troubleshooting hardware and software problems on desktop and laptop PCs running Windows 98 and Windows NT Workstation 4.0
Wrote policies and procedures for IT department
Volunteer
Education (12)
- Eiffel
- Intro to theoretical computer science
- Eiffel
- Intro to theoretical computer science
- How to Reason and Argue
- Data Analysis and Statistical Inference
- English Composition I
- Novell Certified Linux Engineer
- Advanced Linux Troubleshooting and Optimization
- Novell Zenworks Administrator
- Virtual Connect
- Boot-from-SAN
- BladeSystem Administration
- Storage Foundation + HA 5.0
- Netbackup 6.x Administration
- Netbackup 6.x Troubleshooting
- RHCJA
- RHCE 5
Publications
Languages
English
References
“ Larry is an outstanding technical resource supporting Linux / Unix, adept at coming up with creative solutions to any technical problem that arises. He also displays a very calm demeanor and remains that way in high pressure situations working against tight deadlines and when making presentations to Sr. IT Leadership. ”
“ I’ve had the pleasure of knowing Larry during his time at The Auto Club Group. Larry is well versed across multiple technical disciplines. He’s proven his capabilities many times while working together on several projects. ”
“ I enjoyed working with Larry during his time at ACG. He was always approachable, positive and results oriented. Supporting mission critical technology is stressful by nature, but Larry was one of those people who could be counted on to roll up his sleeves and do whatever was necessary to solve problems. ”
“ I'm glad that I had a chance to work with Larry at UM for 4 years. He was technical strong and was instrumental in implementing new technologies like puppet, Munin and SMT to manage our servers better. He was really fun to work with and always to willing to help and impart his technical skills to me and the group. ”
“ Mr. Larry Ludlow is an asset to any organization due to his deep knowledge in Linux / UNIX in addition to his unlimited understand and capability in design and architecture of open source software. Larry is articulate, detail oriented, very efficient and by all means he is all about customer satisfaction. Larry strives in bringing new innovations and his solutions to the IT challenges are thoughtful and intelligent. Larry has a very friendly personality and he gets along with everyone. His sense of responsibility and taking ownership of the problems and issues makes him a breath of fresh air to deal with. ”
“ Larry is a very knowledgeable and well rounded technologist. I worked with him while on the Linux team, and learned a great deal from him. I believe that he would be a valuable asset to any company's team. ”
“ Larry has been an exceptional member of the Linux team at UMHS/MCIT. He demonstrates a willingness to share his knowledge without reserve, which is sometimes rare in this day and age, and has proven himself to be technically strong. Larry's attention to customer service, and his responsiveness to the needs of not only his customer base but also his peers has been very valuable. ”