On Davey Shafik's blog today, he has a new post with a look at being a sysadmin from a PHP developer's perspective - why you should know some about it and what kinds of working conditions you should expect.

As a PHP developer, I believe that its essential to have certain skills. One of the most important, is that of a sysadmin. You don't have be a very good one, but you need to know your enivronment.

Why do I say this? Well, first of all, you're writing the code. You should know what it needs, this means several things: What PHP Version is required, What Apache version is required, What PHP configuration is required, What Apache configuration is required, Directory Structure, Permissions.

More than likely, in any larger company, most of those things will already be set up. All you'll need to do is work with it. Another thing he recommends is the use of a development server - an invaluable tool that can save your bacon later on down the line...