SQLBeard, a/k/a Jimmy Dixon is the IT manager for a hardwood flooring, hardwood lumber distributor,  with its corporate office in Raleigh, NC.

As a part of my post-secondary education, I started down the career path to become a certified public accountant.  After taking a programming course (for statistics), I decided to change schools and major and get a computer science degree.  Many people have asked how much of that degree do I use on a daily basis, and it’s not much.  I don’t have the need write assembler code, or do much with Fortran, but, the basics are there.  TCP/IP was only available to the educational market.  How things have changed.

I started working with computers at a Radio Shack Computer Center (back in the day — July 1985).  After a stint in the retail consumer electronics side of the house, I moved to the Area Training and Support Operations group.  I was the front line technical support for the Radio Shack computer centers in the Raleigh, NC area.

At the present time, I manage a wide-area network covering 10 physical locations in four states, with over 100 users, and nearly 50 servers.  It is my job responsibility to support the networking infrastructure to keep things running.  Our company accepts credit and debit cards utilizing integrated technology with our accounting system.  I am responsible for  maintaining PCI-DSS compliance.

Certifications

Microsoft MCSE

Microsoft MCSA

Microsoft MCDBA

CompTIA A+

CompTIA i-Net+

CompTIA e-Biz+

CompTia IT Project+

BSA Certified Software Manager (CSM)

APC Data Center Associate