I am Carl “Redragon” Thompson.

I began my adventures at an early age on a TI-99/4A that was on display at the department store where my mother worked. I remember working all summer with my father to save up the money to buy my own. I was inseparable from that machine for a very long time. I took computer classes in high school (COBOL and RPG II) feeding my desire to learn more about computers. In the early 90s I played with Linux in it’s youth and my first commercial installation was with Red Hat 5.2 converting a local BBS into an ISP. I finally turned it into a full time career in the late 90’s.

I have held over 14 certifications with Red Hat and became a Red Hat Certified Instructor in 2014.

I have worked my way through being an administrator, engineer, and now architect. During my work history I have taken every possible moment to share my knowledge with others. In my roles over the last two decades I have been a pillar for supporting coworkers with any issues they couldn’t resolve on their own.

By day I architect solutions to ensure software is highly available and secure. My last 7 years at Apple soley focused on Security, High Availability, and Automation.

The nick name comes from me being referred to as the Red Dragon but unix had an 8 character user limit so when I created my first unix account it was redragon and has stayed with me over the 30 years.