Tal Sabadia — Senior Linux & Infrastructure Engineer

About

I like seeing how the whole system fits together.

I usually work where several layers meet: Linux, applications, network paths, load balancers, monitoring, and automation.

Outside production work, I build my own tools and test environments around automation, monitoring, AI-assisted operations, and the occasional web interface. I like making technical ideas easier to understand and use.

What I do

Infrastructure, from the OS up.

Linux, automation, monitoring, migrations, and everything connecting them.

01

Linux & Production Infrastructure

I run Linux estates with an eye on stability, clear ownership, and maintenance that stays manageable.

02

Infrastructure Automation

I turn repetitive operational work into scripts, playbooks, and workflows that are easy to rerun and troubleshoot.

03

Observability & Investigation

I build practical monitoring and follow evidence across systems until an incident makes sense.

04

Application Delivery & Networking

I trace traffic across load balancers, DNS, firewalls, routes, and application endpoints.

05

Migrations & Modernization

I plan migrations in stages, check dependencies early, and validate the service before and after cutover.

06

Resilience & Systems Integration

I improve resilience across high-availability services, email systems, data platforms, and their integrations.

Work

Selected infrastructure work.

The problem, what I did, and what changed afterward.

01

Project notes

Protected-Network Migration

Moved Linux and F5 services into protected networks without disrupting access.

Challenge: The move crossed Linux, F5, DNS, IP addressing, and firewall-policy dependencies.
Approach: Prepared IP ranges and DNS changes, validated firewall paths, staged the cutover, and checked traffic afterward.
Outcome: Finished with little to no noticeable user disruption.

Stack

Linux
F5 BIG-IP LTM
Palo Alto
DNS
IPAM

02

Project notes

Redis Sentinel High Availability for Moodle

Added Redis Sentinel High Availability to Moodle so cache failures would not become user-facing outages.

Challenge: Moodle needed cache failover that was predictable and invisible to users.
Approach: Designed the topology, configured Sentinel failover, and tested application behavior and recovery.
Outcome: Failover was seamless to users and improved performance and resilience.

Stack

Redis
Redis Sentinel
RHEL
Moodle
Monitoring

03

Project notes

CentOS 7 to RHEL 8/9 Migration

Moved selected core systems from CentOS 7 to supported RHEL releases while keeping service dependencies in view.

Challenge: The operating-system move had application and dependency risks beyond the servers themselves.
Approach: Mapped dependencies, rebuilt and reconfigured servers, staged cutovers, and resolved migration issues.
Outcome: Modernized core systems without interrupting service.

Stack

CentOS 7
RHEL 8/9
Bash
Application validation

04

Project notes

Separate Delivery Path for Promotional Email

Separated promotional mail from the main organizational mailing path to reduce deliverability risk.

Challenge: Promotional campaigns shared infrastructure with primary mailing lists, widening the impact of complaints or blocklisting.
Approach: Built a dedicated LISTSERV path with separate Postfix gateway and relay tiers.
Outcome: Kept promotional traffic separate from the primary mail path, reducing reputation and blocklisting risk.

Stack

Postfix
LISTSERV
SMTP
IronPort

Personal Lab

Personal infrastructure lab.

Things I build, test, and occasionally break on purpose.

Maintained Project

Monitoring & Automation Lab

Problem: I wanted one place to test monitoring and automation changes safely, end to end.
Built and tested: Built Zabbix checks, templates, alerts, and Telegram notifications, with repeatable Ansible/Ascender workflows.
Result: Brought monitoring, alerting, and maintenance into one workflow I can test end to end.

Stack

Zabbix
Ansible
CIQ Ascender
Telegram
Python

Prototype

AI-Assisted Operations Investigator

Problem: Operational evidence was scattered across alerts, commands, and separate notes.
Built and tested: Combined monitoring context, investigation steps, and evidence in one agent-assisted prototype.
Result: It works best when it narrows the search and keeps the evidence visible.

Stack

Hermes
Zabbix
Python
AI agents

Maintained Project

Multi-site VPN & Tunnel Operations

Problem: Tunnel deployments were manual, hard to track, and difficult to verify.
Built and tested: Automated VPN and tunnel setup, monitoring, inventory, evidence collection, and investigation.
Result: Made multi-endpoint tunnel operations repeatable and easier to troubleshoot.

Stack

Linux
FortiGate
GRE
OpenVPN
Zabbix
CIQ Ascender / Ansible
Telegram Bot API
Google Sheets
Python
Hermes

Experience

Hands-on infrastructure work since 2019.

Experience timeline event.
Personal Lab
Personal project
Jul 2022 — Present
I use this lab to troubleshoot and automate Linux, routing, DNS, firewalls, VPNs, GRE tunnels, NAT, and load-balancing paths with real monitoring and connectivity evidence.
Experience timeline event.
Senior System Engineer
Tel Aviv University
Jul 2022 — Feb 2026
Managed hundreds of RHEL servers and worked across F5, protected-network migrations, high availability, monitoring, email systems, automation, cloud, and provisioning.
Experience timeline event.
System Team Leader
Intercloud Ltd.
Sep 2020 — Jul 2022
Built and led a small systems team while staying hands-on with Linux, web and email infrastructure, monitoring, troubleshooting, and custom solutions.
Experience timeline event.
System Administrator
Interhost Networks Ltd.
Nov 2019 — Sep 2020
Managed Linux and Windows hosting infrastructure, expanded monitoring, and troubleshot server, application, DNS, and network issues.
Education timeline event.
Cyber Defense Program
John Bryce College
May 2017 — Sep 2019
Graduated with honors