About

I am Tyler J. Wagner, a technical leader with over 25 years engineering experience in software and networks. I’ve worked on planet-scale advertising systems, distributed Linux systems, satellite networks, local and wireless networks, and data centres. I can be found on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn. If you’ve seen a user named “tolaris” somewhere, that’s probably me.

I now lead a team of Google Site Reliability Engineers (SREs) who oversee the Ad Manager, AdSense and AdMob user interfaces. Life at Google is awesome; you should visit some time. Standard disclaimer: The opinions stated here are my own, not necessarily those of my company.

Until late 2014, I was the Chief Technology Officer of Talia Ltd, a satellite Internet services provider and Linux consulting and network engineering company. Talia operates its own teleport and maintains a VSAT network spanning 8 satellites and 1500 modems across the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa. I led the team that built this network from the ground up.

I have a personal collection of servers and workstations which run Ubuntu or Debian. I have managed some form of Unix since I was introduced to HP-UX 9 in 1996, and have run Linux on the desktop full time since 2005.

My wife and I lived in Iraq from August 2003 to May 2005, where I worked for ServiceSat International, later IraqSat, an Iraqi satellite-based ISP. You can read about our experiences there in the archive of our personal blogs at giantlaser.livejournal.com and slownewsday.livejournal.com. I recommend you start here. A friend also wrote an article about my time there; it’s an entertaining read if you have the time.

I’m a US/UK dual-national, live in rural Scotland, and love to travel. I have lived in San Francisco, Amsterdam, Baghdad, Erbil (Iraqi Kurdistan), and London. I hold a B.S. Computer Science from California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.

These are my thoughts.