[ WELCOME · START HERE ]

NEW HERE?
HERE'S WHERE TO START._

TheLineman is a hands-on networking blog by Dylan Doyle — network analyst at Halton DSB, CCNA in progress, Fortinet home lab operator, Ironman in training. Everything here is documented from real work, real gear, and real mistakes. Pick your path below.

★ PICK YOUR PATH

[ CCNA · STUDY ] STUDYING FOR
YOUR CCNA? Subnetting, routing, switching — concepts explained from someone actively in the exam grind.
Why Subnetting Finally Clicked CIDR Cheat Sheet — /8 to /32 Reference How I Structure My Study Sessions
[ HOME LAB · FORTINET ] BUILDING A
HOME LAB? Real Fortinet gear, real configs, real costs. FortiGate, FortiSwitch, FortiAP — documented from scratch.
Fortinet on a Budget: My Stack What Enterprise Networking Looks Like
[ SELF-HOSTING · LINUX ] SELF-HOSTING
ON LINUX? Apache, Cloudflare Tunnel, Pi-hole, Umami — this site runs on a home lab box. Here's how.
Why My Site Worked Locally But Not Publicly Ditching Google Analytics for Umami
[ CAREER · MINDSET ] EARLY IN YOUR
IT CAREER? Co-op to full time network analyst. What the job actually looks like vs what you study.
What Enterprise Networking Actually Looks Like Ironman Training Taught Me How to Study

★ WHO IS THIS GUY

░░░░░░░ ░ DD ░ ░░░░░░░ LVL 23 NET ANALYST

I'm Dylan Doyle — network analyst at Halton District School Board in Burlington, ON. BIT NET grad from Carleton and Algonquin. Two co-op summers at Halton's ISIS department, kept on full time after graduation.

I run a Fortinet home lab — FortiGate 60F, FortiSwitch 124D, FortiAP 421E — and self-host everything including this site on a Pop!_OS box running Apache2 behind a Cloudflare Tunnel.

Working toward my CCNA. Training for a full Ironman. Documenting all of it here — the labs, the certs, the mistakes, the grind.

FULL BIO ▶
[ ★ THE SHORT VERSION ] This site exists because I learn better when I write things down — and because every time I figured something out the hard way, I wished someone had documented it properly. If you're studying for CCNA, building a home lab, or trying to figure out what an IT career actually looks like in practice — you're in the right place._