drake arthur dotson
IT student · homelab architect · SkillsUSA CT state officer
the infrastructure phase
Maintenance work at 14 taught me that real work does not wait for perfect instructions. School gives you a rubric and someone explaining what right looks like. Maintenance was different — something had to be fixed, moved, cleaned, or dealt with, and nobody cared if it was glamorous. That is where I learned how much invisible work keeps a place running.
IT was the obvious trade because it connects everything I already cared about: computers, servers, networking, code, hardware, security. Other trades build real things too, but IT is the one where the systems scale past a single room. There was no movie-scene moment where I knew I was good at this — just a pattern that became impossible to ignore. Building PCs, planning infrastructure, troubleshooting cursed hardware, leading school tech, and people still coming to me for help. At some point it stopped being a hobby.
This chapter is the one where I stop talking about what I want to become and start building the systems for it. Everything on this page connects to that.
I refuse to be told I am not capable by people who have not built what I'm trying to build.// answer to "finish the sentence: I refuse to..."
Machines that post, networks that route
Hardware is home because it is honest — a machine either posts or it doesn't, a fan spins or it doesn't. But software is what gives the hardware purpose, so the real discipline is infrastructure: both, working as one system. The satisfying part isn't the part list. It's when the invisible stuff gets organized — hostnames, labels, DNS, dashboards, shares, uptime checks — and a pile of hardware becomes a system you can navigate.
I don't only follow the clean textbook path. I build, break, and repurpose — forcing cheap or weird hardware to become useful, then wrapping it in enterprise-style structure: naming, documentation, remote access, backups. A failed Ryzen 5800XT build taught me the biggest lesson in the stack: never trust assumptions. Isolate variables instead of emotionally blaming one part.
On record: AMD and Intel builds diagnosed down to motherboard debug-light codes, DDR4 and DDR5, RX 6600 and Quadro cards, AIO loops. A headless GPU workstation — i5-12500, Quadro P4000 — administered entirely over the network. And the un-flashy layer that makes it employable: Active Directory, Group Policy, PC imaging and deployment, PowerShell and Python automation, and end-to-end tickets in ServiceNow, Zendesk, and Jira.
Frame by frame, claim by claim
Taking viral clips apart with ffmpeg and ffprobe — metadata, cuts, compression artifacts, what the video actually shows versus what the caption says it shows. Same troubleshooting instinct as hardware: isolate variables, check the evidence, don't accept the story just because it's loud. Writeups and clips are being assembled for this pane.
The Dotson datacenter, one wall at a time
A home lab planned like a real environment while still in high school: a naming convention that actually works (DD- for the lab, hostnames like DD-MAIN, DD-GPU01, DD-MINI01), per-asset documentation, a master plan, and a hard rule — no important services exposed straight to the internet, ever. Remote access rides Tailscale or Cloudflare Access. No port-forwarded RDP, SSH, hypervisors, NAS, or admin panels. Fed by 1 Gbps fiber and a Cisco 24-port switch, across seven planned network zones, with Cloudflare Tunnel and Access staged for the few services that ever face outward.
static snapshot — live panel gets wired later. remote path: tailscale only. nothing port-forwarded, ever.
Building the room instead of begging for a seat
Turning outsider, friend-group chaos into something people can actually gather around — gaming, clips, memes, challenges, Discord energy. It's for the person who is funny, weird, talented, loud, quiet, chronically online, or misunderstood, and doesn't see themselves in polished fake creator groups. A place where "reject" stops being an insult.
certified
- Introduction to Cybersecurity 2024
- Networking Basics — Cisco Networking 2024
- CPR Certified 2024–26
- Stop The Bleed Certified —
competed
- 3rd — Lockheed Martin Cybersecurity Competition 2024 + 2026
- SkillsUSA CT finalist — Technical Computer Applications 2026
- SkillsUSA CT finalist — VEX Mobile Robotics 2025
- CT SkillsUSA Ambassador + President Awards 2026
- SkillsUSA Nationals delegate 2026
- Class president — elected uncontested, three years running ×3
- SkillsUSA chapter — Vice President; prior Treasurer 2025–
- First-degree black belt — Shaolin Kempo Karate —
- Angelica Marie Padilla Memorial Scholarship 2023
- Runs a small resale operation — sourcing, pricing, risk ongoing
defend vs. touched
will defend in any interview:
touched, not claiming yet — building toward depth:
field time:
BJ's Wholesale — first-line POS / self-checkout / ExpressPay support · 2026–
CTVETS250 — social media intern, photoshop + work-based learning · 2025–
Windham Middle School — maintenance crew · 2024
Uncontested class president three years in a row, 3rd at a Lockheed Martin cybersecurity competition twice, and a home datacenter in progress — while still in high school. Sounds fake if you say it too fast. It's real.// the "sounds fake but fully true" answer
transmission
If you made it this far, you already know more about me than a resume would tell you. The style is not the same thing as the standard — the work is serious even when the delivery isn't.
Next step is already aimed: B.S. Computer Science at UConn, pointed at secure infrastructure, national security, and aerospace systems.