Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

Getting the Random Module in SQL Data Generator

This is a series on SQL Data Generator, covering some interesting scenarios I’ve run into. If you’ve never tried it, SQL Data Generator is a part of the SQL Toolbelt. Give it a try today with an evaluation today.

I have SQL Data Generator, and use it regularly to build quick test data in non-trivial scenarios. One of the things I ran into recently was a minor bug, but one that’s been logged. Hopefully you won’t need this, but in case you do.

I was trying to use a Python script and return a random value from a list. My code was:

return random.choice(mylist)

This gave me an error.

No biggie, I’ll add “import random” to the top of the script. That didn’t help. Apparently the distro with SQL Data Generator is missing the random module for some reason.

Fortunately, I have Python 2.7 on my system. I clicked “Tools” and “Application Options” in SQL Data Generator.

This gave me a dialog. On the General tab, there’s a “Python” section. I added the path to my Python lib folder in here.

That worked fine. I didn’t need to import random; it was available. My script now worked.

October 12, 2017
The Blame Game

Make no mistake, this is going to be something that happens again. The former CEO of Equifax blames their massive data breach on a bad scanner and a person. I’m not talking about a data breach, of course those are going to happen, and when they do, assume that every piece of data in the system is compromised. I know some digital forensic scientists are really talented, but is a company that didn’t necessarily pay attention to security in the first place going to ensure the analysis is done right? Not likely. Assume every record is compromised.

In this case, the former CEO calls out a person that made a mistake, and then says technology failed. I don’t think that’s true, and I’d agree with Patrick McKenzie, who has a good thread on Twitter. A bad engineering decision, or even a process, is the result of multiple people making mistakes. Certainly there are people that must back up the Apache Struts patch person when they’re on vacation. Or there should be. If there isn’t, then that’s a management failure at multiple levels.

The thing that concerns me is that we, as tech workers, are going to be blamed going forward. The individual isn’t named here, but I bet at some point they will be. And some, or many, tech workers will get sacrificed for a company that wants to show contrition and action for security mistakes. It’s common for someone to take the blame, but I haven’t seen a specific person be identified (or their inaction be called out) in the past. I’m sure some tech people were probably fired after previous incidents at large companies, but not publicly.

While the person wasn’t named, there was a report that this individual was no longer employed. Fired? Quit? Who knows. Certainly it’s likely that once this breach became public, anyone who might have been responsible for watching CERT lists, applying patches, or anything to do with Apache Struts might be blamed. In fact, I don’t know I’d want to continue working at a company that might publicly blame my role for a massive breach. My career might be dead with that management, so I might as well move on. Much easier for everyone to blame me than accept responsibility.

This is the first time I’ve seen an IT employee blamed. BA said an IT systems failure with their major issues. Yahoo and Target were hacked, but no one in IT was blamed. Sony didn’t blame their IT staff after their emails and films were released. Yet Equifax did. I hope this isn’t a sign of things to come.

Steve Jones

The Voice of the DBA Podcast

Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 4.5MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and Libsyn.

October 12, 2017
WAITFOR isn’t a function–#SQLNewBlogger

Another post for me that is simple and hopefully serves as an example for people trying to get blogging as #SQLNewBloggers.

I needed to delay the execution of some code the other day. This was a test that was trying to simulate a few things happening, and one batch needed a random delay. I started typing and got something I didn’t expect.

Where’s the TIME or DELAY? SQL Prompt didn’t like this, and since I expect SQL Prompt to save me from writing bad code, I knew I’d done something wrong. I backed up and removed the parenthesis and ‘R’ and then typed again, this time adding a space.

That works. Now I can change this test to real code.

WAITFOR is designed to delay execution, but it’s not a function. No parenthesis. Instead, it’s a control of flow statement, like CASE, so it just takes other expressions after.

SQLNewBlogger

This was one of those commands I haven’t used in a long time, but is a handy one. Hopefully this 5 minute writeup will help me remember this in the future.

October 11, 2017
Time is Precious

I’ll hear people constantly say they don’t have time to work on their career. They can’t attend a UG meeting to network. They can’t spare a minute to go through a Stairway Series. They have family commitments, kids, hobbies, volunteer activities, spiritual needs, and more. That’s not even counting all the work they need to get done as a part of their job. When can they spend time on R or Machine Learning or CosmosDB or anything else?

I get it. My life is chaotic as well, with deadlines and a pile of work that never goes away. I sometimes dread travel and vacation because that means my work piles up on either side of those events. This is on top of commitments to keep up on chores at home (I have cooking and laundry), fix things at the ranch, spend time with kids, get date nights with my wife, and still get to the gym. Most weeks feel like a crazy treadmill for me.

In my life and career, I’ve learned a few things. One of which is that I need to prioritize what’s important to me. That often helps me decide when to do X instead of Y. I regularly make choices between opportunities, but I also try to evaluate the relative importance of events. I rarely miss family events or kid activities, but sometimes I do. I know that there are times that I feel my work is more important in the moment. However, I try to balance those out to be sure I remember that family is more important overall.

I’ve also learned that I can find time for things that are important. I have to adjust priorities and scheduling. It is important to not just overload myself with more work, which is easy to do. I find that if I try to get more done in a week, I can’t do that for long. Like a big project at work, I’ll burn out without balance. Instead, I’ve learned to let something go a bit, or cut back on some part of my life to make a little time.

Everyone can spare some time. Especially those of us in the technology industry. We need to learn and grow, even if it’s just for ourselves. We need to keep our brain’s active, and on a regular basis, we should try something new. Other professions can do this, and we should as well.

I know you can’t dedicate a half a day a week to a class, but maybe you can spend 30 minutes or so working through a book. I know you can’t make the user group every month, but you can make one or two meetings a year if that’s something you enjoy. You can’t go through all our Stairways, or maybe not even all of the Indexing levels in that series, but you can start learning a bit more with one. Perhaps you can’t make SQL Saturday this year in your area, but is it worth a bit of your day to watch a presentation from the SQL Bits archives?

I bet it’s possible, and I bet you can find a little time every month or two to grow a bit as a technology craftsman. Make sure you take care of yourself, and actively work on your career, in balance with the rest of your life.

Steve Jones

The Voice of the DBA Podcast

Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 4.4MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and Libsyn.

October 11, 2017