Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

  • From Great Idea to End Result

    This editorial was originally published on May 5, 2011. It is being republished as Steve is at the PASS Summit.

    What’s the time for you IT department to get from great idea to a resulting application? This is a very good piece from CIO magazine that finds many IT departments are seen as too slow. However there are a number of companies that are trying to innovate and find ways to increase the speed at which IT departments can deploy an application and respond to a business need.

    One great quote in there is “velocity is more important than perfection”,  which is a tenet that I have found to be very true over the years. It’s not that you throw junk out that isn’t well built or tested, but that you don’t try to meet every possible requirement or handle every little issue. The system has to be secure, handle errors, and meet the basic requirements, but it’s more important to get something done and in production than to have it perform and scale perfectly.

    Is that heresy to the developers and DBAs out there? Perhaps, but I think this methodology has to go hand in hand with another mantra I heard fromJason Fried: do more of what works and less of what doesn’t. In this case if a system shows promise and starts to get heavy use, it receives more resources and perhaps gets refactoring in real time, even as it gets enhanced with new ideas.

    “You want IT to be in constant test-and-learn mode”, another quote showing that IT needs to be working closely with the business to try ideas, learn from them, and move forward. The Agile style of development applies, and in some sense I think this is the future for the strategic IT department of the future.

    For the data professional this means that you must learn to model quickly, and with an eye towards a flexible design that might need to change regularly. We need to understand the businesses we work in better so that we can anticipate how requirements might change.

    Management has to buy into the idea that applications will not be perfect, they won’t be polished, and most importantly, they are essentially prototypes that either need to have addition resources spent on enhancements or they should be abandoned quickly. However I think this is a great way to develop internal applications that can provide a nice ROI, and be a more enjoyable way for developers to work.

    Steve Jones

  • Networking Tonight at the YardHouse in Seattle

    I’m heading over to the Yardhouse (4th and Pike) as soon as SQL in the City is finished and should be there by 6. Andy Warren will likely be there earlier, so look for him. If you don’t know Andy, he looks like this:

    AndyWarren

    This is me, though I’ll probably not have the horse.

    dbateam8

    Hope to see many of you there, especially new people attending the PASS Summit, or just data pros in Seattle.

  • Travel Confusion

    I confused myself. Twice apparently in October. Let’s hope that this one works out as well as the last one.

    Jones is a Good Name

    I flew to Orlando on Oct 8. I got a car, and drove up to my hotel in Lake Mary, near the SQL Saturday pre-con. I checked in, the lady asked for me name, acknowledged "Jones" and confirmed I was there for one night.

    I was slightly confused, but thought I might have booked a different hotel for the next night closer to the SQL Saturday. There are times I’ve got events in two places, so I stay near them. When I got to my room, I checked, and my phone showed a reservation for Oct 9-11, at the same hotel.

    Hmmmm.

    I went back downstairs and we determined I didn’t have a reservation for Oct 8, but there was another Jones coming. Apparently I got his or her room. We fixed things, I kept my room, and then promptly double checked the rest of my hotels in the UK.

    Check In is Available for Your Flight

    That was the message I got today when I came out of yoga. At first I started to check in, then realized today is Friday. I planned on going to Seattle on Sunday and I can only check in 24 hours in advance.

    A check confirmed it. I’d messed up reservations again. I called United and they said there was a bunch of space on a couple flights Sunday. If I changed today it was US$300. However if I want until tomorrow morning and call within 24 hours of the flight, there’s no change fee. The benefits of flying a lot are there, but not without some caveats.

    I created an appointment for myself in the am to call and change my flight. Let’s hope a bunch of people don’t book DEN->SEA between now and then.

  • SQL in the City Comes to Seattle in 3 Days

    Last week I spoke at SQL in the City 2015 in London, and it was a great event. We had a wonderful event, and I’m looking forward to Seattle. Lots of good questions and comments in my version control talk, good feedback on the keynote, which I really enjoyed. I thought our end of day panel was outstanding, and I wish we had 2 hours for that as the questions were amazing.

    I’m looking forward to a duplication of SQL in the City in Seattle on Monday, just a few days away. We’re going to be at the Hyatt in downtown Seattle, and we’d love to have you come. You can register and join us, but please don’t register unless you can come.

    There are also a few workshops in Seattle on Tuesday, so if you want hands on practice, come sign up for on of these.