Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

  • SQL Server Knockoffs

    This editorial was originally published on Mar 17, 2009. It is being re-run as Steve is away at the SQL Intersection conference.

    I thought this was an interesting post from John Dvorak on the Microsoft business model. I’m not sure it’s the end of Microsoft, after all, many corporations would not go with non-standard software since it might cause compatibility issues, and the cost of the software might be noise compared to all the questions, complaints, and potential retraining of employees.

    But that could change. And I think that Microsoft is in a bit of a downward spiral. One of their main products, Office, is essentially done. What more can you do to those applications that people need? Even Outlook hasn’t really added much value for a few versions. Most of us view these types of products as commodities, and a few more features don’t really add a lot for us.

    Even the OS is starting to disappear a bit for many people. We live our lives in applications, on the web, or with applets, like Twirl or TweetDeck, that really interact with the Twitter service. Twitter is really what matters, not the OS or even the application I am using.

    So what about the relational database? Are we heading down the road of the RDBMS becoming a commodity? Right now SQL Server, Oracle, and DB2 all constantly strive for a good amount of feature match between them. Each comes up with something new in each release, but how many of these new features are compelling? Already I think a lot of people are perfectly happy with SQL Server 2000, and the only reason to move is because of support.

    What if we get to the point where a MySQL or PostgreSQL type knock-off that runs T-SQL comes along and implements 80% of what SQL Server 2005 has. Would people switch to that engine? I don’t think people would completely convert their environments, but what about the 20% of your servers that are barely used, or are used for homegrown applications? If I sold you a “SQL Server knock-off” for $500, would you buy it instead of the $1895 for SQL Server Standard? What if it wasn’t priced by the CPU?

    I think SQL Server is the best RDBMS around right now, from a feature standpoint, price, performance, and support. Sure it has bugs, sure it has issues, but overall it’s a great database at a great price. It has ETL features, reporting, and most importantly, an extremely well performing database engine. However I can see someone trying to enter the market as a competitor in this space, just like the “netbooks”, hyperspace and theThinkOffice suite are trying to do to general business applications.

    After all, it’s easier to “copy” an application than innovate, and I think at some point the list of copied applications will go beyond Word and Excel.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    Everyday Jones

    The podcast feeds are available atsqlservercentral.mevio.com. Comments are definitely appreciated and wanted, and you can get feeds from there.

    You can also follow Steve Jones on Twitter:

    Overall RSS Feed:  or now on iTunes! 

    Today’s podcast features music by Everyday Jones. No relation, but I stumbled on to them and really like the music. Support this great duo at www.everydayjones.com.

  • Image is Everything

    This editorial was originally published on Feb 13, 2009. It is being re-run as Steve is on vacation.

    Image is everything.

    Or is it?

    I received an email recently from someone that said they liked the editorials and newsletter, but that my T-shirt was unprofessional and I should wear something else. This was from an HR professional, and they mentioned that image matters.

    In some sense I agree. When I interview, speak, present, I want to put forth a good image, but I don’t necessarily agree that the clothes I wear need to be more formal to do that. I wear clean, neat clothes (for the most part), but I don’t adhere to a suit, shirt-and-tie,  or any other formal business attire.

    So for a Friday poll, with one of my beloved SQLServerCentral Friday shirts:

    How much does your attire matter?

    Now I have worn a suit to work before. One of my early programming and DBA jobs was at a small company where suits were required. So I wore a clean, pressed shirt, tie, and suit coat, not sport coat, every day. And every day at lunch I’d go to the gym and come back with my tie undone, or at least loose. And most days my boss would remind me to tighten it up by 2:00.

    After a year of making arguments and lobbying, we progressed from casual Fridays with jeans to khakis and polos every day. Productivity didn’t fall, our customers weren’t offended, and the business prospered. And I was happier at work.

    Attire does mean something to me, but it’s not an image that I want, it’s comfort. I want to be comfortable and not feel restricted or bound up by my clothes. It’s a little immature perhaps, but it’s something that matters to me and it’s something I ask on every phone interview. I am not against a company that requires a tie to be worn, but I’m not working there.

    I’ve seen people work with clients, present on stage, and handle all aspects of their business wearing any sort of clothing you can imagine. From jeans and a t-shirt to three piece suits. The effectiveness of the person has never seemed to be related to the attire, and while I agree you can go too far, clean, un-torn clothing of any sort works for me.

    But I’m curious about the rest of you. How much does attire matter in your business?

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    Everyday Jones

    The podcast feeds are now available atsqlservercentral.mevio.com to get better bandwidth and maybe a little more exposure :). Comments are definitely appreciated and wanted, and you can get feeds from there.

    Overall RSS Feed:  or now on iTunes! 

    Today’s podcast features music by Everyday Jones. No relation, but I stumbled on to them and really like the music. Support this great duo at www.everydayjones.com.

  • Three Trips

    I’m down to three trips, with most of my busy month behind me. It’s been a hard year at times, easy at others. This month I was in Vegas, LA, Atlanta, Charlotte, and Charleston, with one more trip to Vegas next week. The travel is hard, and in addition to wearing on me mentally, it compresses the rest of my time at work. That adds some stress, which bleeds over into family life for me. Some people separate well; I don’t.

    That’s OK, Despite the hard travel, I’ve enjoyed seeing so many people I know and meeting new ones. Across the 11 talks I gave this month, I enjoyed them all. I met at least one new person at each, if not more, and had some great conversations.

    Three trips left.

    The next one is SQL Intersection in Las Vegas, which will be a fun trip as my wife is coming along. Then it’s Portland for a SQL in the City seminar and a SQL Saturday in November, and a repeat in Washington D.C. in December.

    Plus vacation. I desperately need to take time off. Both for mental health, and because I’ve accumulated too much that needs to be used before the end of the year. After searching out a bit of balance last year, I didn’t do a good job this year, and need to pay more attention to things. I love my job, and I enjoy going to work, but the last month+ has been hard.

    I’m just making a note here, partly to remind you to take your own time off from work, but also to warn you I might be gone in Nov/Dec a bit from work.

     

     

  • Up Your Value

    This editorial was originally published on Mar 5, 2009. It is being re-run as Steve is on vacation.

    I have a presentation that I give to a number of user groups on how to better brand yourself in these modern times. It’s based on my experiences over the last decade as I’ve grown my brand and been successful doing so based on the number of jobs I’ve been offered. I’ve drawn upon a lot of my experiences, as well as conversations I’ve had with others about what’s worked for them as well as what hasn’t.

    I noticed that I’m not the only person thinking about this and read a great blog by Kendal Van Dyke on Showing Your Value that covers some similar ideas. He talks about showing your value to your employer, which is something that I bring up in my presentation, and I think is important in these turbulent times.

    I’m not sure what the outlook is for DBAs and developers in 2009. I keep seeing information that shows things are going well for IT employees interspaced with all the announcements of cost-cutting and layoffs. I’ve talked with people that have a number of open positions and are hiring. I’ve talked to some that are reducing staff through attrition and have no plans to lay people off, and I’ve talked with people that have been told their company will downsize. I think it really depends on your company’s particular situation, and you should try to learn as much as you can about that.

    Regardless of whether you need to look for a job or not, I do think that it pays to look for ways to bring value to your employer, and your own career as well. And I think that you should document those things. You should know what you’ve accomplished over the last xxx months and be ready to bring that to the attention of your management during review time.

    Part of being a professional, in my opinion, is helping others do their jobs better. It might be passing along knowledge, it might be making a suggestion or giving someone a tool they can use, it might be changing the way you do something to save resources. These are things you can just do in a humble way, as a part of your daily work. I know many people are uncomfortable with being in the spotlight and bringing attention to themselves and that’s fine.

    However in our busy lives, with so much happening in our careers, it’s easy for your boss to forget how much you’ve done to help out him and/or the company. Keeping a record of these things, and bringing them to his attention is a good idea. It’s important for you to ensure you are managing your career and not letting it drag you along.

    And if you don’t have any way of showing your value, perhaps you ought to think about that as well.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    Everyday Jones

    The podcast feeds are now available atsqlservercentral.mevio.com to get better bandwidth and maybe a little more exposure :). Comments are definitely appreciated and wanted, and you can get feeds from there.

    Overall RSS Feed:  or now on iTunes! 

    Today’s podcast features music by Everyday Jones. No relation, but I stumbled on to them and really like the music. Support this great duo at www.everydayjones.com.