Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

  • Patience

    Update: This is confirmed by Snopes.

    A NYC Taxi driver wrote:

    I arrived at the address and honked the horn. After waiting a few minutes I honked again. Since this was going to be my last ride of my shift I thought about just driving away, but instead I put the car in park and walked up to the door and knocked.. ‘Just a minute’, answered a frail, elderly voice. I could hear something being dragged across the floor.

    After a long pause, the door opened. A small woman in her 90’s stood before me. She was wearing a print dress and a pillbox hat with a veil pinned on it, like somebody out of a 1940’s movie.

    By her side was a small nylon suitcase. The apartment looked as if no one had lived in it for years. All the furniture was covered with sheets.

    There were no clocks on the walls, no knickknacks or utensils on the counters. In the corner was a cardboard
    box filled with photos and glassware.

    ‘Would you carry my bag out to the car?’ she said. I took the suitcase to the cab, then returned to assist the woman.

    She took my arm and we walked slowly toward the curb.

    She kept thanking me for my kindness. ‘It’s nothing’, I told her.. ‘I just try to treat my passengers the way I would want my mother to be treated.’

    ‘Oh, you’re such a good boy, she said. When we got in the cab, she gave me an address and then asked, ‘Could you drive
    through downtown?’

    ‘It’s not the shortest way,’ I answered quickly..

    ‘Oh, I don’t mind,’ she said. ‘I’m in no hurry. I’m on my way to a hospice.

    I looked in the rear-view mirror. Her eyes were glistening. ‘I don’t have any family left,’ she continued in a soft voice..’The doctor says I don’t have very long.’ I quietly reached over and shut off the meter.

    ‘What route would you like me to take?’ I asked.

    For the next two hours, we drove through the city. She showed me the building where she had once worked as an elevator operator.

    We drove through the neighborhood where she and her husband had lived when they were newlyweds She had me pull up in front of a furniture warehouse that had once been a ballroom where she had gone dancing as a girl.

    Sometimes she’d ask me to slow in front of a particular building or corner and would sit staring into the darkness, saying nothing.

    As the first hint of sun was creasing the horizon, she suddenly said, ‘I’m tired.Let’s go now’.
    We drove in silence to the address she had given me. It was a low building, like a small convalescent home, with a driveway that passed under a portico.

    Two orderlies came out to the cab as soon as we pulled up. They were solicitous and intent, watching her every move.
    They must have been expecting her.

    I opened the trunk and took the small suitcase to the door. The woman was already seated in a wheelchair.

    ‘How much do I owe you?’ She asked, reaching into her purse.

    ‘Nothing,’ I said

    ‘You have to make a living,’ she answered.

    ‘There are other passengers,’ I responded.

    Almost without thinking, I bent and gave her a hug.She held onto me tightly.

    ‘You gave an old woman a little moment of joy,’ she said. ‘Thank you.’

    I squeezed her hand, and then walked into the dim morning light.. Behind me, a door shut.It was the sound of the closing of a life..

    I didn’t pick up any more passengers that shift. I drove aimlessly lost in thought. For the rest of that day,I could hardly talk.What if that woman had gotten an angry driver,or one who was impatient to end his shift? What if I had refused to take the run, or had honked once, then driven away?

    On a quick review, I don’t think that I have done anything more important in my life.

    We’re conditioned to think that our lives revolve around great moments.

    But great moments often catch us unaware-beautifully wrapped in what others may consider a small one.

    ==========

    I saw this on Facebook, no attribution. I’m not sure it’s a real story, meaning true, but it’s a great one. One that makes me think about life, and how short it can be.

  • Work to Live

    Me and my son skiing
    Balancing work and life as best I can

    I’m halfway through my career, having spent about 20 years since college working in technology with another twenty to go. The rest of the community is probably spread out around me, some older, some younger. It doesn’t matter what part of your life you are in, there are a few things about work that I think always apply. The first is that we work to live, and don’t live to work. The second is I like to hope for the best, but plan for the worst.

    It’s all too common for people in this business to overwork themselves, work very long hours, and neglect the rest of their life. I have rarely seen someone that is retired or late in life complain that they didn’t work enough over their lifetime, and I’d caution you to keep that in mind as you go through life. There will always be more work, more things to do, and more requests from clients and customers. Keep a balance in your life, and remember to enjoy it along the way.

    The second part of my advice can apply in many parts of our career, but it ought to apply to our finances and our retirement. Unfortunately, I’ve seen a few articles like this one that notes many people have not funded their retirements well. We all have expenses, and it’s easy to delay the investments in our life until later, but that is a bad idea. Whether it’s your IRA/401K or your health, you’d be better off sacrificing a little today for a little more security later.

    In the US, many employers match contributions and you ought to take advantage of that. There are all sorts of options for retirement, like ROTH IRAs, that it seems many people aren’t aware of. I also meet many people that don’t realize they can borrow against their 401K as well, taking a loan whose interest goes back to your own account. There are few excuses to not plan for the future. Enjoy today, but plan to live a long time and to enjoy your retirement.

    How much money you might need depends on your lifestyle, and that’s something you should spend time thinking about and talking with your family about. Many of us may not be able to retire at 65, or count on social security, but I’d hate to have to work longer than I want to because I cannot afford to retire.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    We publish three versions of the podcast each day for you to enjoy.

  • Promoting Engineers

    CS career paths
    Do we have enough of a career path for technical people? I’m not sure we do in many companies.

    Never, ever promote your best salesperson.

    That’s the advice that Scott Horowitz got from his father. He talks a little about how this relates to technical people who find themselves looking at management to further their careers, or are sometimes even get promoted just because they’re the strongest technical employee in a group. Mr. Horowitz sees the transition as one that rarely works well, though he has some good advice on how you can increase the likelihood of success.

    In my career I’ve moved to management a few times and back again to a technical role, though never at the same company. I am sure it would be a strange move to be in charge and then move back to a contributing employee, but I do know some other people that have done it successfully in their careers. I have enjoyed both roles, and at different times in my career, the different role has fit me better.

    Many companies struggle with their technical people as they advance in their careers. Few companies think ahead and build dual career tracks in both the technical and managerial areas for their staff. As a result, many technical people find their career stalled in a company and may look to leave for another position. Setting aside a technical track that allows an employee to advance as a strong technical worker, and continue to grow their challenges and salary seems like a no-brainer, but it’s something rarely implemented outside of technology-oriented companies.

    Perhaps senior technical people can’t continue to add the same value as a manager or director in an organization. There are definitely lots of technical people that have a lot of seniority in a company, but do not necessarily bring a lot of additional value for all their experience. However some do, and those are often the people that a company should not let go. If they continue to grow their knowledge, and add more value, there ought to be a career advancement track for them in the technical area.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    We publish three versions of the podcast each day for you to enjoy.

  • Creating a Sequence in SQL Server 2012

    Sequences are a new object in SQL Server 2012 that generate just what the name implies: a sequence of numbers.

    To create a sequence, you use standard DDL with the CREATE SEQUENCE command. This command takes a type, a starting value, a min, max, and a few other parameters. You can read about the meanings of the parameters in Books Online, and learn how to use the parameters.

    When I first head about sequences, I thought this was neat, but not terribly useful. The idea of a custom sequence seems more like an edge case. However the more I’ve looked at them, the more it starts to make some sense.

    Let’s look at a real world example where we use a sequence since we often use these as a basis for some computer algorithm. Suppose I have a group of kids and I need to assign them to groups. In the real world, we line up the kids and we have them count off to some number. It’s often “1”, “2”, “1”, “2”, but it could be something else. In a youth group a few years ago, we counted off into 5 groups to divide the kids up.

    In this case, suppose I have kids and I want to get them into these groups:

    sequence1

    In order to get that in T-SQL, it can be cumbersome, especially if there isn’t a data point that cycles things, but rather a set counter. Here I can create a simple sequence:

    create sequence RoundRobin
 Start with 1
 increment by 1
  minvalue 1
  maxvalue 3
 cycle
;

    I have 10 rows in my table, being the list of kids:

    create table Kids
( Kid varchar(10)
)
go
insert Kids
 values
  ('Emma')
, ('Tabitha')
, ('Kendall')
, ('Delaney')
, ('Kyle')
, ('Jessica')
, ('Josh')
, ('Kirsten')
, ('Amanda')
, ('Jimmy')
;
go

    To integrate the sequence, I do this:

    select
  'Group' = next value for dbo.RoundRobin
, Kid
 from Kids
;

    That returns the results above.

    It’s not necessarily a common solution, but there might be places where you want custom counters, perhaps counting by a certain value. Suppose you want to alternate counters among two different people in a table. An identity doesn’t allow this, but you could set up two sequences, say one for even numbers, and one for odd numbers, and let each person use the appropriate sequence for inserts.

    Sequences are simple, but they can be useful in some cases. I’ll write a bit more about a few gotchas I’ve run into with sequences soon.