Well, not everywhere, but as long as Prometric sites meet some security requirements, they can offer the MCM tests. I got a note from Joe Sack after someone asked me the question about when the MCM would be offered outside the US. From what he sent me, it’s in these countries:
And the US, where I took my exam.
Check with Prometric in your area to see if there’s a site near you.
The SQL Server Connections spring conference is coming up in a few weeks in Orlando, FL. This is a part of the DevConnections multi-technology conference and this event is the chance to get some great SQL knowledge and inspiration from experts in a fantastic location. Once again SQLServerCentral is sponsoring a track at the conference; Brad McGehee and myself will be down there, looking forward to meeting a few of you.
I think that conferences are a great way to take a break from work, recharge, and get some excitement back in your job. The speakers at these events teach me about SQL Server, and inspire me to come back and try some new feature or technique in my own environment. I might get the solution to a problem, and usually find that the work is just a little more fun when I return. To me, that’s an ROI that’s hard to argue against .
DevConnections puts on a great conference event, recognizing that while people want to come learn, they also want to do it in a nice location. This event is in Orlando, with great weather, at a place you can bring your family for a mini-vacation before or after the event. There’s no shortage of things to do in Florida, and it’s a relatively inexpensive place to visit. The conference hotel even offers complimentary transportation to many popular attractions. Who knows, we might even end up sitting by the pool and talking high availability or Resource Governor in the late afternoons. That’s more interesting to me than discussing things in a conference hallway.
So many people are hybrid IT workers, using more than one technology, and this conference reflects that. The last time I went to a DevConnections event, I attended mostly SQL Server sessions, but did manage to see an ASP.NET session and a couple Sharepoint presentations. Becoming more rounded in my IT knowledge has paid off for me in the past, and the DevConnection events give you the chance to grow skills in a variety of areas.
Hopefully I’ll meet a few of you at SQL Server Connections this spring and share a few drinks while we talk about SQL Server. I should be easy to find in the Hawaiian shirt and cowboy hat.
Steve Jones
Save $200 with the “DevCon1” code when you register.
I hate those puzzle type interview questions. I am sure that they show some level of aptitude about something, but I’m not typically a puzzle person. I’m a let’s solve this person, and I rarely figure out the answers.
Someone send me this interview text, which supposes that someone tried one of those questions on Nobel Prize winner Richard Feynman. It’s rather humorous.
Note that I wouldn’t recommend this. Likely your application would be scrapped by the second or third answer you gave to this.
There’s a lot of talk and press around NoSQL databases, which are a class of systems that are different from relational databases (RDBMS). Most of us are familiar with the competitive RDBMS’s to SQL Server; systems like Oracle, DB/2, MySQL, PostgreSQL, and a few more. NoSQL systems are less well known, going by names like Cassandra, MongoDB, and the best known system used by Google, BigTable.
It seems there are a lot of ranting and raving about which system is better, and even some comparisons that look at performance in different ways that we use systems. I found a SQL Server v MongoDB comparison recently. It seems to show that SQL Server lags way behind MongoDB in terms of simple insert, update, and select operations. I’m not sure it’s the best real world test, but it shows some interesting results.
Those comparisons are important, but ultimately we do a lot more than simply insert rows and select from basic small sets of data in many of our applications. I see many systems making use of complex queries with aggregations, multi-table joins, and complex sorting operations. These might work well in a NoSQL system, but they also might not. Who knows how well complex business transactions and reports will perform on these platforms. Someone will have to try and see if these systems can handle those needs.
NoSQL is worth examining further and learning about. I would not be surprised to see some of the features, such as easier scale-out, coming to SQL Server in the next few years. However I’m certainly not ready to view NoSQL systems as any type of evolution of the RDBMS. I think it’s much more likely that NoSQL systems solve a certain domain of problems better than a row-oriented RDBMS, much like column-oriented databases seem to be much more efficient at working with some types of data warehouses.
Steve Jones
BTW, if you want to listen to a little NoSQL humor, check out this video. It’s Not Safe For Work (NSFW), so be sure that you have a properly configured “cone of silence” so as not to offend others.
