We’ve finally implemented a blog syndication process here at SQLServerCentral that allows us to pull in posts each night from other blogs. The idea is that we’ll allow some syndication from other blogs and sources.
As a test, I’m pulling in this post and I’ll be contacting a few others selectively who keep other blogs and we are looking to give them other exposure.
Or spouses in general, to be fair to all. I saw this piece that commented on long work hours and that spouses withholding attention, love, whatever, might help to reign in those crazy work hours.
I guess it depends and I know that finding a balance between home life and work is a hard thing to do, and it’s a very personal thing. You have to really work at it and make those tradeoffs that work for your family. I know that executives are sometimes in a different situation than most of the rest of us, but it does seem that with people in technology, there is this tendency to work any and all hours, treating many situations as a crisis that has to be resolved immediately.
I know it’s not just technology, doctors, lawyers, and other professions seem to attract and require long hours for success. Starting young, with no family, it’s easy to get sucked into long hours, trying to “outwork” the next guy and get ahead, get more experience, show that you are a great employee. And with that build up a good salary, get yourself set for life. I know I’ve often seen younger people try to get ahead at the expense of those with families because they’re willing to work more.
Perhaps that’s just the nature of the beast, and I know that we do need people like that. Those that work the extra hours, that spend more time on problems, are more devoted, are often the ones that really can drive a business forward.
But lots of people contribute to success and can make a difference. Not always with long hours. There are lots of people that put family and downtime at a higher priority than work and their careers. Not that they are less professional, or that they are less valuable, but they have their own agendas and their own lives to live. A good manager, a good leader, will work with those people’s strengths and use them to the best advantage of the company without requiring them to work crazy hours and be connected all the time. Something that would likely drive them away.
Most professionals will stay late, pull the all-nighter, really help out when it’s needed in a crisis. Just don’t ask them to do it everyday.
Steve Jones
According to Jesper Johansson, senior security program manager at Microsoft, the security industry is giving out the wrong advice by forbidding people to write down their passwords. Strong passwords are impossible to remember and lead to people picking easy passwords or using the same password across all the systems that they access.
And using the same password across all systems us poor security. I tend to agree with that in most cases because if one system is compromised then all of them are. However, for the administrators, it’s problematic if all systems have different passwords. Then the cost (in time) of administering these systems goes up. I admit that in most of my jobs I’ve used the same sa password on all servers and the same administrator password on all systems. The caveat is that we change those passwords often, usually every 30 days and always when an administrator leaves. While a security breach would leave all systems vulnerable, the window of opportunity is fairly small.
Bruce Schneier says that it’s impossible to remember strong passwords. And now password cracking programs are hip to the 3 for e and 0 for o replacements (and others). Plus with distributed cracking programs and cheap hardware, it takes less and less time to crack passwords for anyone that truly wants to get at your systems.
That’s quite a quandry for people. To me there are two problems we are trying to solve. One is protecting systems for the administrators.These are more techincally competent people and should be required to build stronger passwords. The system that I liked the best over the years was the central storage of all our administrator passwords (Windows Admin, SQL, Exchange, service accounts, etc.) in a central storage file. We used Password Safe for this on a network share accessable to administrators only. We changed the file password periodically and scripted changes of the various passwords every 30 days. Usually we’d solicit some theme and assign an administrator to change the passwords.
The other problem is how to get users to create and deal with complex passwords. Of all the suggestions that I’ve seen, I think writing them down is a good idea. Make stringent requirements, 12 characters, mixed case, numbers, etc., require changes often, but allow them to write them down. Not on sticky notes, not posted, but maybe a card that they keep in their wallet or purse. Or these days, maybe their cell phone.
Now if we could just somehow secure your cell phones. Maybe outlaw Bluetooth
Steve Jones
There’s just over a week until the SQL Saturday site goes dark and potentially we lose access to some data. While I don’t know when we will run a live SQL Saturday event again, I do know that the marketing is important.
With that in mind, I recommend the following for anyone that has run a SQL Saturday event.
I would do this 3-4 times across the next week. Most emails go unnoticed, and sending one final note will likely miss people, potentially many of them.
This might not matter, but the more preparation you can make for post 15 Jan, the better.
Voice of the DBA 