Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

  • When Are Your Breaks?

    As I work through 2024, I found myself doing a little more vacation planning this year than in previous ones. In 2022 I traveled quite a bit, but my wife went with me often. We went to Europe 5 times that year and added quite a few vacation days around my work trips. My wife thought that was a great year.

    Last year, 2023, was different. I traveled more (36 trips), with most of them being short. When I traveled that much, I wanted to end trips quickly and get back home. I learned that was too many, and also too disruptive for life. I got behind on things I needed to do at home, my wife went with me less because many trips were all work, and I lacked energy from the pace of moving all over the world.

    As a result, my boss and I are more closely watching my travel schedule, and I’m consciously working to ensure I take some breaks between trips. Part of that is doing some planning. So far this has me reducing the number of trips (10 in H1), but also including 3 good-sized vacations away from work during that time.

    Note: don’t feel too sorry for my travel load. I’ll get a holiday each in the US, Europe, and Australia.

    I know a lot of people like to schedule their vacations at similar times each year. The end-of-year holidays are often a time when many people travel, but I know some people who take time every June, others every August, often corresponding with school breaks for children, family reunions, or some other event.

    When do you like to take your vacation? Are you a many-long-weekends-through-the-year person? Do you go on one long trip a year? Love holidays to get away or stay home and work because work is quiet?

    I don’t know if it matters, but I’m always interested in what others do and why. I prefer more, shorter vacations, but convince me why your long trip is better. Tell me the amazing things/places you’ve done/seen. Maybe I’ll get some ideas for a future trip.

    Steve Jones

    Listen to the podcast at Libsyn, Spotify, or iTunes.

  • A New Word: the Wends

    the wends– n. the frustration that you’re not enjoying an experience as much as you should, which prompts you to try plugging in various through combinations to trigger anything more intense than roaring static, as if your heart had been inadvertently demagnetized by a surge of expectations.

    That is quite a definition. I don’t know if I experience the wends often, or not to that extent, but I do sometimes look at an experience that everyone around me seems to be enjoying. Or many people I know are enjoying.

    And I’m not. Or not much.

    Sometimes this is music, where lots of people like something I don’t. Maybe it’s a place or experience.

    Maybe it’s me.

    I try to step back and think about what other people see, or why they like it. Maybe that is the wends.

    From the Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows

  • Manually Updating Redgate Monitor/SQL Monitor Patch Info

    This post looks at updating the patch information for SQL Monitor/Redgate Monitor without using the automated process. I have other posts on SQL Monitor as well.

    I heard from a customer recently that saw on their SQL Monitor (soon to be Redgate Monitor) Estate screen that the latest patch for SQL Server 2019 was CU24. I knew that was wrong because I’d updated my build list with CU25. On monitor.red-gate.com we show the same thing.

    2024-03-25 13_28_12-Installed versions — Mozilla Firefox

    I suspected that their web server wasn’t updating for some reason, which is possible. We have plenty of customers that wall off their SQL Monitor install from the public Internet, and they have to manually update the system.

    Getting the data

    We store this info in a JSON file that the web server downloads, but you can download it yourself at: https://assets.red-gate.com/products/dba/sql-monitor/assets/files/SqlServerVersions.json?_ga=2.168000097.1575041045.1711384591-1774306502.1648754310

    If you look at the file, you see that there are versions, levels, etc., and in the SQL 2019 area, there is a CU25.

    Once you have this, you drop this on your SQL Monitor web server. The location is: C:\ProgramData\Red Gate\SQL Monitor\SqlServerVersions.json. You can replace the contents of that file with this one.

    SQL Monitor will re-read the file within 6 hours, or if you restart the server, it will re-read the file.

    That’s it. If your system doesn’t have internet access, you can still get up to date info. FWIW, this is documented at the bottom of this page: https://documentation.red-gate.com/sm13/sql-server-versioning-and-patching-195789945.html

    SQL Monitor is a top-notch system for monitoring your SQL Server and PostgreSQL estates. Oracle and MySQL coming soon. If you haven’t tried it, download an eval and give it a go or play with the demo system at monitor.red-gate.com.

  • The Code Freeze

    One of the ideas behind DevOps is that we minimize the time between code commit and deployment to production. We want to avoid work-in-progress and bottlenecks to getting our software into the hands of customers. This has led a lot of companies to release more often, albeit with smaller sets of features. The total number of things delivered under DevOps might not be greater, but it often is more targeted to those things our customers want/need/use.

    However, the idea of releasing often means that we try not to stack up too much work before deploying it. What does that mean for holidays and the code freezes or no-deploy periods that many companies have? How do you implement a code freeze under DevOps?

    I read an interesting series on code freezes (partially paid content: part 1, part 2, part 3), and it looks at some of the implementations, data from surveys, and pros/cons of implementing a code freeze.

    Two things here. First, I like code freezes as it gives staff a break. Two, doing this in a way that doesn’t just shift work (and stress) is hard. Do you have code freezes or deployment restrictions at your company? Do you like them?

    The post has lots of metrics from various companies, some known, some anonymous. It seems that for those companies using code freezes, they help employees take a break, but not everyone takes a break, which means some work is done and merges after the code freeze are problematic. For those who don’t mandate a code freeze, less work is done when people are gone, but some work continues and is released.

    I think the natural flow of work is that when fewer people are available, less work gets done. Poor management (or a hero complex) might overload the staff still working, but that doesn’t work long term. It might work now, given there is an oversupply of tech people and fewer jobs, but when things change, people will leave those positions, and lower quality, or at least less knowledgeable people, will cause problems for those firms.

    I’m not a fan of code freezes, but I am a fan of understanding that staff needs a break. Lots of people want to take time off during holidays, especially those with children who want to celebrate or travel. Others might be fine working and want to catch up on work, refactor things, or maybe address tech debt. I’ve been in both situations, and I hope organizations can adapt to both situations, though without sacrificing quality. We still need good code review and testing, and if there isn’t the staff to do those things, then delay merging code.

    The one thing that stood out to me was the learning that changing the pace is good for humans. If you’re in the habit of releasing every week (or day or whatever), moving to a different cadence for some time is good for you. Just as high-pressure work can’t be sustained for a long time, very slow periods aren’t good. However, both have their places as a change of pace. A high-pressure situation might be necessary to meet a business goal (or solve a problem). A low-pressure time might be a good time to think, experiment, and perhaps innovate.

    Or just fix and refactor some poorly designed technical debt.

    Do you want a time when you aren’t trying to get code to production, either as a dev or operations person? Or do you like to have your job predictable and work in the same pattern year-round? Let me know today.

    Steve Jones

    Listen to the podcast at Libsyn, Spotify, or iTunes.