Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

  • Fixing Report Visuals

    I’m not a visual designer, and I find that as I learn a bit more, many of my previous reports contain lots of silly mistakes. They’re often full of data, which I like, but which can be hard for others to follow and understand.

    I need to do better, and I do ask for help at times from friends. I also need to get a better process for evaluating if I’m doing a good job. I was thinking about that as I saw a makeover article from storytellingwithdata. It gives a short process of things to consider when building reports.

    With most of our software, we go through iterative approaches, either by ourselves, or with others, to try and build something that meets the needs or a client. Reports involve the same process, but I know that often the report process is my showing them something very raw and them asking for changes.

    What can be more time consuming is that the numbers are often the thing a client is concerned with early on. Are we calculating things correctly and including enough data. We might go back and forth quite a bit on this part of the report process.

    Once we agree, and they are happy, I think I’m done and can move on. However, often this is where they start to now care about the visual appear. The layout, colors, etc., and I am drawn into another report writing session, spending more time on something that is far, far less interesting than writing queries or other software code.

    I can see why tools like Power BI, which let the client mess with the visual design, have a lot of appeal. As a software developer, I’m out of the loop here, or more out of the loop. Let them decide they want a vertical or horizontal bar chart, or a stacked line chart. What do I care?

    I know visualization, layout, colors, etc. are important. They’re not enough of my job to care, but I do think someone needs to. I’m lucky in that my company has artists, so I can send over slides, reports, etc. and get hints about what I should change. It’s certainly something I wish I’d have had in the past at other jobs, since anything beyond a simple graph or table is well outside my wheelhouse.

    Steve Jones

  • Reimagining the Car with Electricity

    I ordered a Tesla Model Y awhile ago. I was a little anxious about the cost, but my wife calmed me down and I’m getting a little excited to have it come. Supposedly it will arrive in late Aug or early Sept. Now I need to do some garage cleanup and wiring to get ready.

    The other day I ran across this piece on Volvo’s “pure” EVs and their work on a new concept vehicle. It’s a neat idea, though without many details. Just a sketch, which looks a lot like what Tesla has done.

    To be fair, I don’t love the look of the Tesla. It’s streamlined and I’m sure low drag, but it lacks some of the visual appeal of the 911, the Corvette, or even a modern Lexus. I didn’t buy this car because it’s visually stunning. Instead, I bought it because it’s really a computer on wheels, with tech that’s well thought out and is updated in a DevOps style on a regular basis.

    I looked at a number of other electric cars. However, most of them are cars that have added batteries to them, with a lot of the rest of the car the same, and relatively little thought on how cars are changing. I also don’t trust most other manufacturers to update their software often, or well. I expect they’ll want you to visit a dealer, or they will make minor changes to correct bugs rather than introduce interesting new features, like “dog mode”. One other trick I saw recently was “Joe Mode”, which lowers the volume of alerts. My X5 does the opposite, raising volume when I raise the radio volume, which is incredibly annoying. It’s a design choice, which I hate. BMW wants to tell me how things should work often, whereas Tesla gives me more choice, at least, more choice I like.

    I’ve been watching the software for awhile. Glenn Berry has one, as well as a couple others. I’ve watched online, and I see very few issues with the software. Some, but not a lot. And they fix them. I don’t have a lot of confidence in other manufacturers that they’ll do as well, at least not initially. I saw this with my Prius. Toyota tech was way more solid on hybrids than others initially.

    I’ve been impressed in many ways with how Tesla has grown and adapted over time, truly reinventing how a car could work. I don’t love every decision, and I have no desire for a “yoke” instead of a wheel, but I do like where they are now. Ahead of other manufacturers.

    I expect this to change in a decade, but for now, I look forward to only worrying about brakes and tires, and not needing to mess with gas, oil, spark plugs, air filters, etc.

    I’m also going to start doing car updates again, with a comparison between my X5, which I could have kept, and how the Tesla compares.

  • Daily Coping 9 Jul 2021

    I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag. 

    Today’s tip is to shift your mood by doing something you really enjoy.

    It’s been a semi-quieter week this week. Coming off the holiday weekend, and with the summer time being somewhat slower, I was able to get work done without a lot of pressure on deadlines or out of band requests from other individuals.

    This week I took a break during lunch to swim. I enjoy it, and I hadn’t done much since I had COVID last year. However, with the warmer weather, and outdoor pools opening, I made it a point to get out and swim this week.

  • Daily Coping 8 Jul 2021

    I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag. 

    Today’s tip is to avoid saying must or should today.

    My wife reminds me that “should” is a cognitive trap for an individual. I try to avoid saying, or thinking that I should do things and rather look at what are real obligations or responsibilities and what are things I would like to do.

    This past weekend was a long, holiday weekend, and I had plans to handle some tasks. I worked through some, partially in most cases, but I was able to complete a task. In any case, I didn’t put myself in the place to say I should get more done, or I must get something done.

    Instead, I worked on the tasks in front of my, listening to my body, mood, and family, being satisfied with a good effort and the state of my progress.

    I had wondered if I could get three Juniper bushes cut down, but in two days, I got two done and then enjoyed another day with my family. The state of things (until this weekend).

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