Voice of the DBA

Category: Editorial

  • Thank a Mentor

    “The delicate balance of mentoring someone is not creating them in your own image, but giving them the opportunity to create themselves.” — Steven Spielberg

    I saw that quote posted on Twitter with the request that people tag a mentor that had helped them. Since then, a few people have posted their thanks to someone, and I’ve been tagged a few times. I’m honored that people think I’ve helped them somehow, as that’s been a portion of my career for the last twenty years. I make an effort to do help others have a great career and become better at their jobs.

    I’m not looking for lots of people to post anything about their mentors here or thank me. Instead, I am asking that you stop and thank someone that has helped you in your career.  Let them know they made a difference and how they did so. It’s good for them and for you.

    We all need help, support, and encouragement at times to help us move forward. We can all use someone that can give us an independent view of our decisions, our choices, and more. Their thoughts and observations help us keep perspective on the way forward that best suits us. Certainly, I know I need the perspective, as well as  the advice from others.

    There have been many people who have influenced my life, but two that have made a huge difference in my career are my wife and my former business partner. Those are people I’ve talked with nearly every week for the last twenty years and who have influenced me more than anyone or anything else in my life.

    Life can be challenging at many times and finding the right path forward for ourselves can seem uncertain. A mentor can be an advisor, confidant, cheerleader, and support system. When you find someone(s) that meets those needs for you, treasure them and be sure to thank them for impacting your life.

    Steve Jones

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

  • To Inifinity and Beyond With 1=1

    There is one thing that Aaron Bertrand won’t get mad at me for doing and that’s creating an infinite loop with a WHILE (1=1) pattern. He wrote about this recently in a tip, noting that it’s easy to create an infinite loop with code like this, something that never ends well.

    I have purposefully written infinite loops in the past. A long, long time ago Radio Shack would put out TRS-80s on display, and a few of us would type a quick BASIC program to perform some math work on the screen over and over with an infinite loop. It crashed at some point with an overflow, but for a period of time, it would look neat on the screen. Less neat to the salespeople who weren’t always sure how to stop it and demonstrate something else without resetting the machine.

    I’ve also created infinite loops by accident at various jobs. Those experiences have left me a little concerned about any loop that doesn’t have a defined time to end. I usually use a technique similar to Aaron, ensuring the loop ends. If needed, I add a call that can repeat the entire process if more data needs to be updated after the current loop ends.

    There are plenty of people who spotted the error in the code and think they wouldn’t create that problem in their looping code. However, I think few of us work alone on code for an employer, across time. Often someone else comes in to refactor or “improve” our code. The next person that adjusts this loop might join back to the main table and not realize they are creating an infinite loop. You’d hope they’d test this and find the problem, but I continue to see lots of “little fixes” deployed without being tested.

    This is one reason I want a DevOps style process for database code, complete with automated testing. If you write a piece of code, you are responsible for including a test in the pull request so that the CI system can verify your code passes the test. This isn’t a perfect system and it might not prevent all bugs, but at least a test will exist and someone can then check both the code and test and perhaps use the issue as a teaching moment.

    We try and avoid loops in SQL Server, but that isn’t always possible. As with most techniques in programming, we should strive to learn the best ways to use them, know the weaknesses, and avoid building code that has major flaws now. Maybe we also ought to add that we should ensure our code doesn’t lead less experienced developers in the future to make simple mistakes. I’d say the 1=1 looping code does this, and I agree with Aaron; it should be avoided.

    Steve Jones

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

  • Poor Work Management

    The future of how we will work is uncertain. Every time I read something or talk to someone, I hear different thoughts and experiences, which influence how I feel. Actually, I’m not sure how I feel. Some companies are pushing back their office openings (Google, Microsoft) to a future time, while others are bringing people back part or full time. I had lunch with some friends working at a financial institution, and they are allowed to work at home a day or two a week, but otherwise, they’re in the office every week. I know some other people that are back in the office five days a week.

    There are mixed feelings among many people. While I don’t know many technology people that want to be in the office every day, some do want the option to go periodically to the office. Depending on your commute, you might feel differently, as there are plenty of data pros that want to remain at home full time. Both groups, however, feel that we can be effective at our jobs while working remotely.

    Not all management feels thtat same way, for various reasons. I ran across this piece that speculates that poor management is more likely to fear remote work than embrace it. The example in the piece, from Cathy Merill, certainly seems to indicate this is the case. While I’ve seen some great managers, I feel many managers aren’t good at adapting to dramatic changes and struggle to change their own view of how to do their job.

    I do think culture suffers when we can’t get together in person. Hallway conversations and chats over coffee aren’t as easy remotely, and we don’t build the same bond we get in the office. Working separately at home can work, and we’ve had a lot of success at Redgate, but I also feel more separate from lots of co-workers and miss the chance to get together and catch up. The remote meetings are not the same, and scheduling a quick call is much more of an intrusion than being able to walk by someone’s desk or stop for a minute when I see them in the hall.

    Perhaps it’s the energy from being around lots of people that CEOs and other management miss. It can be invigorating and exciting when lots of people are working together towards a common goal and succeeding. Perhaps management prefers to look someone in the eye and put pressure on them for a lack of performance. That is harder to do virtually, and I know lots of managers that work through intimidation.

    There’s also the investment made in offices. Over the years I’ve seen various configurations and amenities in offices, often to encourage more work and comfort away from home. I know plenty of CEOs and leaders that feel this investment needs to be used by staff for lots of hours each week because of the cost, which seems like a poor excuse to me. That money is spent. These days I suspect more employees push back on longer hours, as they should, and find comfort at home, which might also bother management.

    This issue is complex, but I do know that whether we’re remote or in an office, we can be effective and get work done in teams. Management should know that and use it to try and build an environment that gets the most out of all their staff, whether in the office or remote.

    Steve Jones

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

  • A Great Use for AI

    In the last couple of years there has been a tremendous amount of hype for machine learning and artificial intelligence as a way to improve the world. Plenty of companies have tried to implement ML/AI to generate more revenue or improve their products, often with mixed success. However, I recently saw a place where I think AI might shine.

    I’ve never owned a Roomba or any robot vacuum, and I’ve never encountered a poopocalypse scenario. I do have a cat that is an avid hunter, so I certainly could envision something similar with a carcass in the house, but apparently, some owners of these vacuums have had a very messy experience when they pet has an accident and the robot vacuum attempts to clean the floor.

    The company has implemented a camera and AI to try and avoid this happening, as well as avoiding other obstacles. How this will actually work remains to be seen, but it’s a good place to use AI to try and detect objects that might cause issues, notify the owner, and avoid creating a mess when trying to clean one up.

    This is also a place of low impact if the AI doesn’t work perfectly. If the model can’t determine what an object is, avoid it and flag the situation. Allowing owners to provide feedback and improving the model over time is what I’d want to see, with regular improvements that might help the system tell when an object is something that could cause issues. If Roomba does a good job, they’ll use this as an opportunity to gather data and improve their products.

    AI/ML isn’t often a build it and forget it technology for systems. These technologies use models, which are inherently incomplete and don’t always match the real world well. They need a lot of training, with new data, across time to become something that works really well.

    Are they worth the effort for most systems? I don’t know. I do know that good data science is needed, lots of data for training and testing, and a set of boundaries where the system works well and where it doesn’t. I suspect we’ll see more businesses having success with AI over time, but not in all situations. I suspect older extrapolation and human judgment work just as well for lots of problems.

    Knowing when each might work more efficiently will be a challenge for years to come.

    Steve Jones

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