Voice of the DBA

Category: Editorial

  • Software Maturity with Release Management

    For most of my career, releasing new versions of software that I or others had written consisted of manually running scripts or copying files, maybe using an installer once in awhile, but that was rare. In many cases, the process of actually deploying the software involved a developer sitting with an operational person, especially if the operational person had been burned by previous deployments that were poorly executed. Once burned, you usually require the person building the scripts to be available when they are run.

    That’s a poor way of managing the release of software. We write code to allow computers to repeat the instructions we’ve given them over and over. Computers are good at that, and they don’t make mistakes the third or fifth or hundredth time they execute the instructions. We might not give them the correct instructions, but computers don’t make mistakes and do execute what we code. If we find mistakes, we fix them and let the computer then execute them again.

    However it seems that for many individuals that release software, they want to do it manually. Especially when the release is to just one machine (or database) inside their organization. And time and time again, I find that these people spend time building scripts, correcting them, and still finding mistakes it production deployments that they need to fix. Often these fixes are made on the fly, with no testing.

    There’s a good mantra in software that if something is painful, do it more often. Make it easier with automation and execute it multiple times. Learn to code it better. There’s a whole industry that has grown up to help you release software more often, multiple times, and in a controlled manner. These are release management (RM) tools like Octopus Deploy and TFS Release Management. I’ve been using both of these internally, and I couldn’t imagine not using an RM tool at any point in the future. It should be easy to deploy software from one machine to another, and the process should be repeatable. That’s a sign of mature software development.

    If you’re not using a RM tool, I’d urge you to check one out. Most let you get started for free, and a small Proof of Concept (POC) project is the way to get started. Once you learn the ins and outs of how you really deploy software, you will never want to do it manually again.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcast

    Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 2.7MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and LibSyn.

  • The Proliferation of Roles

    The best practice guidance for SQL Server security is to use roles for permissions, instead of granting rights to users. I’ve always followed this guidance in my career. I’ve learned that if one person needs access, sooner or later someone else will. Even if it’s an automated process, I’ll use a role so that I can build a test login to ensure I’ve configured things correctly.

    In small companies, or in relatively static applications, this makes perfect sense and few people argue with the rule. That is, until they get some requirement that only one account will ever be used. Then they want to just grant rights to a user. After all, why add the role for one person. See my thought above. Sooner or later, someone else will want access.

    However I also have had people complain that if each new required position or process needs their own role, sooner or later we’ll have this proliferation of dozens of roles.

    True.

    I worked in a large Fortune 100 company and we had thousands of groups in our AD forest, and easily dozens of roles in many databases. While that might seem complex and confusing, it wasn’t bad. We named roles to match AD groups or job functions, and adding in new users was simple as we usually mapped them to the same roles as a previous user. If a new system or person needs access, usually their access is the same as some other account.

    However, I know they can be complex, so I’m wondering if you have any tips, tricks, hints, or even gotchas for using roles. I’d also be curious if you think there are cases where roles don’t make sense.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcast

    Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 2.2MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and LibSyn.

  • Solving Tempdb Issues

    While reading Remus Rusanu’s piece on SQL Server 2016 development, there was an item that struck me. There’s a part of the piece where he notes that an engineer at Microsoft realized that there was a tempdb issue with Azure SQL Database. To solve it, a failover was needed, which could be problematic. The basic issue was that tempdb files were sized unequally, discovered after “months of investigation.”

    Now, on one hand this seems silly. After all, we’ve known since SQL Server 2005 that the guidance was for all files to be sized the same. Shouldn’t engineers at Microsoft be following all the practices  known for optimizing SQL Server performance? I think all Microsoft people should follow this, especially those working on other products (*cough* Sharepoint *cough*), but at the very least SQL Server engineers should have a huge list, perhaps with PBM or unit tests, that warn about non-compliance.

    On the other hand, since we’ve known this is an issue since SQL Server 2005, why does SQL Server allow this? I’d think some simple tooling and a few checks in code could eliminate this as an issue in any new install. Catch the issue during upgrades and grow (or shrink) files to be the same size, or at least warn the administrator. I know there are situations where you need to add a new file in an emergency, but shouldn’t this be an item we push administrators to correct quickly after the emergency is past? Or at least force them to consciously make an exception.

    There are plenty of limitations and restrictions in SQL Server systems that Microsoft forces on us. We have limits on where new features can be used, various historical limits on function parameters, and more. Why not also just enforce limits that prevent issues like this? I’m sure people will complain, but wouldn’t those complaints be outweighed by less issues overall from all customers?

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcast

    Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 2.3MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and LibSyn.

  • Use Tools

    This editorial was originally published on May 23, 2012. It is being re-run as Steve is out of town.

    As someone that works with Information Technology, I usually work on applications designed to make work easier. For example, we have accounting systems that ease the handling of debits and credits, they detect mistakes in data entry, and in general require less people to handle the accounting needs of many firms. Do we have less accountants?

    I suppose we might have less, but it seems that the finance departments, handling AP and AR in many companies is as large as I remember from my younger days. Perhaps the department is smaller than it might otherwise be, but it’s usually not small.

    In IT, we have all kinds of tools available to us that can help with our jobs. What’s more, we can create new tools as needed to do our jobs. Powershell or Perl scripting, Codeplex projects, and more are available to most of us to help us better manage systems. In SQL Server, we even have a built in framework, Policy Based Management, that helps us prevent changes or problematic configurations. If you find a third party tool that can help, you can make a case for its purchase, using the time savings translated to actual costs. One of those tools might really make your job more enjoyable..

    In theory, we ought to be able to manage many more systems per person than we used to. Does that many that we need less people? Perhaps, but it seems we grow systems fast enough that we still need to hire more staff in many environments.

    I so often see people working in IT fail to take advantage of all the tools we have to automate much of their jobs. They often tell me if they automate too much of their jobs, they won’t be needed and may get let go. Personally I think that’s an excuse not to exercise your skills, challenge your mind, and get rid of tedious work There’s no shortage of work to be done in most companies. If that’s true, why not use your tools to get rid of the tedious work and spend your time on something more interesting?

    Steve Jones