Voice of the DBA

Category: Editorial

  • Hacking to Hide

    It’s probably no surprise to you that the black boxes for ships are vulnerable to hacking. These are the Voyage Data Recorders (VDR) that should capture telemetry, audio recordings, and more. These devices are really computers now, connected to the onboard networks used for satellite communications and physically accessible in many vessels.

    It was surprising to hear that some of these VDRs are running Windows XP. While I get that there is some ease of development in using Window systems, that OS wasn’t what I’d call robust and stable for stressful and rugged environments. Some systems use real time OSes, which seems like a better compromise, but Linux might be the best choice for a system both tolerant to a variety of conditions as well as one that might be easy to build applications for.

    However no matter what the choice, I’d hope that the developers building software for these systems would treat them with the importance they deserve. While lives aren’t at stake from these applications, liability is. These systems are used in legal proceedings, so the data they collect, in an autonomous fashion, should be protected to ensure its integrity.

    Apparently that doesn’t happen, as there are incidents of these devices being hacked an data erased, corrupted, interrupted, or even accessed by those on the ships. That’s not surprising as it seems people always find ways to take advantage of the computer systems they physically control. Ultimately I’d hope that we might constantly transmit some of this data off the ship to ensure there are backup copies, but that brings to mind the problems of securing data in transit, preventing access or disclosure and more.

    However these systems might provide a good testbed for researchers looking to better build and architect auditing systems. This is a challenging environment, with high stakes, and if we can develop ways to ensure auditing data is intact when we have lost physical control of the device for long periods of time, perhaps we can find ways to build this same auditing into other platforms.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcast

    Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 2.4MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and LibSyn. feed

  • Surface Book

    It’s almost time for me to get a new laptop. I’ve had a Toshiba for about a year, but it’s not held up well. The screen has gotten loose, the trackpad and clickers are not consistenly responsive, the pointer device sometimes drifts on its own, and I have had a couple memory related crashes. All in all, despite a similar travel schedule to what I’ve had the last couple years, this laptop is showing its age quicker than others. These are flaky issues, not easily reproducible, and something that the warranty doesn’t seem to cover.

    As I look to future travel and talks, I realize that I need to find something that might be more reliable. That’s always tricky as it seems people have a variety of different experiences with the same model machine. This last year has made me hesitant to think about chancing a new, or unpopular brand, something I did last year in trying to find a small, lightweight machine that can handle 16GB of RAM.

    I read a review of the Surface Book after two months, which is one I’d like to consider. I’ve been impressed with the Surface Pros, but prevented from using them as I need 16GB on the machine. The Surface 4, on which the Surface Book is based, has that capacity, so I am intrigued. I worried about the new hardware, but it seems that the Surface 4s have been fairly solid. A couple of firmware glitches relating to sleep mode, but I’m hoping those get ironed out in the next couple months. At least I hope they do because I really like the idea of a Surface machine.

    I do suspect that like the reviewer, I’d mainly use the machine as a laptop. That’s what I need, and I’m not a big consumer of media. However the option to use the machine as a tablet is interesting. I had the chance to use Rob Sewell‘s Surface 3 as a notebook with a stylus during a presentation at SQL Relay and enjoyed the experience. There are some nice OneNote integrations, though I’m not sure how often I’d want to take notes on a computer rather than paper.

    However the main contender for me is probably a MacBook Pro. I loved the MacBook Air I had, and was disappointed to move away from it. I also want to do some iOS and cross platform development, which a MacBook would allow. The hardware is solid and proven, and it’s a similar cost to the Surface. I have a few months to decide. If I go MacBook, I’ll wait for the March (rumored) refresh. If I’m unsure that that time, I’ll probably think about the Surface as a backup. Either way, I’ll be in hardware search mode across the next few months, with fingers crossed that my current machine survives.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcast

    Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 3.0MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and LibSyn.

  • Happy New Year 2016

    Happy New Year from everyone here at SQLServerCentral and Redgate Software!

    I do hope you’re not working, and enjoying a start to 2016. If you do happen to read this, I hope you are relaxing and have a big smile on your face.

    This year we’ve got a new version of SQL Server coming, and I’m sure lots of exciting new technologies we’ll see released. It’s a new beginning, and a chance to move forward. With that in mind, a simple question today.

    What new technology, language, or skill do you want to improve in 2016?

    Today is a great day to make a resolution and start growing your skills, for fun or profit, in 2016.

    The Voice of the DBA Podcast

    Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 1.3MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and LibSyn.

  • The End of 2015

    I’m off on vacation, so I won’t be able to respond, but I decided to take a few minutes and look back at 2015 before leaving for the year.

    This was a year that seems to have been marked by lots of data loss and breaches. Certainly these were on my mind as I worked on the SQL in the City keynote, but as I’ve been following Troy Hunt, it seems that every week or two he’s uploading more data to HaveIBeenPwned.com. We had some larger ones, with tens or hundreds of millions of account records released. Despite all the press from the Sony hack over a year ago, it seems that few companies have bothered to update their security. In fact, it seems that until they’re hacked, no one bothers to fix fundamental security issues in their systems. Perhaps some companies are doing so in the background, and aren’t being attacked, but I’m not so sure.

    We didn’t have any SQL Server releases this year, but we had lots of news, and an unexpected Service Pack. Service Pack 3 for SQL Server 2012 appeared out of the blue for me. I hadn’t seen much news on it, and had given up on bothering Microsoft about new SPs for versions. Perhaps they’ll continue to build these yearly for supported versions, which is what I hope, but we will see. It does seem that Cumulative Updates have been appearing regularly, with relatively few issues in them, but I’m still wary of using those as the main patching mechanism for critical servers.

    We did have a lot of growth in the SQL Server space, with many features being announced and starting to take shape. If you’re looking to get up to speed, check out our collection of Learning SQL Server 2016 topics, where we try to keep a growing collection of links to help you learn.  I am excited to see some of the growth of SQL Server to include newer features that people want in their data platform. I’m also glad that things like Stretch Database can be used to help manage the ever growing amount of data we have. Of course, encryption is big on my list, and Always Encrypted is something I am hoping gets lots of adoption.

    We’ve also seen Microsoft really pushing the envelope in terms of data analysis. There is a constant set of articles and blogs written about data scientists, and some of us are moving to learn more about how to better analyze data. Microsoft continues to help, with their forays into Machine Learning, the expansion of the Power set of products (Power BI, Power Query, Power View, Power Pivot, etc.), R language integration, and more. I suspect that more and more of us will get the chance to play with some interesting data analysis tools if we want to. Even if you don’t use those to help your business, I have already seen these tools being used to perform index analysis, DBA monitoring, and more. I’d urge you to let your imagination run wild and see what things you might build.

    It does also seem that more companies are starting to realize that their data and its integrity and management are important. Data professionals are becoming more valued, but the skills required are growing. There are more and more services and tools to help us manage systems that I do think the simple DBA that administers backups and security is really on the decline. At some point, our employers will demand more.

    It’s been a good year, and I look forward to 2016. If there are things you want us to help you learn about, leave a comment here, and I’ll review them when I get back from vacation. Have a safe, Happy New Year, and I’ll see you in 2016.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcast

    Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 3.9MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and LibSyn.