Voice of the DBA

Category: Editorial

  • The Joy of Technology

    Here's my Airplay receiver.
    Here’s my Airplay receiver.

    I ran across this piece on the joy of being a programmer, which resonated with me. I started at a programmer, at about the same age, 10 or so. I’m a little older than the author, but I’ve spent most of my life in the technology business, primarily working with SQL Server, but I’ve built software as well. I’m still building a little software, mostly for fun. I recently set up a Raspberry Pi to stream Airplay music from my idevices and created a ball shooting Lego Mindstorm robot. Granted the latter wasn’t much programming, but I’ve backed a Kickstarter project that will allow me to write some more complex code for the Legos with my kids and I’m looking forward to receiving the kit.

    Programming has been a fun hobby and career for me. Whether that’s been working in a front end language like C++ or VB, writing T-SQL that produces reports, or even scripting administrative tasks in VB Script or Powershell, it’s always a challenge. I find myself going through the same pattern of emotions over and over. Excitement as I start a project, confidence in an initial solution, frustration when things don’t work, and a smile after the burst of creativity that finds a solution. Granted, I may iterate through these emotions a few times, perhaps even spending more time struggling than solving, but it’s been an endeavor that I enjoy most of the time.

    Just like the author, I’ve had success in my career, and found technology to be a better job than many other jobs that people I’ve worked with have had. Looking at the accountants, the managers, the salespeople, and all the other workers in the various organizations I’ve been a part of, I think I’ve had one of the better jobs that exist in the world today. Physically easy work, mentally challenging, well paid, and with demand for workers. I hope you feel the same way about your technology career.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    We publish three versions of the podcast each day for you to enjoy.

  • Relying on Algorithms

    Would you trust software to drive you around?
    Would you trust software to drive you around?

    We are increasingly living in a world that is affected by software (and the data it uses). I have to admit that I’m slightly worried about this as I look at the quality of software, the bugs, the lack of effective testing. It’s not that companies don’t perform a lot of testing; many do, but it seems that many developers, and even QA people, don’t really know how to effectively test. This is especially true of testing for abnormal or unexpected situations. It there’s one area of software development that seems woefully immature, it’s testing.

    However testing isn’t the only problem. We might not like the way that software is designed, and used, to alter our world. As we become more dependent on software to accomplish tasks for us, we will run into new situations that the software may not have been designed to handle. This opinion piece on the ways in which software might alter our lives is both fascinating and scary. How do we want software to behave in unfamiliar situations? It’s not an easy question to answer, and it’s certainly not a question with a simple answer in many scenarios.

    We learn to depend on systems when they work for us. Whether in business, government, or our personal lives, when a system works, we want to use it more. However that’s not always the best long term solution. Humans adapt, and software, especially the systems using a constant stream of historical data for decisions, has flaws. More than a few of you might have encountered this type of situation with Netflix or Amazon recommendations when you have kids sharing your account.

    In some sense I think that we not only need adaptive algorithms, that we can customize over time, but we also need to understand the data that flows through the algorithms. We need ways to remove some data from consideration by the software, when we find it is removing more value than it is adding.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    We publish three versions of the podcast each day for you to enjoy.

  • The Bicentennial

    sqlsat200Tomorrow is SQL Saturday #200 in Philadelphia. I’m traveling today to the City of Brotherly Love for the event. My partner, Andy Warren, co-founder of SQLServerCentral and SQL Saturday, is also making his way there for the celebration. This is the bicentennial event, and even though it might not be the two hundredth event to actually occur, it represents an amazing success of the SQL Saturday franchise and I am thrilled to be a small part of these events that have helped train, teach, and network so many SQL Server professionals all around the world. We even had Bill Gates learn of the events at SQL Saturday #175 in Fargo just a month ago.

    When the first SQL Saturday took place in Orlando in 2007, Andy and I weren’t sure how it would survive or grow. We wondered if we’d ever see 50 total events, or even 12 occur in a single year. Five and a half years later, these events have exploded, with over 80 taking place in the last year. Under the stewardship of Karla Landrum, more SQL Server professionals are getting free training every year than they ever might have dreamed of.

    And they’re excited by the opportunities offered by these events.

    I’ve seen people drive from Jacksonville to Pensacola for an event. People come from Virginia to Ohio for a day. Plenty of other people adjust their travel plans to come a day early or stay a day late to attend a SQL Saturday. We’ve had attendees and speakers bring their spouses and children, and even sessions they could participate in. Hundreds of speakers have donated their time and money, traveled long distances to help others. We’ve had networking sessions, games, BBQs and water skiing scheduled at SQL Saturdays. Summer, fall, winter, and spring, in every month, in over 20 countries, the SQL Server community has come together to teach, learn, debate, practice, and take pride in the work we do.

    I’m proud of what we’ve done together and amazed at how often we have done it. I’m looking forward to tomorrow and all the events that will come in the future.

    Steve Jones

    PS – Putting together a SQL Saturday isn’t too hard. Some events are extremely well organized and funded, but really if you can find a venue that will allow you to use a few rooms, you’re set. Speakers will come, you can charge for lunch, and people will learn. That’s what it’s all about. Contact Karla Landrum if you want an event in your area.

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    We publish three versions of the podcast each day for you to enjoy.

  • The Speed of Azure

    We should be able to deploy a new SQL instance as easy as this.
    We should be able to deploy a new SQL instance as easy as this.

    As database administrators we seem to be slow to embrace new technologies and paradigms. There was a lack of enthhusiasm from DBAs for SANs years ago, and virtual machines more recently, at a time when many other technology professioanls were embracing these ideas. Even today there is resistance from some people, and sometimes with good reason. SQL Servers are not like other servers and have much different hardware requirements. Too often the virtual machine and storage administrators do not appreciate that SQL Servers need different architectures.

    Lately the cloud services push is seeing lots of resistance from DBAs. Various vendors and media hype the idea and potential savings, which then convince management that systems need to be moved or built in the cloud. There are some applications that fit better in the cloud, but not all of them. I certainly don’t want sensitive information in the cloud, at least until we work out some of the legalities for who owns, controls, and responds to subpoena about data.

    The applications that make sense seem to be those that are distributed with lots of paying clients. I ran across a blog that looked at some of the companies that have moved into the Azure cloud with pieces of their businesses and been quite pleased with the results. Quite a few of these are cost-scalable by clients, meaning that a new user or customer is paying some fee that makes it economical to add new databases and servers for that client. If they leave, you can shut down their server.

    It’s definitely easier to start an application in the cloud rather than move an existing one. The architecture is different from an on-premise application, and that means code changes. Not something many companies want to engage in, given the past success of such projects. However the cost savings can be significant for new projects, if those new projects involve investment in equipment, facilities, people, or some combination of all of those.

    However one of the biggest items I see mentioned why companies like cloud platforms like Azure is the speed of deployment. To me that means that the IT infrastructure people, from storage to admin to DBAs, are falling down on the job. There’s no reason we can’t deploy new machines as quickly as Azure these days.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

    We publish three versions of the podcast each day for you to enjoy.