Voice of the DBA

Category: Editorial

  • Time Off

    snowboarding
    I am looking forward to some time off this winter on the slopes.

    As a US citizen, I’m lucky to work for a UK company. I get a generous allotment of vacation, and desperately try to use it all each year. I haven’t been successful yet, but I’m getting closer. If we could only get a little more snow at the beginning and end of the season…..

    Last year a friend told me that they lost 6 days of vacation. Over a few years this person had accumulated extra vacation by basically working too hard and when the year ended, some of their vacation was lost because of carryover limits. This person vowed to change this year and use all their vacation, but with a busy job at a small company I’m not sure that will come true. Unfortunately, I’ve all too often seen this same behavior from many people in IT.

    This piece shows that all too often people are not taking their vacation, or they’re not taking it as a complete break from work. I’ve been in both situations, and over time I’ve learned that I’m not being more productive in either case. I’m unbalanced, and over time I become less productive. That’s especially true if I’m doing creative work, like writing, or developing code.

    There’s no shortage of poor managers out there, and there are plenty of them that will work you as hard as you allow. I don’t have any great solutions for dealing with them other than scheduling vacation every year, insisting you get to take it, limiting contact with work, and if all else fails, looking for another job.

    Life is short, too short to spend more of it as work than you have to. Take advantage of your vacation to relax and recharge, even if it’s a stay-cation at home. Getting away from work is not only important, it’s something you owe to yourself and your family.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

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

  • The Influence of the Cloud

    influence
    What influence will the cloud have on your career?

    To those of us working in technology, it seems that the only constant is change. Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 were just released as their RTM, and we had new versions of SQL Server andSharepoint this year. Those technologies bring with them the need requirement that many of us upgrade our skills to work with new features over time. It’s not that most of us need to learn to work with those versions right now, but the pace of upgrades continues to roll on, whether you are looking to move to the latest version or one that’s slightly older.

    As much as new features and capabilities are a part of version, it seems that the hype and promotion of different technologies can play as much a part in the decision to upgrade as the technical merits of any change. It seems no shortage of management is influenced by the reporting in the media and conversations with other executives about some new technology.

    The “cloud” is a perfect example of this. It’s in the news constantly, being promoted by many companies, despite the fact that the label is being applied to a mix of IaaS, PaaS, SaaS and everything in between. The Friday, I wanted to take a quick poll of how this amorphous beast might be influencing your career.

    Do you think you’ll work more with the cloud over the next year?

    Define the cloud however you wish, but let us know. Do you think you’ll see more cloud services used, deployments to the cloud, perhaps even some databases in the cloud? Let us know if the cloud is influencing your job or if it’s just another fad you are hoping will fade away.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

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

  • Marketing Data is Exploding

    GM Customer Service Facebook Cnoversation
    It would be nice to have this be the norm rather than the exception with customer service.

    The last few years have seen the rise, and explosion, of social media. While fundamentally social media isn’t introducing much that’s different from actions in the real world, it is making the reach and speed at which we can communicate grow exponentially. Facebook will surpass a billion users soon and Twitter has exploded in the world. Even in the tiny SQL world, Twitter use has grown exponentially in the few years since I’ve used it. It you’re unsure of what’s happening there with regards to SQL Server, search the #sqlhelp hash tag and see what you find out.

    All kinds of companies are starting to try and integrate this data into their systems. If you haven’t yet, I suspect you might have to some time in the next few years. There’s a short piece in how this data is in use at GM, and it’s interesting to read. I don’t know how seriously other companies take this, but I do see so many people “following the herd” and as more managers read about other managers implementing projects like this one, we’ll see more adoption.

    What’s interesting here is that it gives us data professionals a number of new opportunities. From the sheer OLTP-type work of collecting and managing this data in real-time, or near real-time, to the need to add BI analysis to trends of data. I can see a lot of new projects, and new employment in this area. It wouldn’t hurt to beef up your skills in this area, and maybe get a better understanding of how social media can work, as well as how you can manage the data.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

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

  • Learning C

    Head First C
    I think C is important to teach the basics of programming.

    Someone else gets it. Besides me, I mean. We should be teaching people the C programming language. An interview with David Griffiths, author of Head First C, says that learning C is a good idea. I concur, and I stand by my statement.

    It’s not that I think everyone should be a C expert, but I’d like to see more programmers spend 5 months, a semester, early in their programming careers. If you’ve written your own iOS app, this would be a piece of cake. If you’re a Python guru, it would broaden your horizons. Getting closer to hardware helps you write code in a more thoughtful way.

    I’d like to see a C programming course as a semester requirement for quite a few fields that might need to develop programs. Not only computer science majors, but also scientists that might need to deal with building their own algorithms. In the same vein, perhaps it’s worth a SQL class for everyone to better understand how to work with sets of data. A query class could also include some of the other query languages, perhaps MDX and XQuery would make sense as well.

    I know this sounds like busy work, but as we become more and more dependent on data and scripting for all sorts of jobs I think it makes sense to start setting a baseline of expected skill for knowledge workers. Those people that knew programming could potentially pass a C test,  and they would be exempt. As we evolve into the future, especially as we may move to more vocational type training, I think it would be good to still require some basics of people as they begin their journey to working with code and computers.

    Steve Jones

    The Voice of the DBA Podcasts

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