Search results matching tags 'DBA' and 'Database Developer'

Presenting at SQL Saturday #46 Raleigh 18 Sep 2010!

andyleonard — Tue, 07 Sep 2010 11:00:00 GMT

I am honored to present at SQL Saturday #46 in Raleigh 18 Sep 2010!

I get to deliver two talks:

Building Your First SSIS Package (Beginner)
Database Design for Developers (Intermediate)

If you read this blog and will be attending SQL Saturday #46, introduce yourself!

:{> Andy

Draft SQLRally Pre-Conference Seminar Proposal

andyleonard — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 11:00:00 GMT

Introduction

Andy Waren (Blog | @sqlAndy), Jack Corbett (Blog | @unclebiguns), and Kendall Van Dyke (Blog | @SQLDBA) have been busy. They're working on SQLRally - a regional PASS event scheduled for May 2011 in Orlando. Andy does a good job explaining the thinking behind the event in his 31 Aug 2010 post: Positioning SQLRally in the PASS Event Universe.

Pre-Cons

Andy's 1 Sep 2010 post on the topic (SQLRally Pre-Con Selection Process – Draft for Comment) includes a draft document outlining a proposal for the pre-conference selection process. I see improvements over the current PASS Summit pre-/post-conference selection process (which I blogged about here). There's even community engagement in the mix.

The Big (Medium) Deal

I think Kendall summed it up well in this tweet:

Andy and the crew also did a good job with this table:

	Summit	SQLRally	SQLSaturday
Attendance	+3000	Max 600	Avg of 250
Price	$995 – $1995	$299	Free
Duration	3 Days	2 Days	1 Day
Sessions/Tracks	160+	40-48	12-50
Keynote	Yes	No	Sometimes
Exhibit Hall	Yes	No	No
Organizers	HQ	HQ/Local Chapter	Local leaders
Meals	Seated buffett	Boxed lunch	Pizza/Box Lunch

SQLRally is positioned as a regional event. I think regional SQL Server events is a market that's currently underserved and look forward to PASS's offering. Given the SQL Server Community talent behind this event, I'm sure it will be awesome!

:{> Andy

Who Thinks Like Database Professionals?

andyleonard — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 01:30:00 GMT

Introduction

I was talking to my team this morning and we were wondering about some design decisions. One of the things that came out of the discussion was: Database professionals think differently.

Differently? How?

A little story: Before I was a database person I did web development. That's a little misleading because I wrote very little that made it onto the big web. Most of my work ran on enterprise intranets.

Back then, I started using Access first (and I admit it). After I crashed Access one weekend, I learned about SQL Server 6.5 and started working with it. After a year or so I started playing with SQL Server 7.0. About six months later I considered myself a DBA.

Were You a DBA?

No.

But You Considered Yourself a DBA?

Yes.

When Did You Learn You Weren't a DBA?

I learned I was not a DBA when I started working on my first Very Large Database (VLDB) project. I started doing database work and realized how little I actually knew. The gaps in my knowledge were readily identifiable, but that was nothing compared to my thinking. I didn't think like a database person.

I'm not going to mislead you: Sometimes, the ability to think differently than a database person adds value. But right then, it was a major liability.

Thinking about parallelism and thinking in sets is different. It's way different from the way I thought about web development. I don't think I'm alone in any of my experiences. I think lots of people have trouble thinking in sets, about parallelism; and quite a few developers think they're DBAs.

It's important to note that there are some developers who are DBAs. I believe they represent a subset of all the developers who think they are. Maybe I'm just biased because of my experience, I'm not sure.

One Last Thing

The most important thing I learned working with that VLDB: I was not a DBA when I started, and I really wasn't a DBA when I finished. I knew a lot more about SQL Server database administration, but that doesn't make a DBA - in my opinion. I learned I'm a database developer, which is a different animal from an application developer and from a DBA.

I can hear you thinking: "What makes a DBA, Andy?" I'm glad you asked. I don't think there's a formula, really. I know some really good DBAs (a couple of them are also really good developers), and they share some traits. One thing they all have in common is they're detail-oriented.

Conclusion

What do you think? What are the differences between the thinking of database professionals and other technology professionals?

:{> Andy

My 2008 PASS Summit Sessions

andyleonard — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 20:05:00 GMT

I am honored to be selected to present at the 2008 PASS Summit!

I'm presenting two sessions: Test-Driven Development For Database Professionals and SSIS Scripting. I've been working on the presentations recently and realize there will be a few minutes left in the SSIS Scripting talk unless I talk slow. (Some people say I talk slow enough already - and that I have a Southern accent. Can you believe it?)

Anyway, I open the floor to you good people - the readers of my blog: What cool (or useful, or challenging) SSIS Scripting demo would you like to see? We'll make it a contest. Leave a comment here (keep in mind I moderate comments so they will not appear automatically) and I'll pick one.

I'll have to come up with some cool gift to award the winner.

:{> Andy

New Features Announced In SQL Server 2008

andyleonard — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 10:23:00 GMT

Buck Woody, Microsoft SQL Server Program Manager, recently posted a list of enhancements in the works for SQL Server 2008 RTM in the SQL Server MVP newsgroup. The usual suspects were included in the list: Policy-Based Management (formerly DMF), Resource Governor, Multi-Server Query, PowerShell, and IntelliSense - but there are also some interesting additions that I'd not heard about until reading his post.

The big addition: Activity Monitor, described in the post thus:

The new Activity Monitor was written from the ground up with the perspective of the DBA needing to chase down a performance problem in real time. Modeled after the new Windows Resource Monitor, DBAs can quickly see the active sessions, wait states, file I/O, and long running queries in a command console like UI.

I'm excited! I currently lug around a collection of scripts (... that I keep promising to add to an application one day) to check hither and yon for performance gotchas.

Another addition: Database Diagram / Table Designer Safety Additions which add safety checks "for operations that that would drop an object or cause data loss."

You will also be able to launch Profiler "from a Query Editor Results window to the SPID of the query." This sounds very interesting. If I'm reading this right I'll be able to execute sp_who2, obtain the SPID of a long-running query, right-click (or something) and start a Profiler trace pre-configured to capture activity of this SPID. You can also launch the SPID-centric Profiler from Activity Monitor. I will be using that a lot!

New right-click options in the Query Results Window will allow users to "select a range of rows in the Results Grid and copy the headings as well. Also, you can select individual cells and copy them with headers if you wish." This sounds like the copy functionality we have in SSIS Grid Data Viewers. I can tell you from expereience this is handy feature. It's very useful to be able to copy a few multi-selected rows - including row headers (especially when you're working with a couple hundred columns!) - and paste them into Excel for analysis.

A new "Info Bar" provides pre-validated navigation cues in many screens.

The Open Table feature limits the number of rows returned. Has this ever happened to you? You right-click a table in SSMS and select Open Table only to hog server resources just so you could take a peek at the data? It's happened to me... (Thank you, thank you, thank you!)

There are also a few changes to ShowPlan - mostly related to XML / graphics interchange. I remember seeing some of this in early SQL Server 2005 pre-releases but I believe it was cut from the 2005 RTM. Nice to see these options - they're great for documenting issues.

Performance Studio will contain a host of performance tuning reports - another exciting feature! The whole Data Collection database has me stoked - have you seen this feature in CTP6? It's pretty cool.

Last but not least, the team has decided to include - drum roll please - the T-SQL debugger in SSMS!

I can hardly wait to see these in action, and it's very cool of the SQL Server Team to give us visibility into these planned features along with permission to blog about them (thanks Buck!).

:{> Andy

Which "flavor" DBA are you?

andyleonard — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 01:25:00 GMT

This re-post from my Applied Team System blog (which was a repost from my old SQL Server Central blog) was inspired by James Luetkehoelter's Agile Development and the "DBA" post a few days back. I'll have more to say about database developers, agile methodologies, and the need for a DBA in posts to come. Enjoy!

I received a cool compliment today from a peer who's a developer. He said, "You know, I really like having a DBA on my team!" I have to tell you, it made my whole day!

It led to a discussion about past experiences and expectations, and I shared something I thought was pretty much common knowledge: there are three types of DBAs. My peer was shocked, so maybe the knowledge isn't so common after all.

The three "flavors" of DBAs I define are:

System, Operations, or Production Support DBAs - these DBAs write maintenance plans in notepad and have no qualms whatsoever about executing in command-line. They were DBAs in the old days, when we carved our own ICs out of wood. They will get your server and database back online fast - and with less data corruption than anyone else on the planet. They live for torn pages and I/O faults.
Application Support DBAs - these DBAs are familiar with one or more (usually complex) applications. I'm talking PeopleSoft, Seibel, and SAP here. If you want to customize a screen or write a one-off web application, you desperately need these folks.
Database Developers - these DBAs are ruthless bit-heads. They use bigint and byte fields for masking binary states. They can optimize a stored procedure in their sleep and wrap an API around a database so developers never have to consider writing SQL that directly hits tables. They are performance freaks that will work 18-hour days on weekends to test in Production - when it's "safe."

Do you think DBAs fall into these categories? Do you know any that do? Do you see yourself in there anywhere? Do you have more or less or different "flavors" for classifying DBAs?

:{> Andy

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