So the news is out, Charlotte NC is a destination city! image courtesy Wikipedia 2012 Democratic Presidential Convention 2013 PASS Summit Already folks are wondering, hey, where is Charlotte? And, can I get good sushi there? Charlotte is a city I visit frequently. Here are a few things I’ve picked up along the way: It’s the ‘Queen City’ – but so are a half dozen other towns in the US The downtown area is called…
Some of my earliest memories involve trips to the dentist when I was maybe 3 or 4 years old. To this day, my blood pressure rises whenever I go in for a simple cleaning. There’s a particular poster I can’t seem to get out of my head, like a bad 80’s song. The intent was to encourage us kiddies to floss our teeth. I remember thinking “Well, I don’t need ALL my teeth…” Hmmm, this…
A lot of good news this week about jobs here in the United States and a bunch of new hires for the month of April has many people feeling much better about the US economy. After being hammered with depressing reports for the past two years, it’s very nice to see the pendulum swing in the other direction. Quest has hired a couple hundred people in the past few months. This is kind of a…
If I had a dollar for every time someone asked me to help them setup their database application or utility to not ‘let someone do something in the database they are not supposed to do’ over the past 10 years, I would literally have about $347. This is generally how it goes: Them: We want your tool, but we don’t like that it lets user do X. Me: Awesome! I want to give you our…
I know you can read, you’re here. But maybe you’re a functioning illiterate. Here’s what I mean. You spend a lot of time in the database writing queries, analyzing data, doing important stuff. Most of the time, things go great for you. You can answer questions for people. You make things happen. The wheels of the business bus go round-and-round. But there’s one thing that really, really scares you. Execution/Explain/Access Plans. Those things that describe…
Disclaimer: I work for Quest Software. I am paid to promote and help sell their software. Did you know we also give away a lot of software, with no intention of selling it? One of the most popular database platforms out there is MySQL. I’m going to guess that’s because it is free (for now). Apparently it is downloaded more than 70,000 times a day. WOW. I don’t use MySQL Jeff. If you are a…
Wait a sec, we don’t let developers even look at Production, much less touch it! There’s no way they can break anything over there. Whew! Jeff was just pulling our chains! I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it’s even worse than you think. The code that those developers wrote? Guess where it runs everyday? That’s right – in production. So instead of them fat-fingering in production, a bad piece of code…
So you’re on Twitter. An interesting blog post rolls by. You click on it. You love it. You reward the author with a RT or even better, a Follow, or a reply on Twitter. The blog author, sees said Twitter response, and is like ‘Awesome!’ But secretly, they are disappointed. Why? Because what they really wanted was a RT AND for you to leave your comment on their blog. Because comments on a blog let…
I’m sorry, I didn’t realize there was such a thing as a ‘fake’ DBA Jeff! Ok, so labeling someone as a ‘real’ DBA is a bit insulting to DBAs everywhere. If you have children, that makes you a parent. If you are responsible for a database, then you are a DBA. So what exactly am I getting at? What do you most fear, and have you ever faced that fear? If you are sitting there…
“Look for things that make them go!” – from ST:TNG, “Samaritan Snare” (Wiki) I have a tendency to relate everything in life back to a Star Trek or South Park episode – it’s a personal problem and I’m currently in therapy, courtesy my DVR. But back to Oracle… How often have you been asked to help with a performance problem, but the person asking for help lacks the ability to describe the actual problem? The…
Did you know you can run Oracle RDBMS for free? Updated on 11/25/2011 – 11gR2 now available for Windows x32 and Linux x64 Yes, there are limitations (fine print), but just about anyone can take advantage of this offering. So, why should you care? Maybe you are a developer, and your DBA refuses to grant you privs you need to do your job. Well, if you can run your own local copy of Oracle, you…
A lot of folks contact me off-line, asking if I really do hate Chet, or do I just like kidding him. Mostly, it’s me forgetting that Chet hates it when I InitCap his Twitter handle, @oraclenerd. Or am I remembering that he hates that? Hmmmm… Anyways, I needed to write this post so people would know, that, ‘yes’, I really do like picking on Chet. He refuses to wear my Toad t-shirts, and more importantly,…
Jealousy is not an emotion I generally feel for the SQL Server technology stack. I covet their Twitter camaraderie, but I ‘know’ that Oracle can counter just about anything thrown at it. People that Helped Me with this Post I was reminded that even old dogs can be taught new tricks while monitoring the #SQLSaturday conversation going on in Chicago this weekend. The subject of monitoring INDEXES came up, and it was casually mentioned that…
Do you take pleasure in killing peo…people’s sessions in the database? If so, you are not alone. If you have Blocking Locks, the easiest way to fix that is kill the offending session and free up the requested resource. But, who should win this battle? What transactions take precedence? Should the business analyst have his report kiboshed because a developer is testing a new feature? Should an ETL process be allowed to finish under any…
Database developers and DBAs often play the role of gunslinger, or a hired gunman. Someone brought in to ‘kill’ the bad guy, in this case, an under-performing database. Our tools of the trade are not as dramatic as firearms, but we can do just as much damage. Ever heard of Angry Birds? In this mobile game, users get various weapons (in the form of Angry Birds) to launch at the naughty piggies. What are your…
