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October 2008 - Posts
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Many of us are extremely lucky as we have never been affected by health issues. However, there are very few of us that can say that they have never been touched in some way or another by someone being affected with cancer or a mental health issue. These two issues are the most common forms of illness that affect the male population. This November I will be taking part in a fundraising activity known as Movember. So during the month of November I will be growing a moustache and I am looking to raise funds to support the effort.
The money raised by Movember is used to raise awareness of men's health issues and is donated to the Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia and beyondblue - the national depression initiative. The PCFA and beyondblue will use the money to fund research and increase support networks for those men who suffer from prostate cancer and depression. If you are interested in supporting my fundraising effort you can donate to my facial growing cause using the following link. I will keep you updated on my attempt to look like Tom Selleck.
Have a Great Weekend.
- Peter Ward
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I was having coffee with a customer this morning and they mentioned the editorial I wrote yesterday on SQL Server in the cloud. I was interested in their point of view on the role of DBAs in the future. I have to admit that I have never really thought that the need for DBAs will become redundant in the future. However, after an hour of discussion and two coffees I am not quite sure if the role of a DBA as we know it today will exist in 10 years.
Think of it this way, if you can lease a part of SQL Server in the cloud for $100 a day that would equate to $36,500 a year, which is significantly less than the salary of a DBA. The difference with SQL Server being hosted in the cloud is that the resources available to you are theoretically impossible to max and someone else is managing the resource for you. Although I am sure that there will be a few organisations that will want to keep their data close to their chests rather than hosting it, at $100 a day why wouldn't you host SQL Server in the cloud? Where do you see the role of a SQL Server DBA in 10 years?
- Peter Ward
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As most people expected, Microsoft have used PDC to announce their future inactivates around cloud computing. As Mary-Jo Foley described, now that the initial pixie dust has settled folks are trying to digest just what the whole cloud platform means. My understanding of the cloud platform, which is known as 'Azure', is to provide developers the ability to write applications that run partially and/or entirely from the Web whilst achieving scale out. One analyst described Azure as 'wearing your underpants on the outside of your clothes'. This description is related to the paradigm shift in development as developers use the new platform to find ways to expose their applications to as many users as possible but still keep in mind factors such as security and scalability.
So what does this mean for SQL Server? Well, according to Ray Ozzie, SQL Server will take on an especially important role in driving Microsoft's strategy by bringing more power to SQL Server in the cloud. Hopefully, what this will mean is that the concept of scale out and shared nothing architecture that will be required for SQL Server in the cloud will then been be available in the editions of SQL Server that can be installed on the servers in your data centre. What would you like to see come out of the cloud computing initiative that would make your life easier as a DBA?
- Peter Ward
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I am starting to see what I think is a worrying trend amongst database administrators. I am not sure if it is me but there appears to be fewer and fewer people who want to take on the role of a DBA. As a result more and more people are taking on the role of the 'Accidental DBA'. In other words, the person that did not duck quickly enough lands the role of the DBA. This person is typically a developer or system administrator that needs to fit being a DBA amongst their other day-to-day tasks.
In the last week I have heard two stories of organisations with very large databases that were being managed by a part-time DBA where an issue has occurred that needed a restore to be performed. The problem in both instances was that there was no valid SQL Server backup to recover from. As a DBA there is no excuse for not having a valid backup to recover from, as a backup is your closest thing to a 'get out of jail free' card. Or as a good friend of mine would say 'a backup is the most important arrow in the DBA quiver'. Are you an 'Accidental DBA' and if so how do you manage to ensure that you have valid backups whilst managing your other tasks?
- Peter Ward
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I have written in the past about 'new ways to work' and the increase in the number of companies that promote telecommuting. However, just as many companies are adopting the flexible workplace, many are finding that workplace flexibility is not improving work place moral and the bottom line. Companies including HP have ended telecommuting arrangements for hundreds in their workforces and Intel has started to require that telecommuters be in the office four days a week. Like a lot of things in life the idea of having ultimate flexibility seems like a great a idea; however, when you look deeper, it may not be all it was cracked up to be.
Telecommuting was supposed to solve all the problems of work life balance; however, I often think that working from home actually skews the work life balance. The problem with working from home for some people is that despite the fact they can improve their productivity through the reduction in distractions, often the experience of working away from the office can be an isolating one. I have spoken to several senior managers of late who believe that team productivity is reduced due to the resentment between team members that work from home and those that don't. So is your company promoting working from home? How are they measuring the return?
- Peter Ward
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I think one of the features currently missing from the SQL Server Business Intelligence stack is a tool for the presentation of Analysis Service data to an end-user. As a database management system, SQL Server has always been a back-end tool, meaning that historically it did not focus on the presentation of data. This changed in SQL Server 2000 with the release of Reporting Services, as all of a sudden there was a tool 'out of the box' with SQL Server that could be used to present data. I have been reading more about the project codenamed 'Gemini' that was announced at the recent Business Intelligence conference in Seattle and it sounds like this tool will provide analysts with the interface to Analysis Services they have been dreaming of. Is there a feature that you think is currently missing in SQL Server?
- Peter Ward
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Today has been one of those days where I have been running all over the city from one meeting to another. In between meetings I have been trying to get organised for my sister-in-law's wedding tomorrow. This is the first time I have opened my computer all day and I thought I would sit at a coffee shop next to the Brisbane River and write this editorial and kill an hour while waiting for the QLD SQL Server User Group that I am presenting at tonight. Ironically, one of the conversations on the table next to me was by a group of female work colleagues celebrating the last day of work for one of them before they got married this weekend.
One of the stories that were being talked about was from an Asian woman who was describing how it was tradition for the couple to be to attend six months of wedding training. Only if they attended this training and passed the final exam would they receive a certificate which would allow them to get married. Now I am not going to question the merits of someone else's culture but I think that this style of approach of 'certification' could be beneficial in the workplace. Imagine a training program to certify that the employee was suitably skilled for the employer and that the employee was happy with the employer.
- Peter Ward
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I don't like to be negative, but a lot of people are starting to ask questions about whether the SQL Server development team dropped the ball with SQL Server 2008. First up there was the issue with SQL Server 2008 being released several days before Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1 and the release of SQL Server 2008 with the critical MERGE bug. Then there is the fact that Report Builder 2.0 that was released in the last few days was released over two months after SQL Server 2008. However, even the new release of Report Builder appears to be a release that was pushed out the door. Instead of being a click-one application that can be launched from Report Manager, Report Builder 2.0 needs to be deployed to each workstation that will be using it.
I am sure that there are various reason that products are released when they are not feature complete, but I have heard murmurs starting to surface that often start with the words 'Half Backed'. After the long delay between SQL Server 2000 and 2005 I am sure that there was a great deal of pressure to stick to the release schedule after already slipping. Do you think that SQL Server 2008 was shipped too early and are you holding off deployment as a result?
- Peter Ward
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I was driving home tonight after what one radio announcer described was the worst storm in Brisbane in thirty years and was amazed at the amount of chaos that a blackout could cause. Personally, I thought that the radio announcer might have been using some journalistic licence but it was certainly a severe thunderstorm. The Storey Bridge is one of the main bridges from the south of Brisbane into the central business district. Normally, when I drive across the bridge at night it is illuminated in a yellow glow from the lights that run up and down the cantilever; however, due to the power outage, it was in complete darkness, except for a set of orange flashing lights at the end of the bridge.
At the end of the bridge is a set of traffic lights and an intersection which during peak hour is extremely busy. The orange glow was the traffic lights flashing, a warning that the lights were not functioning and to approach with caution. As I continued driving home, I thought more about the disaster planning that went into the traffic lights. Obviously, it is not practical to keep the lights fully operational when there is a power outage, but enough power is stored in each light to issue a warning signal if there is an issue. This is the same when it comes to disaster planning for severs that you support. Is there really a need for the intranet to be available? Or maybe the reporting solution does not need to be available where as the ERP and Payroll systems do. Do you have different priorities for your severs when it comes to disaster planning?
- Peter Ward
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I often think that people focus too much on the technical aspects when choosing a software product and fail to recognise the human element. As a technologist I find that occasionally I will fall into the trap where I focus on the features and performance and neglect that at the end of the day there will be an end user adopting the solution. A good example of this that I have seen recently is the comparison of reporting products. Data and reporting is the lifeblood of many organisations and it does not matter whether the report is a black DOS screen or a fancy graph based off a cube. What matters is someone's ability to analyse and make decisions based on the data.
I was talking to a colleague this afternoon and he was telling me about his new employer that was using a non-Microsoft based reporting solution. He was trying to convert them to use Reporting Services and was receiving a great deal of resistance. From what he described Reporting Services would have been a better technical solution; however, the company already had a massive investment in training and all of the analysts knew how to write the reports they needed to perform their job. One of the key drivers in any technology decision and is evaluating the needs of end-users, something that is often overlooked in the need to train end-users. Do you evaluate end-user needs?
- Peter Ward
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It never ceases to amaze me the lengths that advertisers will go to in order to promote a product. It seems these days that almost anything is up for grabs in order to get a message across. The days of advertising being restricted to billboards and commercials are well and truly gone. Everything from the back of a boxer to the stumps in cricket now carries advertising. I was in a bar last night and even the hand drier had adverting on it. As soon as the hand dryer was activated an LCD on the front of the dryer started to show a commercial for anti-dandruff shampoo. I recently read an article that when you visit a supermarket that we are exposed to over 2,600 advertisements.
If you look at many software products that you install these days one of the questions that is asked is whether you would like a toolbar from one of the various search engine companies to be installed. This product placement is another way to gain eyeballs for search engine providers but also an opportunity for a software vender to make additional revenue. I wonder if one day we will see more free software available that contains advertising as a revenue-generating model. Could you imagine SQL Server with ads running down the side of Management Studio?
- Peter Ward
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I had an early flight to Perth this morning and while in the taxi on the way to the airport I was stuck behind a rubbish truck that was emptying the garbage bins for several blocks. The bins were being automatically emptied using a mechanical arm that picks up each bin and deposits the contents in the truck. I do not consider myself old, but I can remember back to when I was a child when there would be a team of staff that would run behind the truck picking up each bin manually. It was even a tradition at Christmas time to leave a six-pack of beer on the top of the garbage bin to say thanks to the 'garbo'.
As with many industries, emptying garbage is not immune to technology replacing a manual job with an automated process. The interesting thing is that despite the current economic turmoil unemployment levels are very low despite jobs continually being replaced by automation. If you look at where most jobs are now being created they are typically in a role that could be classified as a Knowledge Worker. At the most basic level a Knowledge Worker is someone that provides value-add to a business. So is your role going to be replaced by a mechanical arm one day, or are you providing significant value-add to your organisation?
- Peter Ward
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There is a common saying that I am sure a lot of you have used to describe someone that thinks he has more knowledge then he does. The saying is 'a little knowledge is a dangerous thing'. In the IT sector this is often used to describe a person that might know how to used Excel but decides that this means that he knows everything that there is to know about computers. You will often hear this person giving advice on everything from how to use Internet Explorer to how to change a motherboard. It is not until he actually changes a motherboard and he short-circuits it that he realises he is out of his depth.
This afternoon I was hacking some ASP.Net code together for a simple webpage and learnt very quickly that although I am component with SQL Server it does not mean that my skills extend beyond this into C#. I think the key for anyone is not what he knows but understating what it is he doesn't know. As once you have identified what you don't know you can then focus on the gap between what you know and what you don't.
- Peter Ward
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I was listening to the latest SQL Down Under podcast this morning and I heard what I thought was a great story to describe what Software as a Service (SaaS) is. SaaS is typically described as a model of software deployment where an application is hosted as a service that is provided to customers across the Internet. In other words the application is not installed on customer hardware but somewhere in the "cloud." Typically when people purchase a car they want to know what the engine size is, how fast it goes, and if there is an option for a leather interior. People can be very passionate about their car purchases and will only buy a car from a particular manufacture such as Toyota or Holden. However, when you break a car back to its purpose, it is to get from one location to another. When you catch a taxi you do not care what brand it is or if it has a V-8 or a V-6 engine, as long as it gets you to the destination in a timely manner.
When we look at computers we think in the same manner. We focus on the vendor and what the CPU is and not the function. When something becomes a commodity there is very little analysis done and the focus is based on function. SaaS is the provision of a service where the focus is on simply providing a service that does the job as described without worrying about the underlying technology.
- Peter Ward
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This weekend I am in Wagga Wagga, which is a rural town five hours inland from Sydney, for the annual SQL Down under Code Camp. In order to get to Wagga Wagga there are two options, either fly or drive from one of the larger cities. The flight is on a Dash-8 aircraft, which is a small aircraft that flies about 40 people. It is about the same size of most small luxury aircraft. As someone who flies regularly, I normally do not give too much thought to the engineering evolved in a plane getting off the ground and arriving safely at its intended destination.
However, on a small aircraft you are exposed to a lot more, especially when the plane is prop-driven. I read an article once that Microsoft Windows is the world's most complex engineering project due to the billions of lines of code. Based on this rational I am sure that SQL Server must also be up there with other complex engineering projects. Many people might argue that a plane is more complex than Windows because if a plane crashes it could potentially kill people. However, when you think about it, SQL server drives many critical functions every day, such as hospital systems and rail networks. If these systems fail they could also result in death. I think sometimes we take for granted what a marvel many software engineering feats are.
- Peter Ward
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