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Thread: Physical DBA vs. Development DBA

  1. #1
    Join Date
    May 2005
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    Physical DBA vs. Development DBA

    Thoughts ? Comments ?

    This is week 3 at my new job as a remoteDBA, so I should change my handle as I never took the gig requiring air travel.

    As I do this job I feel it is about all of the things Oracle is trying to automate and that the DW work I used to do was closer to the business. I think that puts you in a better position to do more value-add work.

    This article talks about how the DBA must move towards the business and away from the low level tech chores.

    http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:f...utsource&hl=en

    Anyone agree ? Disagree ?

  2. #2
    Join Date
    May 2005
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    [soapbox]
    1) The author works for Gartner Group now, since Gartner bought their company, take it with a grain of salt.
    2) " By some estimates, 30 percent " - Personnaly I always question anyone's validity who will not directly quote a source (unless doing so would jeapardize national security or someone's life). I also don't trust statistics since 95% of all statistics are made up on the spot. (Or should I make that 92%? - without a source to quote - who would know? Besides, isn't percentage based on sampling size and demographics - nobody asked me! So I wasn't included in their 30%! )
    3) "History has taught us that as technology improves, less-sophisticated jobs are eliminated" - last time I drove by the orange groves, they were still hiring illegals to pick the fruit, and they still have hot-dog vendors at baseball games (don't they?) So, the only jobs that get eliminated (IMHO), are those that have been replaced by machinery, not sophistication. (I don't recall seeing anyone delivering blocks of ice to homes, since we now have ice makers - although here in AZ, you can get ice delivered to cool down your pool in the middle of the summer. )
    4) Call yourself whatever you want, providing you can back it up with action, and whoever is footing the bill needs your expertise and services. You wouldn't want to confuse an Industrial Engineer with a Sanitation Engineer, just because they are both engineers.
    5) With so many places still using oracle 7 - us old dinosaures will be around for a while.
    6) If anyone takes any of this seriously, they should not have stopped their sessions with the mental health counselor!
    [/soapbox]

  3. #3
    Join Date
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    Quote Originally Posted by dbtoo
    [soapbox]
    (I don't recall seeing anyone delivering blocks of ice to homes, since we now have ice makers - although here in AZ, you can get ice delivered to cool down your pool in the middle of the summer. )

    [/soapbox]
    You get ice delivered to cool your pool How hot does it get in AZ?
    OCP 8i, 9i DBA
    Brisbane Australia

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Dec 2001
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    UK
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    Hi.

    [my opinion]
    Each new version of Oracle includes additional automation meaning that people don't have to be concerned with the nuts and bolts of alot of processes. I believe Oracle 10g can do a pretty good job out of the box, and it chucks out ADDM and AWR reports that highlight problems to resolve, so it's even helping you do some of the problem identification and tuning.

    That said, good DBAs are still necessary to make sure the database is up to scratch. The difference is, in the past this required lots of nuts and bolts stuff, whereas now it involves directing developers to use the correct features and getting closer to the business to head off problems before they happen.

    I was told years ago that a good dba is one you don't even know exists as he fixes all the problems before you notice you've got them.

    Now I would say that a good DBA is one you know exists as he is constantly involved in design and development decisions to make sure you don't start down a path that you will later regret.

    Developers at my company look at ADDM and AWR reports. They then identify poorly performing SQL and use explain and tkprof to tune it. Sounds like the job DBAs did a few years back doesn't it. Now are the developers here really DBAs? No, they are in good habits because the DBA (me) forced them to do their job properly
    [/my opinion]

    Cheers

    Tim...
    Last edited by TimHall; 06-23-2005 at 05:23 AM.
    Tim...
    OCP DBA 7.3, 8, 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
    OCA PL/SQL Developer
    Oracle ACE Director
    My website: oracle-base.com
    My blog: oracle-base.com/blog

  5. #5
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    Automate, automate, automate. Do more with less.
    Jeff Hunter

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by marist89
    Automate, automate, automate. Do more with less.
    I must have been confused, I always thought it was do less with more.

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by dbtoo
    (I don't recall seeing anyone delivering blocks of ice to homes, since we now have ice makers - although here in AZ, you can get ice delivered to cool down your pool in the middle of the summer. )
    If you can't stand the heat, then don't live in an oven. I had a layover in Phoenix in March, it must have been 95 degrees there. With all those pools I saw on the way in, it must be getting more humid by the day.

    [IMHO] When I worked with 7.3.4 I spent a lot of time worrying about extent sizes. Mostly cleaning up after someone who believed that all tables and indexes should occupy only one extent, and if they absolutely must then two extents but no more. Which is a terrible strategy given that we supported so many remote databases. I couldn't be bothered with his complicated, and arbitrary, spreadsheet for figuring out extent sizes and made all the extents uniform in size. The databases were small and a few megs did not matter. By the time 9i came out, I spent almost no time looking at the number of extents, I see this as a big step forward, not back. I would rather spend my time looking at the architecture of the database, rather than the nuts and bolts so to speak. I also am not a big fan of using hints, Set up a good schema and you should not need to use hints. [/IMHO]

  8. #8
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    Quote Originally Posted by grjohnson
    You get ice delivered to cool your pool How hot does it get in AZ?
    It's been 118 this week. It's been as hot as 128. The airlines had to stop flying out of phoenix because the programs which calculated speeds for takeoff, were only programed for temperatures to 126. (That is farenheit - if it was celcius, we'd have to be in hades or the sun, no? ).

  9. #9
    Join Date
    May 2005
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    Quote Originally Posted by dbtoo
    It's been 118 this week. It's been as hot as 128. The airlines had to stop flying out of phoenix because the programs which calculated speeds for takeoff, were only programed for temperatures to 126. (That is farenheit - if it was celcius, we'd have to be in hades or the sun, no? ).
    I have 2000 hour as a commercial pilot/flight instructor.

    The biggest problem in the heat of summer down there is the 'density altitude'. The air is so thin its like trying to take off at 20,000 feet. Put simply they run a calculation to avoid running out of runway.

  10. #10
    Join Date
    Oct 2002
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    807
    Quote Originally Posted by dbtoo
    It's been 118 this week. It's been as hot as 128. The airlines had to stop flying out of phoenix because the programs which calculated speeds for takeoff, were only programed for temperatures to 126. (That is farenheit - if it was celcius, we'd have to be in hades or the sun, no? ).
    Very comforting. I am travelling to PHX tomorrow.

    PS : I lived in Scottsdale some years ago..so am kinda used to the mild temperatures

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