As some of you may have already heard, I spent much of December moving from Hawaii to Missouri. Generally, when I tell people this, they ask if I am crazy. One important reason for the move is work-related, as it will be much more convenient, and less expensive, for me to travel from the center of United States than from Hawaii. A second reason is that my wife and daughter were missing our relatives in Missouri, and wanted to move back. Personally, I would have preferred to stay in Hawaii, but I got outvoted.
Monthly Archives: December 2010
How Do You Work When You are Not at Work?
From my Database Weekly editorial.
Most of us DBAs don’t work in a standard 40-hour a week job. We often have to work late, work weekends, and be on call just in case a problem arises. If you’ve been a DBA for a really long time, you still remember the days before the Internet, VPN connections, and cell phones. Back then, many DBAs carried a pager when on call, or took phone calls over a land line. In many cases, the only way to resolve the problem was to physically go into the office and check out the problem in person, no matter what time of the day it was.
Microsoft Codename Atlanta Attempts to Help Out DBAs By Providing Basic Assistance
I have always recommended that DBAs be as proactive as possible, catching potential problems, and actual problems, as soon as possible before they can negatively affect a SQL Server’s performance or availability. In fact, I am working on a new book, tentatively titled, How to Perform a SQL Server Health Check, which will provide a large number of check-off lists DBAs can use to verify that their SQL Server instances are correctly configured using generally accepted SQL Server best practices.
Brad M McGehee 