Jacks of all trades

Instagram has a complex architecture for it's technology infrastructure. The people that work there have to be jacks of all trades. Is that the type of environment you'd like to work in?

Encryption Works

Encryption is supposed to protect data, and it appears to be working as police and authorities are often stymied by encrypted disks. Steve Jones recommends you encrypt your disks on all your machines.

Working with SQL Server Third Party Vendors

I ran across Denny Cherry’s (@MrDenny) blog on Fixing Vendor Performance Problems in which he outlines three methods of dealing...

PASS Speaking Results

I got the PASS speaking results today on the new speaker portal. They posted the top sessions as well, overall...

The Employment Contract

This Friday Steve Jones wants to know if you'd like to have an employment contract of some sort. Do you want your duties, or maybe exlcusions, explicitly spelled out in an agreement?

Network Protocols

Data Usage

This is somewhat shocking to me. I was reading about ATT’s decision to throttle some high bandwidth users, and there...

Not So Unbreakable

Oracle touted its database software as unbreakable, but many security researchers think the company is not spending enough effort on security. Steve Jones has a few comments.

Sharing Your Database Server

Is is time to consider sharing your database server with other applications? Steve Jones thinks with today's powerful servers and changes to licensing, this might make sense.

The Layman’s View of a DBA

I wrote this piece as a guest on Bradmcgehee.com for the DBA in Space competition. Republishing here.
A DBA (Database Administrator)...