Knowing What You Don’t Know

  • Eric M Russell wrote:

    Sharing what we think we know with others (external validation) is a good way to learn what we didn't know before. Even the "resident SQL Server expert" in an IT organization may discover their knowledge base and point of view about certain topics are lacking when they step outside their day to day environment and start interacting with the broader IT community.

    I learn a lot from my systems engineers (particularly SAN stuff) and they learn from me about SQL - so 100% agree, but we only seem to do it when something breaks 🙂

    MVDBA

  • That's not a shock really. But a little more sharing ahead of time, might, might, prevent some outages.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • Grant Fritchey wrote:

    That's not a shock really. But a little more sharing ahead of time, might, might, prevent some outages.

    that would be a fantastic article... how we prevent outages..

    I have a server consolidation project (to cut licencing costs) and I know there is new hardware, DNS fixes, code  changes, rollback plans, point of no return... but pulling all of those people together is starting to feel like the DBA job description.  question …. is the DBA becoming too much of a project manager? or is devops making the DBA assume that role? -

    i'm going to re-read the phoenix project (for about the 5th time) and seek wisdom. 🙂

    but I still have to plan for those outages and bang those heads together way earlier than people think

    MVDBA

  • MVDBA (Mike Vessey) wrote:

    i'm going to re-read the phoenix project (for about the 5th time) and seek wisdom. 🙂

    I need to get the Unicorn Project and read it.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • Grant Fritchey wrote:

    MVDBA (Mike Vessey) wrote:

    i'm going to re-read the phoenix project (for about the 5th time) and seek wisdom. 🙂

    I need to get the Unicorn Project and read it.

    Santa clause bought me the last copy - it was delivered by the Easter bunny... sorry Grant, there is no unicorn.

    MVDBA

  • Excellent questions, Grant. I've been trying to determine that myself, recently. I tried asking Gen AI guidance on that. It pointed me to W3Schools C# Quiz, which is an untimed quiz of 25 questions. I went there last weekend, but finished all 25 correctly in 7 minutes, 47 seconds. So, I don't consider that a useful way of learning what I don't know.

    Still looking.

    Rod

  • The one thing I miss about working in an office is having lunch with other people in IT but outside my area. Just random conversation about "what are you working on?" followed up with "what problems are you having with that?" would sometimes uncover a common pain point or a design issue or result in a helpful suggestion from someone in a different area but who has relevant experience from a prior job. I've seen that help move projects forward that some of the informal conversation contributors didn't even know existed (unknown unknowns).

  • Eric M Russell wrote:

    Sharing what we think we know with others (external validation) is a good way to learn what we didn't know before. Even the "resident SQL Server expert" in an IT organization may discover their knowledge base and point of view about certain topics are lacking when they step outside their day to day environment and start interacting with the broader IT community.

    I have to give that a million thumbs up and say that's exactly why I love the SQL Server community at large.

    --Jeff Moden


    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.


    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

  • m60freeman wrote:

    The one thing I miss about working in an office is having lunch with other people in IT but outside my area. Just random conversation about "what are you working on?" followed up with "what problems are you having with that?" would sometimes uncover a common pain point or a design issue or result in a helpful suggestion from someone in a different area but who has relevant experience from a prior job. I've seen that help move projects forward that some of the informal conversation contributors didn't even know existed (unknown unknowns).

    I've never experienced that. I get that more from my local .NET User group, then from my coworkers. I don't know why, but in my area people in the same company just don't talk to one another.

    Kindest Regards, Rod Connect with me on LinkedIn.

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