Management of Database Systems

Discussions held at the Avon Information Management group meeting on 1 February.

My current working research questions were discussed.

To what extent are best practices and procedures utilised by the database community?
Is their adoption affected by the complex interactions that are an integral part of the management of Database Systems? 
Can the use of holistic methodologies contribute to improvement and innovation?


The Database System
The 4 main components in the system:- 

• Technical Conponents
• Cultural factors
• Paradigms
• Application Centric

Technical Layers 
The current technical system discussed broken down into sections including:-

• Architecture
• Access and Control
• Maintenance
• Resiliance and Conservation
• Data Artifacts
• Change
• Forecasting

Cultural Factors
Items relating to cultural  arena:-

• Ethics and Governance
• Companies perception vs DBA’s
• Organizational management structure
• Customer requirements
• Financial and IT progression
• Proactive vs Reactive
• Database community
• Vendor  vs Supplier  vs Competitors
• Change Managers vs Developers vs Service Managers
• Attitudes and beliefs of DBAs
• Market place changes from local to global
• Environmental considerations
• Government, Legal and Political issues
• Business Owner, Changes to the business model, Risk

Paradigms
A few major methodologies that are in use today:-

• Service Management
• Data Management
• Problem Management
• Forensic Management
• Agile Management
• Information Lifecycle Management
• Database as a Service

Additional paradigms to consider:-

• Service Orientated Architecture
• Capability Maturity Model

Application Centric
Taking the viewpoint that the application is at the centre of everything:-

• Structured vs Unstructured vs Semi Structured
• Transient vs Transactional vs Historical
• Big Data vs Scalability, Sharding
• Scale out vs Scale up
• Quality of Data
• Cloud vs On Premise
• Data Sets for Public consumption
• Database Engine changes vs Virtualization

Architectural Design issues: Scale Up and Scale Out

Scale up is about vertical scalability. This means increasing the capacity by adding more CPU and memory.

Scale out is about horizontal scalability. This means increasing the number of servers available.

Brent Ozar wrote a couple of really interesting articles

Scaling up or scaling out?
http://www.brentozar.com/archive/2011/02/scaling-up-or-scaling-out/
Scaling up of scaling out? part 2
http://www.brentozar.com/archive/2011/03/scaling-up-or-scaling-out-part-two/

Interesting analogy here
Scale Up or Scale Out your Data Problems? A Space Analogy
http://dennyglee.com/2012/01/24/scale-up-or-scale-out-your-data-problems-a-space-analogy/

2012 SQL Year of the Dragon

The year 2012 is associated in Chinese astrology with power and wisdom. With the release of SQL Server 2012 this year we will see the power of the product multiply with a vast array of new features. But what will the future of data and databases bring. There are many post around trying to predict where the database world will shift this year. Here are a few that took my interest

Michael Stonebraker thinks

• one size no longer fits all
• “big data” means three different things  (could mean big volume, velocity and too much variety of data sources)
• ACID [atomicity, consistency, isolation, durability] is still a really good idea
• Think memory. It’s the new disk

http://searchdatamanagement.techtarget.com/news/2240113325/Michael-Stonebraker-predicts-trouble-for-relational-databases-in-2012

Forrester Predictions for 2012 are that

• Enterprise Hadoop deployments will expand at a rapid clip
• In-memory analytics platforms will grow their footprint
• Graph databases will come into vogue

http://blogs.forrester.com/james_kobielus/11-12-19-the_year_ahead_in_big_data_big_cool_new_stuff_looms_large

Edd Dumbill lists the five big data predictions for 2012 as

• More powerful and expressive tools for analysis
• Streaming data processing
• Rise of data marketplaces
• Development of data science workflows and tools
• Increased understanding of and demand for visualization

http://radar.oreilly.com/2011/12/5-big-data-predictions-2012.html

Big Data, analytics get even bigger, hotter in 2012 as Chris Kanaracus writes

• Big Data is not going away
• In-memory processing will be the belle of the ball
• Will analytics-as-a-service take off?
• BI and analytics start showing up everywhere

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9222996/Big_Data_analytics_get_even_bigger_hotter_in_2012?taxonomyId=18&pageNumber=1

How wise will we become from all this additional data and knowledge?  Data will rule the day and it will be provided by which ever tool meets the requirements, whether it be SQL, NoSQL, Oracle, MySQL etc.

Send Victoria Holt to Space

https://dbainspace.com/finalists/victoria-holt

DBA in Space Last Day of Voting

It has reached the last day of voting for the Redgate DBAinSpace competition. I have to say it has been  quite a busy week trying every way possbile to promote yourself, Redgate and get votes. I have to say a major thanks to my brother Roger Holt for his determination and persistance with trying to get votes over the last week. It has been a fun experience and for everyone at work, it meant they got a whole week of me not talking about SQL. Voting still possible till 12 tomorrow  https://dbainspace.com/finalists/victoria-holt

You will find me also at 

DBA in Space Finalist Victoria Holt
The home of great sql server articles
http://www.simple-talk.com/community/blogs/dba_in_space_finalists/default.aspx

DBA in Space video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28LA0sTaxW8

Make it Count
http://sqlblogcasts.com/blogs/simons/archive/2011/12/12/make-it-count.aspx?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+SimonsSqlServerStuff+%28SimonS+SQL+Server+Stuff%29


Oxford Brookes Alumni
https://www.facebook.com/brookesalumni

Open University
https://www.facebook.com/theopenuniversity

Singletrack Mountain Bike Magazine
http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/please-send-my-friend-into-space

SQL Server Community
Help with the local user groups in the region  tweeting
SQLServerClub in Bristol http://www.sqlserverclub.co.uk/ and
Avon Information Management Group in Bath http://avonim.wordpress.com/

Once upon a time ..

 

Once upon a time there was a DBA who through the years aspired to learn, to live, to breath, the universe of the DBA. There was excitement and thrills to watch the database space expand. To breathe new life into a field that hadn't changed that much over the last 30 years. The tools required to manage such an ever expanding set of data need to evolve and expand with agility to match the rapid growth of data which IDC say would be a hypothetical stack of DVDs that will reach halfway to Mars.  To see the Red planet, Redgate would be proud. The complexities of data management and chaotic changes to the type of data, creates a new universe. A data universe where both structured and unstructured data collide.

The DBA travelled around to explore those strange, new worlds. And sought out new data life and new data civilizations. To follow her name into space to ensure the data sent to space is archived. Please vote for Victoria Holt in the DBAinSpace competition that Redgate are running. To experience a once in a life opportunity this DBA would treasure for the rest of her known life. To Vote  https://www.dbainspace.com/finalists 

An extraordinary competition  for an out of this world experience for the DBA to collect more data.

Merry Christmas to all.

DBA in Empty Space

Vote to launch me into space to start DBA cloud services in space.





Articles listed

These are links where you can currently see details about the DBA in Space Redgate competition.

Vote our DBA into space! 
Promotion from My Company

http://www.eduserv.org.uk/newsandevents/news/2011/vote-our-dba-into-space
Short url:  http://bit.ly/vBNb0v

Interplanetary and Space Affairs
This group is managed by volunteers from the The British Interplanetary Society (BIS). The society is devoted to initiating, promoting and disseminating new concepts and technical information about space flight and astronautics.  Messages/boards
http://www.meetup.com/Interplanetary/messages/boards/thread/18517332
Short url: http://bit.ly/vmpeQj

Rocketeers DBA in Space
Rocketeers is a journal documenting an interest in commercial spaceflight ("NewSpace"), particularly in the growing number of British firms involved in this fascinating area of technology. UK software company Redgate funds space flight competition. Forum Entry
http://www.rocketeers.co.uk/node/1751#comment-339
Short url: http://bit.ly/sAqaxN

Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution (BRLSI)
The Bath Literary and Scientific Institution was founded in 1824, but was a direct descendant of Bath societies going back to the 1770s. The Educational Charity promotes science, philosophy, the arts and current affairs and has been kind enough to support my endevours by adding details to their weekly newsletter.
http://www.brlsi.org/