Blogging in your career
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The SSC timeout just ate my long winded reply - who built this thing anyway!
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Jeff, thats a fair question. Dont know that my answer will do it justice, but here goes. I can see a few developers posting code bits, but you're right, probably not a lot. I think a blog about db related critical incidents would be very valuable, what happened, how long to fix, what was the fix, something that goes beyond the 'server is up again' email. Or a blog about perf improvements, what you tuned, how much gain, how it impacts the company/application.
Blogs are about communicating and we can pick our media; email, IM, blog, web report, conference call, in person meeting, wiki (sorta). Each have their place but we tend to overuse email. It's a great thing to allow senior mgrs to see a bit of what goes on 2 or more levels down, and definitely to see what goes on with their direct reports - things that wouldn't merit an email. Results of a team building trip. Someone speaking at a local user group event. New employees joining the team. Blogs are an easy and informal way to communicate some stuff that might be technical or to personalize what can be a very faceless business. The more transparency we can create the better the business will do.
Different standards for internal vs external blogs. Internally posts should be professional, but its absolutely ok to voice frustration occasionally, just think about who would read it and are they seeing enough of the story to see where your frustration comes from. External blogs are different, look at the recent Google fiasco around medical records.
I work at very small company so we do email and phone, no need for blogs internally at this point. Externally we communicate monthly to our customer/prospects, and we issue the rare formal press release. My SSC blog kinda splits the difference, they can see some of my professional thoughts that relate to the business, but it's a me blog, not a company blog.
Blogs don't take a lot of time, I spend maybe 5 minutes typing in each of mine. I'd think most companies would be ok with that, but worse case you come in 5 mins early to work!
Looking at this, Im not sure I've said it well - which is generally a sign that I need to have a good conversation about it with someone to help crytalize whats important, or not!
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My thoughts when writing this were that some companies are promoting blogs. Not all of them, but some are. It's a marketing effort to be sure, but it does allow some people to express themselves. For places like Microsoft, it gives them a little more human face.
Not all developers want to write, or speak, or share what they do. But some do and a blog is an easy way to do that. You might want to get into speaking or maybe show off some knowledge without the formal editing that comes with other publication methods. Or you may not want to lead a brown bag session, but you'll write. Or you may not want to do either.
The thing about technical blogging is that you can promote yourself in a way that can be hard to do elsewhere. Publication is a hassle and having someone change/edit your words can be annoying. Some don't care, some do, so as Andy mentioned, this gives you another medium to communicate.
You definitely have to be careful about what you write. You don't want to write things that offend people, but you can explain how you figured something out. And promote yourself as well. To some extent the company takes a chance by allowing you some exposure. You might leave for another job!
I'd say that blogging (personal, professional, or corporate) is worth trying. You might love it. Might hate it. Could be a team building thing. Might be a way to get FAQs out there quickly. Might be a way to show off your own project and even get help. I've seen all of these. Jamie Thomson (http://blogs.conchango.com/jamiethomson/) does a great job of professional blogging as a consultant and we track his stuff in the Database Weekly newsletter. Oren Eini has a project he blogs about (http://ayende.com/Blog/category/486.aspx), though I think he mixes things up with personal stuff too much. Jonathan Schwartz does a great corporate blog (http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan/), but he's the CEO. I think the PSS engineers for SQL Server have a great blog (http://blogs.msdn.com/psssql/).
Just for the record, Andy wrote this
Doing the CTRL-A, CTRL-C thing now.Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/way0utwest
Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help
My Blog: www.voiceofthedba.com -
Hi Steve - Maybe the editorial should become part of SQLServerCentral.com blog then you don't have to worry about neglecting the blog in favor of the editorial. Just make the editorial a thread on the blog.
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Myself, I've isolated my personal blog/email from my job application process (not that I'm doing that right now). I don't want my employer looking at my blog before I'm hired as I have some strong political opinions that they may or may not agree with, so I bought a vanity domain name and use an email address through there, forwarded to my normal email, for all job applications. My vanity site has my resume and will shortly have a CMS system so that I can post cool stuff that I discover or write in SQL Server.
So let 'em find my personal site, let 'em find my posts here at SQL Server Central. They won't be able to link to my personal blog through there.
Two things drove me to do this. First, getting ridiculous amounts of spam from Monster, Dice, etc. Second, a friend of mine lost out on a tech writing job for a major national radio show because of some content in his blog.
Isolation for me, baby!
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[font="Arial"]Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves or we know where we can find information upon it. --Samuel Johnson[/font] -
Heh! More than 6000 posts and you still haven't got it down to {Ctrl-A}{Ctrl-C} before you hit the Submit button?
--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)
Intro to Tally Tables and Functions -
I agree with both Andy and Steve (thanks for the feedback, guys). A blog at work could certainly be useful to the company as well as allowing the individual to get some well deserved recognition. Some folks would do well in that they'd realize that it would be read by many at work and maybe make a decent effort at making their blogs stick to the point they were trying to make instead of turning it into a bitch session or a diary. But the others... oh my!
The idea of a Wiki has taken hold at work... whilst it's a bit up to the author as to what format to use, I think it'll work better than a simple blog maybe even just because of the name... Because blogs are, thanks to some folks, perceived at work to be rants and diaries instead of the sharing of technical expertise. Wiki's are perceived, at least my place of work, to be somewhat more professional and, therefor, better received by management. Another perception at work is that because blogs are considered less professional, anyone who attempts to write a good strong blog with lot's of examples, might be considered to be wasting time or not doing their primary job.
I guess it's a matter of what the local perception of blogs are.
So far as sharing infomation goes, people should try it at work... it's amazing how much you can get done when folks understand how each other thinks. Blogging and Wiki's are certainly one way to do that... but, it's a little impersonal... before I publish something on our Wiki, I have to have a reason to believe that the article would be useful to what we're doing and that people don't already know the material. There's only one way to do that and that's to talk with peers, supervisors, and subordinates. Seems like a lot of folks are afraid to leave their cube to go sit with an SME or even pick up the phone, anymore... the instantaneous feedback of dialog is much more effective than the 20 or 30 emails it may otherwise take to clarify even simple points.
Then, there's the matter of "Prima Donnas" and folks in fear of their job... neither of them will share info... but that might not be a bad thing, now that I think of it
--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)
Intro to Tally Tables and Functions -
I guess I'm a lucky Man... I don't have that type of problem at work and this is the 3rd company in a row I've worked for that actually embraces the idea of taking suggestions. If you're not working for such a company, perhaps it's time to start looking.
--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)
Intro to Tally Tables and Functions -
>>> I do like the idea of a 'professional development' blog that is a lot more like a diary and a lot less about come read what I wrote. ... It's a great way to keep track of little bits and pieces, and it sure would be nice to have that available for the next job interview.
In theory this is a nice idea but if you're an employee this may not be allowed. As an employee, if you create a work-related professional development blog this will count as the IP of your employer (since it was created during course of employment as an employee). So if you left the employer, you should not (in theory) retain access to the professional development blog.
The only cases where a professional development blog would work is if it was non-work related, or if you were a contractor who had retained rights over the works created during your contract.
I would be happy to be proved wrong by anyone with legal knowledge
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Yeah, normally I do the copy, but got interrupted and was merrily typing away, just lost track. Ouch again.
I think a professional development blog should be external, and you should - legalese or no - be a little careful about what you post with regards to work. Short of posting the source code to some super duper algorithm or revealling a proprietary business processs, I suspect most of it would be of little interest to anyone except you and your next employer. Lists of articles read, interesting threads (hey, who will post this thread to their blog?), magazines, classes, etc - plenty of stuff that has nothing to do with our current employer.
Jeff, thats interesting about the wiki and perception. I think the hard thing about wikis is deciding somehow about what goes in or not. Wiki's for internal apps might make sense, especially if maintained by the help desk! Maybe the trick is to substitute something for 'blog', so maybe you have the 'Database Critical Incident Web Page'. Update 'the web page' instead of 'posting to my blog'! Sometimes it IS all about labelling.
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If you work in government (man, I just realized I've got close to 15 years in working for gov't!), anything that you write might be public domain and could be seen via a public records or FOIA request. The data behind it might not be public (for example, law enforcement, or your neighbor's electrical bills), but why shouldn't the code be? We send people to conferences showing off cool things that we've done, so why not? And no, I'm not in the "information wants to be free" club, though aspects of it do appeal.
For myself, I have to find the right software that will make it easy enough to manage a professional blog. I installed five packages on my site last night and two of them look pretty nice. Since what I write are specifically to help me do my job as a DBA (maintenance and such) and are not problem solving coding, I see no problem with sharing the info.
And I like the idea of an internal wiki. I'll have to think about that and discuss it with the higher-ups.
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[font="Arial"]Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves or we know where we can find information upon it. --Samuel Johnson[/font] -
Select all then paste? Oh master poster of over 3500 posts, surely you meant "Select all, then copy?"
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Your lack of planning does not constitute an emergency on my part...unless you're my manager...or a director and above...or a really loud-spoken end-user..All right - what was my emergency again? -
Maybe that's how you get 6000 posts: paste!
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/way0utwest
Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help
My Blog: www.voiceofthedba.com -
Heh... good catch... I "pasted" the wrong key
--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)
Intro to Tally Tables and Functions
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