April 17, 2009 at 8:02 pm
Nicholas Cain (4/17/2009)
Here's my personal favourite to spring:It's 3pm on a Friday, your production OLTP environment is down, every hour down costs the company one million dollars. People are phoning constantly, folks are rushing the hallways, running into your work area and freaking out wanting to know what you are doing, and why it's not fixed yet.
What do you do?
Negotiate a raise. 😀
[font="Times New Roman"]-- RBarryYoung[/font], [font="Times New Roman"] (302)375-0451[/font] blog: MovingSQL.com, Twitter: @RBarryYoung[font="Arial Black"]
Proactive Performance Solutions, Inc. [/font][font="Verdana"] "Performance is our middle name."[/font]
April 17, 2009 at 8:10 pm
Lynn Pettis (4/17/2009)
Hmmm, blame me not for Air Force flashback. Alvin's comment it was.
Go ahead, put the blame on me. (Just kidding Lynn)
I'm not going to provide an answer to this question. I worked as an engineer for 14 years before switching to IT. One thing I learned in those years was troubleshooting. One thing I found in IT is that many of my co-workers had poor troubleshooting skills.
I'm interested in seeing what some of the "junior" members can come up with.
For best practices on asking questions, please read the following article: Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help[/url]
April 17, 2009 at 8:18 pm
Actually Alvin, your answer is perfect. It's what you are doing behind the locked doors with the phone off the hook that is important. Doing all that just keeps people from interupting you while you work, which is extremely important when dollars are going down the proverbial drain.
April 17, 2009 at 8:26 pm
Lynn Pettis (4/17/2009)
Actually Alvin, your answer is perfect. It's what you are doing behind the locked doors with the phone off the hook that is important. Doing all that just keeps people from interupting you while you work, which is extremely important when dollars are going down the proverbial drain.
I agree. What I'm interested in hearing is what people (other than the well known gurus on here) think is a good next step.
For best practices on asking questions, please read the following article: Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help[/url]
April 18, 2009 at 2:29 am
Alvin Ramard (4/17/2009)
Lynn Pettis (4/17/2009)
Actually Alvin, your answer is perfect. It's what you are doing behind the locked doors with the phone off the hook that is important. Doing all that just keeps people from interupting you while you work, which is extremely important when dollars are going down the proverbial drain.I agree. What I'm interested in hearing is what people (other than the well known gurus on here) think is a good next step.
Order Pizza.
Gail Shaw
Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability
April 18, 2009 at 2:34 am
paul.starr (4/17/2009)
any info on really good interview questions for a sql server dba?
Memorising questions and answers is not going to help you pass an interview. You need to be familiar with the product and comfortable with your level of knowledge, even if that means answering questions "I don't know"
Any competent interviewer can tell the difference between a candidate who knows what they're talking about and one who's memorised parrot-fashion the answers.
Gail Shaw
Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability
April 18, 2009 at 8:07 am
GilaMonster (4/18/2009)
Order Pizza.
That's the manager's job. My last manager did that several times. The only question she had to ask was: "What do you want on it?"
For best practices on asking questions, please read the following article: Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help[/url]
April 18, 2009 at 8:24 am
GilaMonster (4/18/2009)
paul.starr (4/17/2009)
any info on really good interview questions for a sql server dba?Memorising questions and answers is not going to help you pass an interview. You need to be familiar with the product and comfortable with your level of knowledge, even if that means answering questions "I don't know"
Any competent interviewer can tell the difference between a candidate who knows what they're talking about and one who's memorised parrot-fashion the answers.
Correct.
Also, I've seen a few interviews cut short because the interviewee was not able to discuss items on his resume. Be prepared to discuss every item on your resume in great details. This is much easier to do if your resume is an honest representation of your accomplishment.
For best practices on asking questions, please read the following article: Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help[/url]
April 18, 2009 at 8:56 am
I agree with Gail and Alvin. You want to represent yourself well, and show what you know on your resume. I have talked to dozens of people that eliminated candidates that could not back up what was on their resume.
If you don't have experience, you don't have experience. You won't be able to answer questions well and discuss things you don't know. It's not a quiz show where you give an answer to pass. Most interviews I've had in the last 10 years required me to give more of an explanation about the answer, not just answer.
Follow me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/way0utwest
Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help
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April 18, 2009 at 9:32 am
Alvin Ramard (4/18/2009)
GilaMonster (4/18/2009)
Order Pizza.
That's the manager's job. My last manager did that several times. The only question she had to ask was: "What do you want on it?"
Good point. Last time I had one of these one of the manager's first questions was 'Where do I order supper from and what do you want?'
In that case, assuming I'm working alone, not with a team, put headphones on, switch on some Enya, review what I so far know about the problem and formulate a plan of action.
If I'm working with a team, leave out the headphones and the Enya.
Gail Shaw
Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability
April 18, 2009 at 9:35 am
GilaMonster (4/18/2009)
Good point. Last time I had one of these one of the manager's first questions was 'Where do I order supper from and what do you want?'In that case, assuming I'm working alone, not with a team, put headphones on, switch on some Enya, review what I so far know about the problem and formulate a plan of action.
If I'm working with a team, leave out the headphones and the Enya.
Noise canceling headphones
April 18, 2009 at 10:03 am
Alvin Ramard (4/18/2009)
Also, I've seen a few interviews cut short because the interviewee was not able to discuss items on his resume. Be prepared to discuss every item on your resume in great details. This is much easier to do if your resume is an honest representation of your accomplishment.
Absolutely.
A further word of advice about the resume. If you use a skills matrix, make sure it's realistic. When I interview people, if they've put 5/5 (or 10/10) for a specific product, I assume they mean that they know absolutely everything about it (that's what 5/5 means). Hence they had better be able to back that up in the interview.
I once got a resume from a person applying for the position of "SQL Server Performance tuning specialist". The resume indicated that he had 4 years of IT experience and he rated himself as 5/5 on all of the following technologies:
Windows 98
Windows 2000
Windows XP
Windows Server 2003
Oracle 9
SQL Server 2000
SQL Server 2005
In addition he rated himself as 4/5 on 5 different 'programming languages' (VB, C#, Html, php and XML)
There was nothing in his work history that indicated he'd even worked on half of those, and most of the others were 1 year experience. We didn't bother asking him in for an interview.
Gail Shaw
Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability
April 18, 2009 at 4:27 pm
Hi
Alvin Ramard (4/17/2009)
I agree. What I'm interested in hearing is what people (...) think is a good next step.
I don't try to give an answer for this question because I'm no DBA but a developer. I only could answer what my next steps would be in this situation and I don't know if this is interesting in this context or even on this page.
...(other than the well known gurus on here)...
But why only others than the gurus? Gail is already introduced in the discussion and I'm really glad about this! I think many other people (including me) here can learn from the answers.
Greets
Flo
How to Post Data/Code to get the best Help How to Post Performance Problems
April 18, 2009 at 5:05 pm
Florian Reischl (4/18/2009)
But why only others than the gurus? Gail is already introduced in the discussion and I'm really glad about this! I think many other people (including me) here can learn from the answers.Greets
Flo
Why not the gurus? Sure I'm interested in what they think, but if they answer first that will like affect how "junior" members answer.
For best practices on asking questions, please read the following article: Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help[/url]
April 18, 2009 at 5:16 pm
Alvin Ramard (4/18/2009)
Florian Reischl (4/18/2009)
But why only others than the gurus? Gail is already introduced in the discussion and I'm really glad about this! I think many other people (including me) here can learn from the answers.Greets
Flo
Why not the gurus? Sure I'm interested in what they think, but if they answer first that will like affect how "junior" members answer.
My thought on his request told me he had a good idea what we might say, so he wanted us to hold off and see what others might say before we ventured forth with our suggestions on what we would do.
Makes sense in a way, see what others think before we taint their ideas.
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