When LOST finishes this year, we’re going to need some new entertainment. Here’s the shows that I’m pitching to the major networks:
Dancing With The SELECT *’s
Every week, celebrity developers are paired with SQL Server MVPs to manage SQL Servers. Tune in to find out if these coders can make their data dance, or if their efforts will fall flat.
Dirty SQL Agent Jobs
Every week, host Mike Row (no, not Rowe) searches the country for those thankless scheduled tasks that keep your servers in good shape. He’ll interview the ones in the trenches – maintenance plans, index defrag scripts, and mirroring alerts.
The Deadliest Try/Catch
It’s not just the Bering Sea – it’s the Bering C#. Ever seen those computers on the Captain’s dashboard that track where the crab pots are laid out? This is where the real work is done – inside the database. Forget the diesel engines and check out the database engines as we join the ship’s mechanic: Adam Machanic.
SSIS
When crime impacts the government database community, the SQL Server Investigative Service team jumps into action. They might be disarmed forces, but they have keyboard hotkeys programmed to fire off KILL commands.
Law and ORDER BY
The police procedural genre has spawned countless spinoffs, and now it’s time to CREATE another one: the stored procedural show. Turn your volume up, set nocount on, and join us for this brutal thriller that will solve a new execution plan every week.
Magnum, BI
Ever wonder where the “master” database got its name? That’s right – Robin Masters. Turn the clock back thirty years and join us in Hawaii to witness the birth of Business Intelligence. Is Brad McGehee really the butler, or is he the man running the whole show? You’ll have to watch to find out.
Doctor SP_Who
For decades, the cult British classic has tried and failed to make its way to the American shores, but this version is surely destined for success. If this one doesn’t succeed, we’ll reboot it as Doctor SP_Who2.
It’s Your Turn! Pitch Us Your Show
Think you can top these? Give it your best shot in the comments before Monday, January 4th. My personal favorite will win an autographed copy of my new book, Professional SQL Server 2008 Internals and Troubleshooting. Good luck!
Brent Ozar
Brent specializes in performance tuning for SQL Server, VMware, and storage. He's one of the very few Microsoft Certified Masters of SQL Server, a published author, and a Microsoft MVP. He likes travel, Jeeps, Apple gear, jokes, and writing about himself in the third person. Read more and contact Brent.
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The Database Whisperer.
This is actually how I describe what I do for a living to non geeks. Can’t believe no one suggested it yet…
That show stars Michael J. Swart, right?
http://michaeljswart.com/
sure.
The bRAIDy Bunch
The wacky antics of a large family of disc drives.
Forgot to mention that a DBA named Alice does maintenance on the SAN that they call home.
Welcome Back, Cotter.
The Highlander.
Starring Paul Randal.
“There can be only one”
I stole that from Tom LaRock.
This one has actually been around for a while:
JOE CELKO THE SQL APPRENTICE
http://joecelkothesqlapprentice.blogspot.com/
Indiana Jimmy and the Disk Partition Alignment of Doom
By all appearances a scholar, Jimmy May is all of that and more. He uses his deep knowledge of Disk Partition Alignment to navigate the mysterious SAN to save the day.
Starring @aspiringgeek
The Six Million Dollar SAN
Better… Stronger… Faster!
Trace:1999
Dumps information into the error log when nuclear waste on the Moon suddenly explodes, breaking it out of its orbit and hurling it into outer space to experience really crappy boring adventures.
Real Housewives of DBCC
Coming to Bravo in 2010: A reality show about shallow women DBAs who mis-use DBCC commands. One of the housewives, Michaele Salahi, ends up crashing a server at the White House.
I’d like to sign up to be on the Real Housewives of DBCC. Where can i submit my casting director’s number?
Little House on the Query
A nice wholesome family show about a family of DBAs (the Ingalls) who live on a server farm in Walnut Grove, Minnesota.
Sesame Tweet
A breakthrough children’s show, an hour-long program made up of short segments or skits lasting no more than 140 seconds each, since children do not have long attention spans.
Null House
A stupid show with NO VALUE WHATSOEVER about three guys raising three daughters… (insert joke about three-valued logic here).
America’s Next Top Model Database
A trashy reality show in which a dozen 85-pound women DBAs compete to solve challenges in putting together a winning MODEL database. Tyra Banks and her band of self-important judges humiliate and eliminate a contestant each week. The winner gets a contract and a spread in SQL Server Magazine.
The Batchelor
Twenty-five attractive and insipid scripts vie for the attention of some guy scheduling SQL Server Agent jobs.
(Okay, now I’m really scraping the bottom of the barrel… you can tell it’s a do-nothing holiday week)
Oops… looks like Tim Ford already thought of this one. “Who will get the ROWs?” Love it.
The Weakest Linked Server
When too many pings to a linked server get dropped, the host casually dismisses the server with a curt “Goobye!”
Cold CASE
A mystery series following investigators who spend days looking through unused case statements in long blocks, trying to determine what someone once thought they were doing.
The Suite Life of Quest and Toady
A riveting new documentary from Ken Burns about the evolution of the Toad Development Suite for SQL Server by Quest Software.
How about “The Code Whisperer” starring Joe Celko as he mumbles while reading seemingly anonymous proc code, (which no one will claim), trying to imagine what its’ purpose was and what caused it to die (or why it should die)?
Several other crazy titles popped into my head this morning:
The Sgt. Celko Show
The Host and Mrs. VIEWer
The OUTER JOIN Limits
CURSOR Jackie (starring Edie Falco, who everyone thinks is addicted to OxyContin but in reality she’s just naturally slow)
FULL JOIN House (Yeah, I agree, I liked the NULL House entry from yesterday better)
Family WITH TIES (starring Michael J. TOP)
FAST_FORWARD (Everyone on earth goes unconscious for 2 minutes and 17 seconds because they’re bored to death waiting for a CURSOR-based procedure to finish)
lmao at FAST_FORWARD!
The Deadlock Zone
A horror tale of a serial killer stalking innocent queries. Who is this mysterious ‘deadlock detector’ and will our intrepid team of query tuners be able to identify the target query before the killer strikes again
I forgot to include this one this morning…
The Incredible BULK INSERT
When DBA David Banner gets frustrated doing a BULK INSERT, he turns into a monster!
/some fun for the little DBAs/:
Dora the SQL Explorer
With Boots the Performance Monkey and her friends – The Dynamic Magic VIPs she fights against Swipper the Worst Performing
She can always consult her Backpack Online or get advices from the Map /that redirects her to the nearest MVP community/
The Profiler.
Sort of like The Mole. Unlike The Mole, the more intently he monitors the situation the worse everyone else performs. Oh, also unlike the mole, this might actually have viewers.
Secondary plot line:
Murder mystery where victims disappear without a trace.
American Idle Wait Stats
Mighty Morphin Power RANGEs
Unsuspecting teens become endowed the power to query in various color-coded forms (coloring courtesy of @mladenpradjic ‘s SSMS Tools Pack). Led by Buckdon, a giant floating head in a tube, they set out to kung-fu the crap out of databases everywhere.