I Hate The Way You’re Using “It Depends.”

Can I be honest with you for a second?

It makes my skin crawl when I hear database people smugly answer a question with “It depends!”

Because most of the time, when they do it, they chuckle as if they know something, and as if what they just said illustrates what an awesome expert they are. They elbow their DBA buddies, who also scoff and nod because they’re in on the DBA joke too, and they all feel superior to whoever asked the question.

And they sit there like the conversation is over, like they’ve finished their answer. They expect the questioner to just be satisfied with their ignorance, and to feel dumb for thinking that database administration ever has a clear answer for anything.

That’s bullshit.

If you say “It depends,” you have to finish the sentence.

Exactly what does it depend ON?

If you don’t finish the sentence by explaining what it depends on, then you don’t know the answer, and you’ve done the questioner a disservice by belittling them and ignoring their question.

You don’t have to give the complete answer in one sentence, but you have to finish the sentence. Examples include:

• “It depends on whether we’re talking about a table with 100 rows, or 100 million rows. How many rows are in this table?”
• “It depends on whether this query runs a few times per minute, or once a day. How often does it run?”
• “It depends on whether you need a short-term fix within an hour, or if I can get a few days to put together a solution that will last us at least a year or two.”
• “It depends on how many indexes this table already has – how many does it have?”

When you finish the sentence, you keep moving quickly towards a solution, and you’re a helper rather than an obstacle. Don’t be an obstacle: don’t be yet another reason why developers hate database administrators. <sigh> And if you need help understanding what it depends on, check out my anniversary sale.