Professional Development

Salary

It’s time for our annual salary survey to find out what data professionals make. You fill out the data, we open source the whole thing, and you can analyze the data to spot trends and do a better job of negotiating your own salary: We make Stacks of Sacks Take the Data Professional Salary Survey now.…

What Should We Change About the Data Professional Salary Survey for 2019?

October 18, 2018

Salary

Every year, we publish an open Data Professional Salary Survey. Last year, 3,113 folks from 73 countries answered, so we’re doing it again this year. Here are the questions we asked last year. If there’s any changes you want to make, leave a comment and we’ll talk through it as a community. I want to make…

Book Review: Microsoft SQL Server Training, Volume 1

May 10, 2018

Book Reviews

Last week, I shared a few pictures out of Ron Soukup’s Inside SQL Server 6.5 book. You had a blast with that one, so I figured I’d share some more pictures from another, uh, let’s call it “well-preserved” book about SQL Server. Make sure you see the subtitle of this book before you add it to your…

Book Review: Inside SQL Server 6.5

May 2, 2018

Book Reviews

Books Offline 30 years ago, back in 1988, Microsoft, Ashton-Tate, and Sybase got together to start building SQL Server 1.0 for OS/2. I wanted to take a trip down memory lane to celebrate, but I didn’t wanna go back quite that far. I wanted to go back to what would probably be fairly recognizable – say,…

The 2018 Data Professionals Salary Survey Results

January 8, 2018

Processes and Practices, Professional Development

Salary

How much do database administrators, analysts, architects, developers, and data scientists make? We asked, and 3,113 of you from 73 countries answered this year. I make my query bucks the hard way Download the 2018 & 2017 results in Excel. A few things to know about it: The data is public domain. The license tab…

Automating Complacency

January 5, 2018

Erik Darling

There’s no Latin word for Robot I’m all for automation, especially when it comes to the boring stuff. As awesome as the automation routines we have for that are, I still see people messing it up. Right now, there’s no Clippy/HAL mashup glaring at you, telling you that what you’re doing is a bad idea.…

Our 25 Most-Read and Most-Commented Blog Posts of 2017

December 27, 2017

Blogging

We published a whopping 312 blog posts in 2017! Looking back, wow, there was a lot of fun stuff in here. First, here’s the ones you read the most: 25. Max Worker Threads – Don’t Touch That 24. Announcing Our 2017 Black Friday Doorbusters 23. Ola Hallengren’s Maintenance Scripts are Now on Github 22.…

Female DBAs Make Less Money. Why?

December 26, 2017

The 2018 Data Professional Salary Survey is open now, and you can look at the live responses as they come in. (To get that in Excel, click File, Download.) As of this writing (Dec 23), there’s already over 2,500 responses, so I’m going to take a look at a few things to see how it’s…

Tell Us What You Make: The 2018 Data Professional Salary Survey

December 11, 2017

Not what you’re worth, dear reader: we know your worth cannot possibly be calculated in base-10 numbering systems because you’re just so awesome, but what you make. How many stacks of Paul Whites are you pulling down? A few things to know: It’s totally anonymous (we’re not getting your email, IP address, or anything like that.) It’s…

What Should We Change About the Data Professional Salary Survey?

December 6, 2017

119

Last year, 2,899 of you filled out the 2017 Data Professional Salary Survey (results), so I figure we should probably do that again. Here are the questions we asked last year. If there’s any changes you want to make, leave a comment and we’ll talk through it. 1. What’s your total salary in US dollars,…

How to Hire a Junior DBA

September 28, 2017

Interviewing

When you’re hiring a Junior DBA, ask yourself a few questions: “What job did they have before this?” Someone who’s currently employed as a Junior DBA isn’t looking for another Junior DBA job: they’re looking for a Senior DBA job. Because of that, you have to rethink how you write the job description and minimum…

4 DBA Resume Anti-Patterns

June 8, 2017

Professional Development

Every now and then, clients ask me to interview candidates for their open DBA positions. I get to see a lot of resumes, and there are a few warning signs that pop up regularly. 1. The Keyword Encyclopedia. I get it: you’ve opened SSMS before, and you clicked on all the options and wizards, and…

Automated Tuning And The Future Of Performance Tuners

June 7, 2017

Erik Darling

Consulting, SQL Server

Before you get too excited This isn’t a dive into any of the new automated tuning features of SQL Server 2017. I’m interested in them because Microsoft thinks they can put us out of business with them, but… Fat chance. See, a lot of the automated performance tuning features assume you EVER HAD GOOD PERFORMANCE…

This Year is Your Best Chance to Speak at the PASS Summit.

May 22, 2017

#SQLPass, Writing and Presenting

Me presenting, photo by John Martin The call for speakers at the PASS Summit is open now. As of this writing, there are less than 120 sessions submitted. To put that in perspective, in 2016, there were 758 sessions submitted overall, and about ~175 general session spots. Your chances have never been better. Get in…

Group Post: If I Took Another DBA Job, My First Question Would Be…

May 10, 2017

Production Database Administration, Professional Development

“Question 1: how do you predict how long a rollback will take?” Brent says: “How many people are in the on-call rotation with me, and can I give them each a technical test?” Once you get out of the on-call rotation, it’s really hard to go back to the electronic tether. I’d be willing to…

Wanna speak at the PASS Summit? Here’s how.

April 19, 2017

#SQLPass, Writing and Presenting

No Comments

The PASS Summit is the biggest SQL Server community event, and a lot of us speakers have “present at PASS” on their bucket list. Getting in is legendarily difficult because competition is fierce. Many sessions are submitted for each one that’s accepted, and you have to work hard to stand out from the pack. This year’s Call…

Announcing Our New DBA Job Interview Q&A Course.

April 5, 2017

Interviewing

Whether you’re applying for a DBA job or getting ready to hire a DBA, you probably don’t know what questions to ask to tell if somebody really knows what they’re doing or not – or what answers to look for. There’s the classic tired question, “Tell me the difference between a clustered and nonclustered index,”…

What Kinds of Raises do DBAs Get?

March 2, 2017

I took the data from the 2017 Data Professional Salary Survey, and filtered just for database administrators in the United States. Then, I pivoted it on the two experience questions. First, we’ll cover database experience, and then we’ll cover job experience. How many years of experience do you have with this database? I stopped the analysis at…

The 2017 Data Professional Salary Survey Results

January 19, 2017