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Home -> Community -> Mailing Lists -> Oracle-L -> RE: "Application DBA" vs. DBA vs. Application Administrator
Patrice - I think the previous discussion was not referring to application developers that had appointed themselves to be an "application DBA" but to honest-to-goodness certified, card-carrying Oracle DBAs, some of whom tend to work with new development. I agree with you that DBA has the word "administer" in it which is inherently different from "developer".
My interpretation of the previous discussion is that our workload as DBAs tends to be split between production support and development support. Some of us DBAs tend to migrate our careers toward jobs that involve almost entirely production support, while others crave the excitement of development situations. When a large application is developed and then moved into production, it is not unusual to see the DBA that shepherded the development to move onto another development project and be replaced by a DBA with a history of maintaining production databases.
However, we must remember that developers come in a wide range of database capabilities. With some developers it is important to keep them on a tight reign so they don't do something that will cause problems in the future. Some developers have excellent database skills and may even have previously been a DBA (I know that is hard to believe, why would anyone give up the mad, carefree DBA life). I feel that you need to adapt your style to accommodate differences in development groups, development tools (some cause more DBA headaches than others), company politics, etc.
The part that I struggle with is that I am the sole DBA for a group
of production databases and I also support 4 separate groups of developers,
each with their own competencies and tools. When push comes to shove (about
every day), I tend to work on keeping the production databases going at the
expense of sitting down with the developers to find what they are up to,
coach them on modeling, etc. My manager doesn't always understand why I
don't have time to keep the development side of my job going. In terms of
justifying my salary, the development stuff has a lot more visibility. If
anyone has any tips for balancing these two areas of responsibility I am
eager to listen.
Dennis Williams
DBA
Lifetouch, Inc.
dwilliams_at_lifetouch.com
-----Original Message-----
Sent: Thursday, November 08, 2001 7:30 AM
To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L
Sorry to sound harsh, but in my opinion "Application DBA" is an oxymoron.
There are database administrators, these can advise on how best to build the underlying data structures if need be.
Sometimes developers have to tune their applications, proper design is part of that process. This does not make them "Application DBAs".
There are application administrators, these administer applications like SAP, Oracle Applications, boiler-plate applications, in-house programs that need constant tweaking and "improvement", etc.
We went through this here a couple of years ago, the developers kept referring to their "Application DBAs" when in fact they design and develop applications, then tweak them --> they are Application Architects perhaps, Application Administrators probably, but Database Administrators? No.
This smells like developers not having enough to do. Sometimes for whatever reason they want to start doing DBA-type work to fill their gap times and to increase their control over the machines. Not a good thing, most often when we are handed a server from end users or developers, the servers are a mess. Main reason: Developers tend to work by trial and error, and to build things over time. And... "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" usually implies: No planning ahead, no tuning or monitoring if there aren't any glaring problems, if there is one patch it up if it's a faster way to "get by".
That is neither database administration, nor system administration.
My CDN$0.02 which is worth about US$0.0124 as of yesterday's dollar conversion.
Regards,
Patrice Boivin
Systems Analyst (Oracle Certified DBA)
Systems Admin & Operations | Admin. et Exploit. des systèmes Technology Services | Services technologiques Informatics Branch | Direction de l'informatique Maritimes Region, DFO | Région des Maritimes, MPO
E-Mail: boivinp_at_mar.dfo-mpo.gc.ca <mailto:boivinp_at_mar.dfo-mpo.gc.ca>
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Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.com
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Author: Boivin, Patrice J
INET: BoivinP_at_mar.dfo-mpo.gc.ca
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Fat City Network Services -- (858) 538-5051 FAX: (858) 538-5051 San Diego, California -- Public Internet access / Mailing Lists --------------------------------------------------------------------To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message to: ListGuru_at_fatcity.com (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and in the message BODY, include a line containing: UNSUB ORACLE-L (or the name of mailing list you want to be removed from). You may also send the HELP command for other information (like subscribing). Received on Thu Nov 08 2001 - 17:32:32 CST
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