Re: First DBA job!

I second that plan of home and on the job study. However, it has been my experience that if you've learned a lot at one job then you'll never get the recognition you have earned if you stay w/that employer. I've always had to move on before anyone recognized my new skills. Also, contracting has no real drawbacks, and you can earn twice as much as a "permanent" employee. As my former boss used to say, "None of us are permanent."

Paul Cluiss
Dallas, Texas

Van Messner wrote:

> You are right to be concerned about only passing the tests and not having
> any experience. So I suggest you take your home computer, put in a minimum
> of 128M of memory and a 4G hard drive, load up NT workstation, and buy an
> Oracle Enterprise server CD from Oracle's web site for $5. Then install
> Oracle and build a database or two. Try breaking things and repairing them.
> See if you can leverage any of your new knowledge into persuading the bosses
> at work to let you improve their Oracle system. It needs to be tuned,
> right? It needs a better backup and recovery plan, right? In six months
> you'll have your certification and be able to claim a year's experience.
> And you'll have more confidence in your ability to get things done.
>
> Van
>
> PS that home computer can be an old P90. It's the memory that counts.
>
> elle <elle_at_surma.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
> news:940361222.25558.0.nnrp-03.d4e4e2cc_at_news.demon.co.uk...
> > Hi,
> > I've done 2 of the Oracle DBA Certification Tests and planning to finish
> the
> > certification in a couple of months.
> > I am currently working as a software engineer(1 yr). Basically, my job
> > consists of embedding SQL into COBOL apps. My team also act as DBAs of our
> > development environment. (setup servers, advice on sql, security,etc.) for
> > both MS SQL Server and Oracle (but ms sql server is main platform so I
> don't
> > get to do much Oracle at all in my working life)
> > I am willing to move on and start a career as an Oracle DBA, but I don't
> > feel very confident about it at all. I know I'll get the certification,
> but
> > my experience is so limited, that I'm worried I'll forget all the stuff
> > pretty soon if I don't practice it.
> > It's not that I don't believe in myself. I know that if I get the
> experience
> > I can become good at it, but worries me thinking how I am going to
> convince
> > a prospective employee, that just because I lack the experience I cannot
> do
> > a good job and be an asset for the company.
> >
> > any advice?
> >
> > thanks in advance
> >
> > elle
> >
> >
Received on Wed Oct 20 1999 - 11:38:03 CDT