Re: Are Oracle GUIs causing a decline in DBA salaries?

Karsten Farrell <kfarrell_at_belgariad.com> wrote in message news:<MPG.191847d0a5c5474398975e_at_news.la.sbcglobal.net>...
> Comments embedded...
>
> joel-garry_at_home.com said...
> > The problem is, management too often does not want to pay for
> > experience if they don't have to, and the GUI's allow them not to - to
> > a point. So you wind up with unemployed or underemployed experienced
> > people, and places that don't have experienced people when they need
> > them for a brief fix.
> <snip>
> I think the current desire on the part of management to pay less for
> employees is only marginally based on the fact that GUIs exist. Yes, I
> know a number of DBAs who can't find a job because they're
> "overqualified." And most of them don't use a GUI.

I again disagree - poor managers hire those most like themselves, so they understand fiddling with a PC more than performing DBA tasks.  

>
> I've mentioned before that the company where I work hired me, in part,
> because they got my experience very cheaply (I work for a lot less than
> others with less experience will accept). I do sometimes use a GUI. Is
> there a lesson in there?

Perhaps because my experience only ranges from 20-something to 40-something, but I've found companies are much happier with me when they pay more money to do the same thing as other companies paid less for. I can only interpret this as them having to emotionally justify the higher cost to themselves. Sorta like women will judge guys more attractive if they are with prettier women. I would guess you pulled it off like Mercedes salesmen say even rich guys like getting a good deal. Have you seen the GUI's in Mercedes? Yechh. At least it's not as bad as BMW iDrive. The lesson is don't get stuck with a bad GUI, even if it is part of a good deal.

>
> > >
> > > And in many cases, using a GUI does allow a DBA to do some tasks in half
> > > the time. If there's a GUI tool that helps me do my job, I use it. If
> > > there isn't a GUI tool available, then I do it the old-fashioned way.
> >
> > But it requires experience to know the limits. When crunch time comes
> > and help becomes hindrance...
> >
> > Ever see grants and privileges get propagated so that everyone has
> > everything?
> Oh, absolutely! Give everybody DBA privileges and the DBA can go on
> vacation. :) But again, is this caused by a GUI or a lazy DBA?

Think about what it requires to propagate them via command lines viz. a GUI. The point I was trying to make is that the GUI makes wrong things too easy as well as right things. So you have the increased productivity, as the vendors say :-) and things spiral out of control because more wrong things are done than right. With no audit trail or logs, of course.

Of course, it can happen in a non-GUI enviroment, but that is more often because there is no DBA rather than a lazy one (or maybe that's just my skewed experience - I have very little experience going into a well-run [from a DBA viewpoint] shop, and am not sure I would do well if I did!). And of course, some of the best programmers and DBA's are "lazy workaholics" - stay up all night to optimize some bit of code to save work!

>
> >
> > >
> > > This idea that "real men don't use GUIs" is an old myth.
> >
> > There's gotta be a "real old men" joke in there somewhere! :-)
> Even if there isn't, I laughed.

Then I've done my job!

>
> > jg
> > --

jg

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