Re: HELP! migrating from NT to UNIX

"Joel Garry" <joel-garry_at_home.com> wrote in message news:91884734.0401271653.464cf865_at_posting.google.com...
> Yes, he might make an expensive mess, but I don't see how people can
> lose jobs over that. Either the migration works or it doesn't or it
> corrupts everything unrecoverably. I would make the assumption that
> if it is small enough for a PHB to hire his nephew, there aren't
> enough people around to hurt, because if it is a large org, there will
> be enough expertise around to help him through it. And I, for one,
> _love_ stories of large orgs where that is not true. There is no
> getting around the fact that the ultimate responsibility is with
> management, not with some newbie.

<snip>
 > Perhaps you can point me to the insurance company that will cover for
> > backups which were taken, but were lost along with the data centre when
they
> > weren't taken off-site as per normal practice.
>
> Business interruption insurance. Altavista gives a sponsored link
> that actually has some decent stuff:
> http://www.irmi.com/expert/insurance.asp
>
> "Valuable Papers/Computer Files. Policies may only provide a small
> limit for valuable papers or limited coverage to only restore computer
> files from back-ups. This could be problematic if the only back-ups
> were stored at the loss site. Also, some policies may provide coverage
> for the costs associated with recreating or re-engineering information
> that was lost. Where this coverage is afforded, a methodology must be
> developed to accurately capture the time and expense required in
> recreating the information."
>
> So, such policies are out there. Whether anyone bothered?...

Thanks for the pointer, though I suspect that the economics of developing a methodology to accurately capture time and expense to recreate the data would a) need to be done at the time of taking out the policy and b) cost more than offsite storage of tapes.

> > Dan and Sy have both offered relatively sensible advice and links to the
OP.
> > Like them I have difficulties in dealing with someone who says 'I've
just
> > got myself hired to do a job I cannot do, please help'.
>
> Why the difficulties? Maybe he can with a kickstart. It's not like
> someone asking for homework cheats. Honest questions with informed
> and understanding management, maybe through necessity he can figure
> out what he doesn't know and avoid getting ripped off by some useless
> salesperson. It just all depends exactly how far in over his head he
> is. Some little nothing 100M db might work out mostly ok with 9i
> defaults and SQL*Loader. The NT might just have needed some decent
> dba work to deal with growth, so what? as long as it gets kicked up
> into unix.
>
> More importantly, the Oracle/cdos world should not toss such
> situations into the garbage.

Actually you are right and I was probably wrong, Yes I still have difficulties with 'I don't know how I got hired for this job I don't know how to do...', but yes people do achieve stuff that they thought they couldn't and just being dismissive isn't a particularly helpful or professional attitude.

--
Niall Litchfield
Oracle DBA
Audit Commission UK
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