Multi-platform

In the past, Harry Splinter, Database Reliability Engineer at OptimaData, wrote about SAP ASE backups under the title "Thoughts on backups," in which he also paid attention to recovery. During his career as a DBA, he encountered quite a few situations in which recovery was the last straw. This sometimes led to unpleasant surprises. In this blog he shares his experiences. To learn, but also to amuse.

Once upon a time there was a client with a request for help. For this customer, we do not do regular management and no active monitoring was set up for that purpose. The customer had noticed that two disks on a SQL Server instance were nearly full. Normally, the disk is then enlarged; after all, it is quite normal for databases to grow. But the customer saw that there might be more to it, as the transaction log files had also grown very large, and asked if we would investigate what was going on. In this blog, Cindy Beernink, database consultant at OptimaData, talks about the importance of monitoring.

We as OptimaData hope that all clients and other relations have been able to conclude 2022 nicely. It is time for a new chapter. In the year behind us, we received many questions about database consulting and were able to give just as much advice and implement solutions. So what were the most important and common issues we discovered and what lessons can you take into the new year?

In previous blogs, we described how to select a database support partner, how to prepare your team and what the three phases of effective database support are. But how does it actually work? In this blog, Eric Gipon gives an example of how we worked at one of our customers.

Formula 1, never before has it been so popular. The fact that Max Verstappen is not doing undeserving business in the king class certainly contributes to that. Who doesn't remember last year's spectacular finale? His comfortable lead in the championship is, besides his talent, also due to the qualities of the car. Such a Formula 1 car is one big jumble of technology and the trick is to find the right configuration and setup to achieve maximum performance. In this blog, we make a comparison with the setup of databases.

In previous blogs, we described how to select a database support partner and how to prepare your team. Now the real work begins. You've chosen your partner, the QuickScan is done, there are clear agreements about hiring additional expertise, and your team is trained. You can get started. The following three phases can be distinguished.

In a previous blog, we described how to select a database support partner. But before you can get started, there are a number of preparations you need to make. In this blog, we'll tell you what those preparations are and what to look out for.

The world of database management is changing rapidly and has a huge impact on the way we work and think. The traditional database administrator, dedicated to full-time management, will increasingly give way to a coordinating spider in the web. Infrastructure advice, scripting, applying best practices in the deployment of resources, thinking together about the most efficient way of working instead of regular, manual management tasks. Of course, you could bring in such a database expert as a permanent employee, but you might be better off spending your time on things that will benefit your business. How do you select a good database support partner?

Do you recognize this? You look back at your work and see that you've spent far too long doing repetitive, boring, manual tasks that are not very sustainable. Moreover, their number only increases as the environment grows. As a Product Owner or IT Manager, this is also hard to understand. You only see that a team does not get around to producing deliverables in the development sprints. You don’t see them drowning in putting out fires and making manual database changes. How beautiful the world would be if the DBA could lean forward in DevOps teams, speak the same language as the software and system engineers, empower team members and act as a trusted advisor. Everyone wants a DBA like that! In this blog, we go one step further in talking about useful redundancy and how you can create a stable and secure work environment with the shift to Database Reliability Engineering.

The FD Gazellen Award is a prize that Het Financieele Dagblad has been awarding since 2004 to the fastest growing companies in the Netherlands. We at OptimaData are very proud to be able to call ourselves FD Gazelle for the second time in a row in our five years of existence. In this blog Gerard Zuidweg, OptimaData's Managing Partner, tells us why we are honoured.

What has always surprised Gerard Zuidweg, Managing Partner at OptimaData, is that the profession of database administrator is often somewhat undervalued. And that while a well-organized database is crucial to any IT solution. It may not be the sexiest profession in the world, but it is one that should be cherished. In this blog, Gerard explains why.

Tino Dudink is one of our DBA Consultants and Senior Database Reliability Engineers. Earlier we looked into Tino's backpack. In this blog, Tino tells us how it is possible that after 25 years he still enjoys plodding through the depths of the database world.

We regularly get staffing firms on the phone looking for a full-time DBA for - say - a year. That's quite a lot. Are you going to migrate the whole world, I then ask. When I then hear what the request for help is, I think: surely that can be done much more efficiently. Where does it go wrong?

For the past six months, Thomas Brinkman has been conducting a research assignment at OptimaData. During the assignment, he investigated how a company like OptimaData can deal with the development around databases in the cloud and how they can function efficiently. What are his conclusions?

Ransomware attacks. They are becoming more common and have an increasing impact. In this blog, our colleague Thomas Brinkman discusses three best practices for reducing data loss with a good database strategy.

In our work, we encounter many companies and organizations with a mission-critical database environment that is managed by a single database administrator or where care of the database environment rests with a single application or system administrator. In many cases, that can be an excellent solution. And as long as there are no exciting changes and everything is functioning normally, there are no worries. And yet ... it just so happens that something goes wrong while your employee is on vacation. Can your employee with all the knowledge of your database also go on vacation without a laptop?

IT develops at the speed of light. Innovations and updates follow each other in rapid succession and one new tooling is presented after another. There is also a lot of movement in the field of open source databases. Staying abreast of all these developments is therefore quite a challenge. In this blog we will give you some tips and valuable resources.

There is a growing interest in Database-as-a-Service (DBaaS). At the same time we only seem to be at the forefront with regard to quality and possibilities. Countless variations are now available from different cloud providers. Databases can be deployed in the cloud with seeming simplicity. If you believe the marketing stories, you no longer need a database administrator. Developers with ready-to-use building blocks - containers - can get started right away. But did they really take a good look at DBaaS?

In the previous blog Gerard Zuidweg explained why we at OptimaData find it very important to offer internships. In this way we can contribute to the level of knowledge of a new generation of professionals. But finding an internship is not easy these days. For that reason Minister for Education Ingrid van Engelshoven and chairman Jacco Vonhof of entrepreneurial organization MKB-Nederland are calling on schools and businesses to deploy creative solutions. As a recognized apprenticeship company for MBO trainees, we are happy to do our part. In August Jeroen Versteeg started as an MBO trainee at OptimaData. What are his experiences?

IT is developing rapidly. The rise of the cloud and the changing way organizations develop, monitor and manage applications can lead to the gradual disappearance of in-depth IT knowledge and expertise within organizations. Before you know it, we have become managers of the cloud instead of craftsmen within IT. An impoverishment, according to Gerard Zuidweg. In this blog he explains why and what OptimaData is doing to turn the tide in their world of databases.

Eric Gipon spent many years as a DBA mainly working on one platform at one company at a time. Then he switched to OptimaData, a service and consultancy organization with multiple customers and multiple platforms. In this blog he describes how he liked the first month.

Lately we've been writing regularly about cloud solutions and points of consideration of different variants of cloud solutions lately. But what exactly is the difference between all those variants? With which form are you the most carefree and with which model do you mainly have control over the performance? Can you still see the wood for the trees?

In this blog Martijn Wallet, our Manager Consultancy and Training, discusses what containerization is, what the pros and cons are and when it's better to stay away from it.

We wrote earlier that there is nothing wrong with managing databases in a somewhat older environment. But there is also nothing wrong with more mature database administrators. Thomas Spoelstra - yes, the guy from the man cave - is one of those. He knows better than anyone how to set up a database as efficiently as possible, because 'before' there simply wasn't any more disk space or memory. Now that we are massively switching to the cloud, with all its space and possibilities for scaling up, those efficiency skills no longer seem that important. Until the costs get out of hand. Then you need someone who can assess and fine-tune the content of the data model to reduce your cloud costs. So someone like Thomas...

Voiceworks devises and develops innovative communication and collaboration solutions for the business market. A healthy database environment is crucial in this respect. Because database management just is not their core business, Voiceworks has decided to outsource this to OptimaData. Bas Roos, Infrastructure Engineer at Voiceworks, explains why.

Because of the coronavirus, we're all working remotely all of a sudden. In order to be able to work remotely there are sufficient tools available. But to work well and enjoyably from a distance and to really make contact with colleagues, employees and customers, some extra attention is needed. We are very happy with co-creative entrepreneurship. Pieter Groenendijk, our staffing and recruitment specialist, explains in this blog what we mean by this and why we care about the extra bit of vitamin A (attention).

There is nothing wrong with the management of databases in somewhat older environments. On the contrary, these are applications that keep a lot of companies afloat. But there are a number of things you need to pay attention to. Roland van Veen, OptimaData DBA and Database Reliability Engineer, explains in this blog what those things are.

As a partner of MongoDB we have unlimited access to the MongoDB University (on demand). What does unlimited mean in this case? If you don't have this kind of access to the MongoDB university, then you can still do the courses for free, but the only limitation is that you can't do the courses on your own pace. New course subjects will be available on a per week basis. This means that if you've done one course subject, that you have to wait a week for the next subject to become available.

I recently started as a multiplatform DBA. Two weeks before I actually started working at the company where I work now, I already got an invite to go to PG day UK, with a few other DBA's. As I had no prior experience with PostgreSQL, I did not know what to expect. The first few weeks there I've looked into both MongoDB and PostgreSQL, just to get to know the products my colleagues were already supporting. So I started my first PG day with very little knowledge of PostgreSQL.

A few months ago I came across a job opening that stated "multiplatform DBA". Immediately I was intrigued. What would this multiplatform DBA job require, is this something I would like to do, am I able to let go of my notion of "one database platform is better than other database platforms", what other database platforms should I have knowledge of? I had lots of questions, but no answers. So I decided to apply for the job. Talking about this job and being assessed about my Oracle and MS SQL knowledge made me realize that I have picked up more on the SQL server platform than I realized, the company was really happy to have me. I've had multiple opportunities to expand my IT knowledge to other areas in IT like storage, operating systems, and network but never had I the chance to expand my knowledge on multiple databases.