SQL Server - consolidation of multiple rows

Asked By canoe41

06-Mar-08 05:40 AM

Greetings all,

I've got a table raw_Companies
--nname
--address
--phone
--fax
--email
--homepage

with no keys defined
and a table Companies
with the same structure but with nname declared as a primary key.

Once raw_Companies gets loaded up I see where there are multiple rows
with the same value for nname but missing data in the other fields.
One row may have an address and phone while another will have only an
email, while a third may have an address and a homepage.

I need a way to take the rows in raw_Companies with the same nname and
consolidate them into one composite row inserted into Companies.

So from

IBM----1234 Main Street,Rochester,NY----\N----\N----sales@ibm.com----
www.ibm.com
IBM----\N----212-745-9324----212-745-0158----\N----\N

in raw_Companies to

IBM----1234 Main
Street,Rochester,NY----212-745-9324----212-745-0158----
sales@ibm.com----www.ibm.com

in Companies

Any help/hints/suggestions/code would be greatly appreciated.

TIA,

Still-learning Steve

05-Mar-08 11:24 AM

Perhaps a grouping/max setup?  Something like this (untested):

select nname, max(address), max(phone)...
from raw_companies
group by nname


--
Kevin G. Boles
Indicium Resources, Inc.
SQL Server MVP
kgboles a earthlink dt net

06-Mar-08 05:40 AM

A table like raw_Companies is called a staging table and Companies is
the production table.
If you want the data to load automatically into companies, a PL/SQL
procedure or trigger is one way to do it.

You can audit the changes (e.g. put in a log table messages like 'ABC
Inc. : street address changed from 1234 Main Street to 123A Main
Street") as well as logging errors (e.g., Update failed), checking
data consistency  (Zip code 11234 is invalid for Ohio), and even
outside data validation (look up address in the USPS yields Zip code
but also indicates the address is at least valid).

So it's time to step out of straight SQL and into PL/SQL.
HTH,

Ed

06-Mar-08 05:40 AM

1) If two of the rows in your raw data staging table have different
values for the same attribute, say a phone number, which one do you
pick or does it matter?  If not, then use this skeleton:

SELECT company_name, MAX(phone_nbr), MAX(..), ..
FROM RawData
GROUP BY company_name;

else find the conflicts:

SELECT company_name AS conflicting_data
FROM RawData
GROUP BY company_name
HAVING COALESCE (NULLIF(COUNT (DISTINCT phone_nbr), 1), NULLIF(COUNT
(DISTINCT ..), 1), .. ) IS NOT NULL ;

2) If two of the rows in your raw data staging table have the same
value for the same attribute, do you need to know or do you just use
it?

3) If all of the rows in your raw data have NULLs for an attribute, do
you use the NULL or want to now about it?

There are a lot of games we can play with a HAVING clause on the raw
data.  You might want to get a copy of THINKING IN SETS and look at
Chapter 10, "Scrubbing Data with Non-1NF Tables" for some more
ideas.

06-Mar-08 05:40 AM

I will go one step further and tell the guy took at Melissa Data address
scrubing products.

06-Mar-08 05:41 AM

Makes sense ...  perhaps the OP can give us some more background of
how and why info gets into the raw table.


What is "Thinking in sets"? and who wrote it ... not familiar with
that title.

05-Mar-08 03:22 PM

One could hardly be familiar with the title, as it is copyrighted in
2008 (any decent internet bookstore will show you). Quite
unsurprisingly, it is written by Joe Celko. I don't think he has any
reason to be ashamed of some shameless self-promotion...

Keep up the good work, mr. Celko!

Ruud.

06-Mar-08 05:41 AM

http://www.elsevierdirect.com/product.jsp?isbn=9780123741370

and me.

06-Mar-08 05:41 AM

Nor do I!  I remember being asked by a priest if I was ever bothered
by evil thoughts.  "**Bothered** by them?  No."

06-Mar-08 05:41 AM

it is good to go to the experts - I have often wondered if they keep the
really good ones all to themselves.

06-Mar-08 05:41 AM

--- from Ed

Thank you Ed for supplying the standardized naming for the these
tables, makes
googling (v.?) more accurate...

--- from CELKO
Thank you , all these suggestions are helpful. There'll be scrubbing
o'plenty happening shortly.
As for the data, I'm merging ~20 xls totalling >200Krows into this
table, using Perl to scrub the data per field perl line b4 loading
into the staging table.

I'll give these suggestions a try shortly.

Thanks to all who responded,

Still-Learning Steve

05-Mar-08 04:38 PM

Thinking In Sets was written by Joe Celko.

If you know the names Date and Codd you should know who you are
addressing: Joe Celko.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

08-Mar-08 11:29 AM

Not a name I am familiar with.


But at least you got to put your url out again eh?

07-Mar-08 12:54 AM

Says much about your attitude toward our profession.

Enlighten yourself:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Celko
http://www.dbmsmag.com/artin301.html#A000009
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22Wikipedia%22+and+%22Joe+Celko%22&btnG=Google+Search
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

07-Mar-08 07:26 AM

Not necessarily.  There are a lot of top notch programmers and DBA's who
have never heard of Joe Celko.


--
==================
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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07-Mar-08 08:39 AM

But at least they should know Wikipedia  ;-))

Shakespeare

07-Mar-08 01:24 PM

Well right now I can only name one. <g>

Of course you are correct. There are top notch programmers that
don't know who Chris Date is. There are top notch programmers
that don't know who Dennis Ritchie and Ray Boyce are either no
doubt.

Though I suspect you could put the names of those "top notch"
programmers on a 3x5 card.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

08-Mar-08 11:30 AM

LOL!  Programmers, sure; I know some who are not sure who the
president is.  DBAs, probably not :)  I am teaching a graduate
Database Course at a small local college from the 8-th edition of a
popular textbook.  I am not just quoted in a few places, but my name
is used in data in the examples.  Unfortunately, I am shown as knowing
Java in one of the tables, which I don't.

07-Mar-08 03:36 PM

My first run in with Joe was 12 years ago in form of a QA suite named
It contains "SQL for Smarties" queries.

Cheers
Serge
--
Serge Rielau
DB2 Solutions Development
IBM Toronto Lab

08-Mar-08 11:30 AM

d of Joe Celko. <<


I'd have to root about, but I think I have an email from Joe from
about 15 years ago.  (You can assume he made a positive impression for
me to remember that!)

jg
--
@home.com is bogus.
http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2008/01/15/dreamhost-accidently-bills-customers=
-7500000/

07-Mar-08 05:03 PM

Quite incorrect.  Right off the top of my head I can probably name a
dozen I know personally who haven't heard of him.  He's well known in
some circles, but definitely not all.

--
==================
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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07-Mar-08 05:05 PM

I'm not arguing about your qualifications at all.  But I can name some
excellent DBA's for Fortune 500 companies who haven't heard of you.
These are guys with 20+ years of experience on huge databases running on
mainframes.

--
==================
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Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
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08-Mar-08 11:30 AM

of Joe Celko. <<

Joe probably you do know a lot.  It looks like you started doing
things in the relational world after I was already working in the
database area.  Like many I paid dues in the mainframe area ( IMS and
DB2 ) before moving into the oracle area.

Real world experience doing complicated designs teaches you a lot of
things.  Codd and Date were the authors of the texts and mathematical
theory that was most useful to me.

If you changed or advanced the fundamentals based on those authors
contributions to relational theory then yes I am unaware of those
contributions.

I find the curious allegations of Captain Morgan off target as usual.
But I expect him to reply at least several more times in this thread.
After all it gets his name and website posted several more times on
cdos.

08-Mar-08 11:30 AM

d of Joe Celko. <<


Lots of people in the oracle side also apparently.

Bingo,

08-Mar-08 11:30 AM

But clearly every good programmer and every good DBA knows who
Torvalds is. Also IMO every good programmer knows who Stroustrup is.

08-Mar-08 11:30 AM

I am not aware of anything either :)  I think it is funny that I get
accused of being too theoretical in some of the newsgroups when my
(few) academic publications were in Software Engineering and not very
important at all.

I have always written for the working SQL guys or consulted for
companies developing SQL products.  I did find out that some of the
tricks I popularized in SMARTIES were optimized for in several
products, as a direct result of the development teams using the book
for test suites.

07-Mar-08 06:43 PM

I'd say wrong on both counts.  There are a lot of programmers who have
never heard of either - because they aren't into Linux or C++, for instance.

I would suspect more know of Stroustrup, but even that's a relatively
small number of all programmers.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

07-Mar-08 08:59 PM

Next time you come to Seattle I'll take you over to Starbucks and
introduce you. <g>
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

07-Mar-08 09:00 PM

DB2? Broken? Tell me it ain't so. <g>

Have I got a story to tell you about zLinux.
On second thought you probably don't want to hear it. <g>

Have a great weekend.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

07-Mar-08 09:02 PM

The operative phrase here is "top notch." If they ever took even a basic
class on normalization they could not have missed the name Boyce. If
they learned more in C than "Hello World" they'd know who Dennis is.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

07-Mar-08 10:24 PM

Not necessarily.  A lot of great DBA's know normalization but don't know
Boyce.  And these are DBA's who manage databases in the hundreds of
terabyte range, running sometimes tens of thousands of operations a
second.  They learned normalization techniques and maybe even heard of
Boyce and Codd.  But they have no idea who they were.

And while they were famous 20 years ago, a lot of people who have
learned C in the last 10 years or more have never heard of either
Kernighan or Ritchie.

--
==================
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Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
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07-Mar-08 11:06 PM

Unfortunately I know far to many "so-called" DBA's who "manage" 250+TB
databases or OLTP databases that do thousands of txn/minute that have no
clue about normalization or database design or the nuances of SQL
programming.  Managing databases, designing databases and writing SQL
are really the three sides of the same coin... (yes, a coin is
3-dimensional) Each is necessary, but you can **do** one without
completely knowing and understanding the other. (Since a coin is an
inanimate object does it *know* it has 3 sides?) It is helpful if you
have some understanding of the each, but in reality it is not necessary.
Sadly we are the ones who answer a lot of SQL howto questions in
CDM,CDOS and MPSP from those who call themselves DBA's and may have
heard the names of these "legends of technology".

The other really sad part is that they were hired because they were

Michael Austin -
and I have heard of all of these guys... including Joe and even have
(and read) some of their books. :) :)
last few years, it has stagnated the innovation in that technology.
Nothing but the color of the box, price and customer loyalty
differentiate many of the current offerings in computing technologies. --MA"

07-Mar-08 11:23 PM

I'm not talking thousands of transactions a minute.  I'm talking TENS OF
THOUSANDS ever SECOND.  A much higher order of magnitude than you have.
To do this successfully, you need to be a great DBA - and these are.
They have to be to be in the business and companies (mostly Fortune 500)
they are in.  And they have to be able to design databases well - and
they need to know when to break the normalization rules for performance
reasons.

But these people don't ask questions.  The know the answers already.
And, if they don't, no one does.

To be a fair DBA you don't need to know everything.  But to be a great
DBA, you've GOT to understand the design, coding and administration of
databases.  Someone may know one part really well.  But that doesn't
make him a great DBA.



None of these are "certified", AFAIK.  They were hired for their
knowledge, not because of a piece of paper.  But then they were doing it
long before certifications were around.



--
==================
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Jerry Stuckle
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08-Mar-08 02:23 AM

Celko - the great forum clown.

Actually he isn't that well know, go to any conference and ask and folk will
tell you who? There are also a ton of folk (the majority) who don't even use
community forums like this one - does not make them bad.

Celko is a content jocky - the only thing he's popularised is nested sets
and he even pinched that idea from somebody else - search, there is a
discussion somewhere on the nested sets origin.

He's certainly not respected anymore; in the SQL Server forums he's
ridiculed and ignore by most now - treaten as the village idiot because of
his lack of acceptance on how the product works and his very old very dated
canned answers that are always getting him into trouble.

--
Tony Rogerson, SQL Server MVP
http://sqlblogcasts.com/blogs/tonyrogerson
[Ramblings from the field from a SQL consultant]
http://sqlserverfaq.com
[UK SQL User Community]

08-Mar-08 09:03 AM

I would disagree with your characterization of them as "great DBAs."

I know that might be your impression of them. And I've no doubt they
can install, patch, and backup and restore without crashing and burning.
But it takes more than that to be "great."

You don't know normalization if you don't know Boyce-Codd Normal Form.
What you are describing is the competent self-taught ... not the

All "great" lawyers go to law school.
All "great" surgeons go to medical school.
All "great" engineers to go college/university.
Only in our profession is great defined by the fact that so far
the bridges you've built haven't killed anyone ... well lately.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

08-Mar-08 09:07 AM

We've a mixed crowd on this thread ... MySQL, Oracle, and SQL Server
so we need to be careful about what we claim and how it will be
interpreted by different audiences.

MySQL certification?

SQL Server certification may be important to finding jobs. I don't
know the market well enough to comment and given my proximity to
Redmond my view may be skewed.

Oracle certification, at least in my part of the planet is a waste as
it won't get you a job and teaches much that is incorrect.

I wouldn't open my mouth for my dentist if she had the equivalent
skill set of someone that gets a certificate in a software program.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

08-Mar-08 09:13 AM

You must be a very humble man Tony. You've so much to be humble about.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

08-Mar-08 10:02 AM

ANY certification.  These guys (and gals) have been DBA's much longer
than MySQL - or even SQL Server - has been around, much less
certifications for them.  Not sure when Oracle started up.


Only for clueless employers.  Proven ability to do the job is more
important for knowledgeable ones.

Certification means only that you can pass a test, not that you can do
the job.  Just like driving - passing a written test only means you read
the book, not that you can handle the vehicle.


Ditto.

--
==================
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Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

08-Mar-08 10:09 AM

That is a completely asinine comment.  You don't know them; you don't
know their background or their jobs, you don't know their training and
you don't know the quality of work they do.

Yet you say they are not great DBA's because they aren't familiar with
Boyce's name?  I've seen stupid and small minded in this group before,
but that tops the cake.


And you have no idea what my background is.  For your information, I've
been programming for over 40 years.  I've been working with RDB's for
around 25 years - I started while working for IBM in the early 80's.
And I've been teaching sql and database administration to Fortune 500
companies for around 15 years.

I know a great dba when I see one.  And I know a small minded idiot when
I see one.  Your comments do NOT show you are a great DBA.


Who said they don't know Boyce-Codd Normal Form?  They know how to
normalize a database.  They know the rules for each of the 5 normal
forms.  The fact YOU call it Boyce-Codd does not mean everyone does.


Small minded people make small minded comments.

--
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08-Mar-08 01:22 PM

Don't worry Denial Again; I hold you in the same albeit less extreme light
as celko, i.e. somebody stuck in the classroom with little if any real
industrial experience of SQL Server.

--
Tony Rogerson, SQL Server MVP
http://sqlblogcasts.com/blogs/tonyrogerson
[Ramblings from the field from a SQL consultant]
http://sqlserverfaq.com
[UK SQL User Community]

09-Mar-08 06:07 PM

Strange. In our trade most great people are largely self taught in the
areas they are great in - the industry is new, and people are coming
up with innovations all the time.
Linus Torvalds came up with lots of really cool stuff when he wasn't
even a Master. Sergey Brin and Larry Page do have PhDs, and they came
up themselves with what makes them great.

Returning to normalization, it is not a very complex theory. When I
was getting my education, it did not exist yet, but if it did, it
would be taught in my first year, and it would be an easy course. In a
top notch university you have to learn a lot of more advanced math to
get your Master's degree. More to the point, for me as a development
lead, as well as for many DBAs, normalization is just one of many
challenges, and a relatively easy one to put it mildly.

Memorizing last names has nothing to do with the ability to administer
databases. Names of inventors are forgotten and or omitted all the
time. This is especially true for foreign names. Consider periodic
table of the chemical elements - it is being taught in American
schools, but the Russian name of its inventor is rarely mentioned.
Similarly, names of inventors on Normal Forms may be omitted of
forgotten, especially in other countries, and that is OK just as well.

08-Mar-08 08:11 PM

Actually I do know one thing ... that is with respect to their training.
You provided that answer yourself.

But my comment is hardly asinine. I just, it appears, have a higher
standard than you before I refer to someone as "great."


Not because. But it is part of it: Yes.

Again ... my standard it, it would seem, rather higher than yours when
I throw around adjectives.

Since we are speaking English lets go with a dictionary definition:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/great


I guess I find them less remarkable than you do.


We are not discussing you personally: Don't change the subject. Above
in pursuing that but I doubt you are older than me so be careful here.


Never claimed to be one. Not once.


Actually it does.
http://www.datamodel.org/NormalizationRules.html
http://ycmi.med.yale.edu/nadkarni/db_course/Norm_contents.htm
http://comsci.liu.edu/~murali/syllabi/cs148_fall_2007.htm

At least within the community of those of us that teach it.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)

08-Mar-08 08:17 PM

Stuck in the classroom no. I spend less than 5% of my time there.
Just built, and next week delivering to a NYSE traded public utility,
an F5 Load Balancer front-ending clustered application servers
front-ending a RAC database with dual NetApps. And all done without
a single PowerPoint slide: A real stretch!

But industrial experience with SQL Server? On that you are correct.
I am so ashamed. They'll probably make me turn in my Oracle Ace
shirt and start wearing one that says "SQL Server Joker."
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

08-Mar-08 08:38 PM

And you proved just how small minded you are.


Again, you have no idea how good these people are, nor what my standards
are - other than whether or not they've heard of Boyce.

Small minded people have small minded requirements.  And your mind is
miniscule.


Not at all.  Yours is based only on whether or not someone has heard of
Boyce.  How trite.


Yep.  And you don't have to know of Boyce to be either.  But you seem to
think so.  Says enough about you.


I find it remarkable that ANYONE would define a great anything on
whether or not they have heard of one person.  But there are a lot like
you around, unfortunately.


No, you brought it up.  I'm not changing the subject.  You just can't
justify your position.  So you aren't going to pursue it.

As to whether or not I'm older than you - I don't care.  But I'm sure I
have a hell of a lot more experience than you.



Obviously.  Because you have no idea what a great DBA is.




Not at all.  You can quote all the websites you want.  I can show you
just as many websites which do not mention either Boyce or Codd.

As a matter of fact, my courses don't mention them, either.  Not because
they aren't historically important, but because I have a limited amount
of time to teach DBA.  Our courses are very intensive, and do not allow
time for historical perspective.  We concentrate on the job.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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08-Mar-08 08:43 PM

Maybe in your experience.  I make a very good living teaching Fortune
500 employees in a formal environment.


Unless you got your degree in the early 70's (like I did), it did exist.
But Universities are notorious in not teaching the latest theory, either.

And I do agree, normalization itself is quite easy.  But typically, the
more normalized the database, the poorer the performance.  It takes a
great DBA with an understanding of the programming requirements (among
other things) to be able to balance the two successfully.


Agreed.  Neither my high school nor my college chemistry classes ever
mentioned Mendeleev.  It wasn't until I became more interested in
history that I learned about him.

--
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Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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09-Mar-08 05:20 PM

Sorry to disappoint you, this was an example not actual - even a close
proximity would be a trade secret.



You- and the "great DBA's", my friend, have been fortunate.  Recently
(last 5-7 years) there are a lot of folks like me who couldn't get a job
even as a "contractor" if they tried because we were not "certified".
10-15years experience - yes. Multi-platform, multi-db-engine - yes.
Fixed major performance problems on business or mission critical
databases for many name-brand F500 companies - yes.  But again - more
recently - because we did not have that certificate - were passed over
or not even considered usually because the certified "DBA" was fresh out
of school (term used very loosely) with "certified" behind his/her name
and hourly rates at or near the poverty level.

I have had head-hunters hang up on me when they ask about certification.
At this point there is no way to talk to the hiring manager. No way to
state your case or demonstrate your abilities.  But, such is the IT
hiring business of today.

Back to our discussion of what it takes to be a great DBA.

Granted, you should be able to do all of the things you stated, but the
sad reality in business is that *usually* the people who initially
designed that very fast, properly normalized (the balance of when to
normalize/de-normalize you indicated), properly sized, properly
distributed (physical storage DOES matter) database are not the ones
having to maintain it due separation of duties being spouted about by
Sarb-Ox auditors everywhere.

I would consider a great DBA to be one that can walk into any shop and
take whatever is thrown at them including make current db perform better
- keeping in mind that NO amount of physical, memory, sql, index tuning
will EVER completely overcome a poor logical design. And the latter is
usually connected to some COTS package and there is no way to change it
on the production application without $MM in cost over-runs.  It can be
mitigated, but only to a point.  Sometimes starting from scratch is the
only way to achieve the required performance.

09-Mar-08 07:19 PM

These DBA's work in an entirely different environment.  Their managers
understand the real meat is in ability to do the job and not just hold a
piece of paper.

Companies who only care about a certification have no idea what they
really need.  Rather than getting someone to help them hire the correct
person, they just say you need a certification.  Personally, I wouldn't
work for such a company.


That's what happens when you use head hunters who have no idea what
they're doing (which is most of them).  Same with hiring managers.  You
need to find the person who makes the decisions and talk to him/her
directly.


No, people move on.  But the people who replace them are just as
qualified and knowledgeable.  Big companies can't afford anyone less.

Picture a major airline who couldn't access their reservations system
quickly, a  shipping company who can't track packages reliably, or an
automobile manufacturer who can't manage their parts inventory, all
because performance is so bad.

Neither is good for long term viability of the company.


Agreed, but if the job was done properly in the first place, that isn't
as much of a problem.  From what I've seen as a bigger problem over the
years is the changing needs for the database.  Different information
required, different reporting, etc.  Eventually, the creep becomes so
severe that the current database has little or no resemblance to the one
designed 20 years ago.  But there are millions of lines of COBOL (or
whatever) code accessing it.

You're correct - it costs a fortune to make the changes.  But eventually
they often need to do a complete rewrite.  And that keeps programmers busy.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

12-Mar-08 12:23 AM

Objectively, I know that.  But sometimes he just gets on my nerves.  I
can get a twit filter to clean him out of the in-box and I really
should.

09-Mar-08 11:58 PM

Innovations all the time ... yes. Innovations all the time in medicine
too.

But "new"? I would disagree.

Alan Turing, widely considered the father of computer science, died in
1954. In 1969 I was writing Fortran on IBM mainframes and we aren't
talking bread-boards by any stretch of the imagination.

So unless you are well into your 70s or above computers have been
widely available (not PCs I'll grant) your entire lifetime.


Not to take anything away from Linus as I am a proud user of Linux
but I think you exaggerate just a bit. By that standard we would have
to credit Bill Gates for his great work with Basic. And the google
crowd ... I don't want to start an off-topic flame war here but like
Gates I am more impressed with their ability to market than code.


Teaching at university I hear this argument all the time ... from
those who haven't a degree. I'll grant you don't seem to be part of
that crowd ... but I'll still respectfully disagree.

I've no doubt someone could, in theory, be a physics genius without
knowing the names Newton and Einstein. But I suspect you will agree
that the chances are about the same as winning the lottery.

I am not impressed by arguments that go "well it is true for everyone
else but it doesn't relate to us."
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

10-Mar-08 12:02 AM

I have him in my spam filter so I never see anything of his unless I
go looking for it. But when others respond to him his puffery shows up
and then, alas, I sometimes give into temptation and look up the
flatulence d'jour.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

10-Mar-08 11:02 AM

Yes, universities always were good at teaching irrelevant information
and then testing on it.

Try doing like I do - teach C, C++, Java, etc. in one week.  That's 5
straight days, 7.5 - 8.0 hours per day, no homework.  And at the end
have students who can write code.


Of course.  Knowing who Einstein or Newton were has nothing to do with
learning physics.


I'm not at all impressed by your arguments.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

10-Mar-08 12:47 PM

Really - name 5 conferences in the past 12 months you've presented at - and
I don't mean user group meetings - I mean proper conferences; also - not
just ones you've attended! Also, in the SQL Server community you've probably
done 1 in 2 years if my memory recalls - face it; nobody will have you
because of your attitude and because you are so out of date and out of
touch.


http://counter4.bravenet.com/index.php?id=395552&usernum=264967159

In nearly 2 years you've had only 15,536 visitors; I get more than half that
amount in just a month
(http://www.3dstats.com/cgi-bin/showuni1.cgi?usr=00001948&dd=10&mm=11&yy=2008&period=4)

And if you think the person running the site has earned hundreds of dollars
out of you then youre a bigger fool with even less grasp for business than I
took you for - I use adwords myself and on that many visitors he's probably
earned $50 in 2 years.

And as for the rest, we've all popularised them for you to say you've done
it all yourself is very arrogant but we all know you are very arrogant,
ignorant, etc....

--
Tony Rogerson, SQL Server MVP
http://sqlblogcasts.com/blogs/tonyrogerson
[Ramblings from the field from a SQL consultant]
http://sqlserverfaq.com
[UK SQL User Community]

12-Mar-08 12:24 AM

Once again we have a thread in this group where practical "working
hero's" are attacking the "classroom fossils" who comprise the
academic branch of our diverse industry...

It always astounds me that the two "factions" fail to recognise that
they are co-dependent.  The academic side teaches the theory (which
may not be practical) which shapes the way students approach real
problems, the practical side provide the implementation and innovation
that drives the industry forward.

The fact that these "innovations" are predominantly based on theories
and thought processes they learned in the classroom (or read in books/
blogs/<insert academic reference here>) seems to have been forgotten
or is glossed over ... but innovation becomes classroom material, and
the next generation's thoughts are shaped and ready to face new real
problems.

This is the nature of evolution and progress - grow up and live with
it!

10-Mar-08 01:31 PM

You have never taken my class and I do appreciate the quick way in
which you have gone from name calling ... Morgan is narrow/small
minded ... to commenting on that of which you have zero knowledge.

Well done.


Hello World.


That is utter and complete nonsense and you won't find a physics prof.
on the planet who would agree with you.


If you think I am trying to impress you, or even writing this in
the hope of changing your mind you are engaged in a serious
misunderstanding of my posts.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

10-Mar-08 01:33 PM

Fair question Tony. And, in return, why don't you list all of
your conference presentations, books and journal articles published,
and credentials such as sitting on the ANSI committee.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

12-Mar-08 12:24 AM

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is the most sensible post in the whole
thread,  I suggest we end it there :-)

-g

12-Mar-08 12:24 AM

LOL!  You really don't have any idea how few speakers do more than
three conferences per year, do you?  I only attend out-of-town or out-
of-country conferences where I am speaking, got a free ticket or have
a consulting gig.


I missed PASS this last year, but I have *already* done two "SQL
Saturday!" shows in Florida and I am hoping for a third. I believe, if
you follow true to form, you will now poo-poo the whole Code Camp and
Server community.

My overseas speaking trips will be to London and Munich later this
year.  I am also getting something ready for Las Vegas.


Tony, I have had NO visitors at all!  This is not my blog.  I have
tried to get it taken down, but without any luck.  All Google will do
is post a note that "This blog is not Joe Celko's but it is a
collection of his answers in public newsgroups" for me.  I have a
stalker, not a blog.  And now I just given him a plug! Arrgh!


For me?  Thank you! :) I never said I "did it all myself"; you did.
First you ask me to name techniques I popularized; I do so, cutting
the list off at 20; I have publication credits to them.  Then in
typical Newsgroup Troll fashion, you berate me for an answer to you
own question.  But let's play your idea.  What would be an objective
measurement of "popularization" of X by Y?  Let's pick an SQL
technique that has a name and do a social network search on the
Internet.  TECHNOLOGY REVIEW this issue has some articles on such
tools and I did a little project for a company that sells such a
tool.  It is fun to play with these things and see how an idea
spreads .. but I digress.

I think I would score high on "Nested Sets", "Celko's Relational
Division" and pretty good on many others.  Ben Gan and Moreau would
score high on "Path Enumeration" or " Materialized Path" in the same
way. Ralph Kimball and Bill Inmon would have spread the word about
Data Warehousing almost alone.  What do you think your scores would be
on anything in the database world?

10-Mar-08 04:09 PM

Believe me, I don't need to take your class.  I've taken many university
classes, and they're all more less the same.  Lots of good theory, but
also lots of unnecessary garbage.

So you tell me - what does recognizing the name Boyce have to do with
being an good DBA?


Yes, your words have spoken for themselves.


Wrong answer.  Productive members of a team.  Not experts - but then
graduates of a 1 semester class aren't experts, either.  That comes with
time.  But they can do more than your 1 semester classes can do.


Nope.  No PROFESSOR will agree.  But physicists will.  That's the
difference between those who teach and those who do.


I'm not at all impressed by any of your arguments.



Quite frankly, I don't give a damn.  You go ahead and teach.  Let those
who know, do it.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

10-Mar-08 03:14 PM

Name 3 in the last 12 months then, if you are so popular... there must be
cracking on for 40 conferences in the various vendors/ db industry every 12
months.


User Group events....

Orlando SQL User Group
Tampa SQL User Group
Jacksonville SQL User Group

These are all really great user groups and we in the UK follow the free
Saturday conference model with our own SQLBits brand - we completed our 2nd
conference on Sat 1st March with 350 attendees.

They are also all FREE.


I poo-poo your attitude and the rubbish you post 'period'.


I'll be sure to watch out - but it's probably more rubbish to try and build
you in tatters profile up.



15,536 visitors in two years, 6 unique visitors in the last 7 days.

That is the measure of your popularity celko - that is the measure!


My blog statistics speak for themselves - rather more than 6 visitors in the
last 7 days - what you get in a week I get in an hour and if you care to
check it's a good mixture between new and repeat visitors.

--
Tony Rogerson, SQL Server MVP
http://sqlblogcasts.com/blogs/tonyrogerson
[Ramblings from the field from a SQL consultant]
http://sqlserverfaq.com
[UK SQL User Community]

12-Mar-08 12:25 AM

Well, maybe people in the IBM mainframe world of the '80s didn't want
to talk to you about how stupid IBM was for not aggresively following
up on their own theorists and let Oracle put out a product first.

You might learn some history, man. "Yes, actually Oracle had an
earlier SQL product than IBM. IBM invented the language, but Oracle
shipped it first." http://www.mcjones.org/System_R/SQL_Reunion_95/sqlr95-Ora=
cle.html

Personally, I started working with a relational db in a business
environment in early 1981, but it wasn't SQL.

jg
--
@home.com is bogus.
http://www.baselinemag.com/index2.php?option=3Dcontent&task=3Dview&id=3D4536=
&pop=3D1&hide_ads=3D1&page=3D0&hide_js=3D1

12-Mar-08 12:25 AM

But who does the hiring?  Catbert, the evil director of Human
Resources! And all Catbert knows to look for is that Certification.
Sad, but true.  This is one of the reasons we set up Neumont
University's model to include Certification, college degree and a
portfolio of actual work.

10-Mar-08 10:16 PM

Sorry, incorrect.


Sorry, try again.  IBM had a relational database as a commercial product
in the late 70's.  I don't remember what it was called at the time - but
it implemented the SQL language at the time.  This later evolved into DB2.

And don't believe everything you read on the internet.


I wasn't working on relational databases at the time, but I was working
for IBM and familiar with many of their products.


--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

10-Mar-08 10:18 PM

Not necessarily.  You get to the right person with the right
qualifications, and you can basically bypass HR's system completely.
They will tell HR whom to hire.

It's all in knowing how to work the system - and obviously you don't.

--
==================
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Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

12-Mar-08 12:25 AM

As compared to law, medicine, and engineering, which have been around
for generations, IT is still very new.
Suppose a professor is ten years behind the practice. In law ten years
is just a tiny fraction. But being ten years behind in IT is huge.


As for me, I hear this argument all the time from PhDs who got their
degrees and left academia to work in the industry.
Clearly one and the same standard should be applied to prominent
scientists regardless of their origin.


With all due respect to inventors of normal forms, I think that
Newton, Mendeleev and Einstein contributed significantly more, so the
comparison is incorrect.

10-Mar-08 10:47 PM

Actually it is far worse than you imagine. There are three Oracle
instructors at the University of Washington. I have been the primary
instructor for 8 years, personally wrote the curriculum, and it is
95+% practical. The other two instructors are Robert Perry, a
production DBA at Boeing, who has worked with Oracle since version
4 and Jeremiah Wilton, a member of the Oak Table (www.oaktable.org),
and one of the people to whom Amazon.com owes its success.

Theory has its place in computer science classes. In Oracle classes
at the University of Washington it is all about hands-on experience
and midterms and finals deal with real-world issues experienced in
the aerospace and communications industries ... not a single test ever
given was True/False, Multiple Choice, or Essay. All exam answers
always involve writing working code.

I am sure those throwing around their criticisms of academia have
years of experience on their resumes. I'd also be willing to bet that
a quarter or more of our students could code circles around them.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

10-Mar-08 11:56 PM

I'll take your bet any time.  I have yet to find any student who can do
as well as an experienced programmer.

And anyone who thinks they can has no idea what the real world is like.

Tell me - have you ever worked on a 2-3 year project with 75 other
programmers, creating a large real-world application?

Have you ever worked on maintaining and upgrading a 1M LOC+ program?

Or have you ever even taken a 50K LOC project for someone you don't
know, and taken it from requirements gathering to final delivery?

Have you ever worked on a project where the requirements change weekly,
if not daily?

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

10-Mar-08 11:47 PM

Go to www.sqluniversity.net.
Click on Sample Courses
Take one (they are free)
When you find the "lots of good theory" part point it out to me and I
will remove it.

Ignorance is such a precious thing ... you really shouldn't wave
it around in public.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

10-Mar-08 11:58 PM

Yes. But compared to the lifetimes of the humans spouting off here it
has been around longer than more than half of them.

Would you tell your physician penicillin is new? It has been
commercially available about the same amount of time as mainframes.

Penicillin first successful treatment: March 14, 1942.
IBM 650 first mass produced mainframe: Shipped 1954.


No one was discussing professors we were discussing IT and medicine and
law and engineering. So lets not change the subject and pursue it.

How long can a surgeon in the US retain his license to practice medicine
without continuing education? Two years max. A CPA one year if he or she
plans to file tax returns for customers. Attorneys and Engineers about
the same amount of time. If they don't maintain their education level
they lose their malpractice insurance, they lose their license to
practice, they lose their ability to work.

Want to guess what percentage of Oracle DBAs have never taken a single
class in their lives? Or how many are running 9i and above while
certified on 8i or below? We don't come even remotely close to the
quality control levels required of other professionals.


Sorry but that's nonsense. If you think you can find a person that can
competently tune an Oracle database and doesn't know who Cary Millsap
or Jonathan Lewis is you are kidding yourself. If you think you can
find a competent Oracle developer that doesn't know who Tom Kyte is
you need to lay off the stuff. You can't segment knowledge the way you
are trying.

Next are you going to tell me is that you can understand Newtonian
mechanics without knowing who Isaac Newton was.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

11-Mar-08 12:18 AM

Few that small actually. You might want to read my CV before you
stick the other foot in it.

Or perhaps you'd like to come to Redwood Shores in April and meet me
here: http://zseriesoraclesig.org/index.php.

Some people here might remember me from OOW 2005 where my team built
a 24 node RAC cluster in Moscone West in two days. That gig came after
building two 10 node clusters for one of the largest commercial banks
in Japan to run SAP. I'll let you guess at the dollar figure.


Delivering one on the 17th of this month here: http://www.mdu.com.


You are either very young, very inexperienced, or both. You may be
quite sure I don't care which but I'll put my money on both. I suspect
I was coding in Fortran before you spoke your first word.

Speaking for myself I've had enough of this schoolyard nonsense. Killfile.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

11-Mar-08 09:00 AM

So far, I am totally unimpressed.


That's not 1 1M LOC+ program.  That's just putting together a bunch of
tools on some systems.  Tool jockeys are not at all in the same league
as programmers.


A website!  ROFLMAO!  Try a real application.  But you probably don't
know what one is.


Over 40 years of programming experience, and 18 years as an independent
consultant.  My first programming was Fortran II on an IBM 1401 back in
1967.

But I've been working in the real world, not some ivory tower.

You're just like many other academicians I've met.  You think you know
everything. But you really know nothing.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

11-Mar-08 09:02 AM

Sqluniversity is not a University.  That is not a university class.  But
you wouldn't know the difference.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

11-Mar-08 09:08 AM

So, what does that have to do with the fact you are out of touch with
reality?


So?  What does that have to do with the fact you are out of touch with
reality?


No, we were discussing professors and their lack of touch with reality.
So lets not change the subject.


Fortunately, a lot less time than an incompetent professor can keep his
tenure.


Who cares?  If they can do their job, what's the difference if they took
a class or are self taught?  I know a lot of DBA's who know a hell of a
lot more than what they might learn in one of your "classes".


Only you thin that knowing someone's name makes you a better DBA.
Clueless idiot.


Yes, one can.  You can even call it fizzbin mechanics.  The name does
not affect the math.


--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

12-Mar-08 12:25 AM

LOL!  You really have not seen Dan's Oracle classes!  They hand you an
empty server and you start by loading and configuring it from
scratch.  I am not kidding.  Forget about an already installed DB
waiting for you; Dan starts at the hardware.


My, what a carefully reasoned argument :)  Knowing the history and
important concepts of your trade area measure of professionalism.  It
also means you know how to communicate with others and research inside
your trade.  You have a context for your tools.


LOL!  Do ever watch Futurama?  You're Dr. Zoidberg!  He is a lobster
alien who has no idea about human anatomy and makes up his own words.
Or maybe you're the seagull in THE LITTLE MERMAID, who calls a fork a
a comb.

Why not carry this line of non-reason further?  Having clear, industry
standard data element names, interfaces and protocols does not effect
the compilation or execution of a program.  In fact, back in the old
FORTRAN days of my youth, we had a slogan that "If it was hard to
write, then it should be hard to read!" and we meant it.  Therefore,
learning anything but how to write code for a particular release of a
particular complier for a particular language makes you a clueless
idiot.

12-Mar-08 12:25 AM

That is not true in the United State.  Lawyers have to obtain a
certain number of CEU credits per year to get their bar card.  They
can take a course or teach one; I have a friend who does bankruptcy
courses for UCLA after she got out of IT.  It is a major part of their
careers.

Ten years in law is huge -- the tax code alone changes constantly!
Have you ever been to the Computer Law Institute in Los Angeles and
seen what is happening in IP?  The topics of importance change from
year to year.

However, I frequently run into people in IT who have not taken a
course or learned a new technology in 5 to 10 years.  They know Java,
HTML, Crystal Reports, etc. and earn a living with it doing websites
or writing code at a company.  The last educational thing they did was
cram for a certification.  They do not read trade publications and
only look at the gaming parts of SlashDot.

Sad but true.

11-Mar-08 12:39 PM

Another troll heard from.  I used to have a decent amount of respect for
you.  But now that I have seen your posts - NOT!

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

11-Mar-08 12:55 PM

Oh, and BTW - what a colossal waste of time.  How often does one have to
install Oracle, anyway?  If it's more than once per system, then you
need to go to a better product.

No wonder it takes him a week to teach a Hello World program.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

Thank you for a carefully reasoned argument and/or useful information.


To be honest, I never heard of you before now.

11-Mar-08 12:58 PM

Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn. I'm not the one strutting my fame.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

[snip]

[snip]

Installing and configuring an Oracle installation is valuable
experience.  I'd consider it a valid part of a decent course.

-g

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

ng

Oracle.html


2.

Well, I gotta say, the particular link I posted is a lot more
trustable than "I don't remember what it was called at the time - but
it implemented the SQL language at the time..." Go back to that link
and look at the quote attributed to Codd.  And read the rest of doc
with those navigation arrows at the top and bottom, it might happen to
be about what you don't remember.

IBM and familiar with many of their products.

So you were not in an ivory tower, you were in a manure silo.  I guess
that makes you a hands-on expert.

Oh, and I watched part of Dan putting together that OOW demo - it
wasn't a "tool" it was a 24 node cluster.  From scratch.

And I did know about Mendeleev from before they mentioned him in AP
high school chemistry.

jg
--
@home.com is bogus.
section." - William Robertson

11-Mar-08 02:14 PM

My customers would consider installation a complete waste of time.  If
it's that hard to install, maybe people should use a different product.
DB2 comes to mind.

In the time his students take to install Oracle, our DB2 Admin students
have learned about the tuning parameters, explained SQL statements to
determine why things run slowly and tuned the system for better performance.

Much more useful use of time than sitting there watching a CD spin.

--
==================
Remove the "x" from my email address
Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

11-Mar-08 01:22 PM

With regard celko and Denial Again - never a truer word spoken!

--
Tony Rogerson, SQL Server MVP
http://sqlblogcasts.com/blogs/tonyrogerson
[Ramblings from the field from a SQL consultant]
http://sqlserverfaq.com
[UK SQL User Community]

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

[snip]
[snip]


Some would, I am sure.  However, I'd consider it a useful exercise.  I
trust, like any good organisation, the customer is always right?  ;-)

-g

11-Mar-08 03:01 PM

Ah, yes, it was known as System R, back in the early 70's.  Long before
Oracle.

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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11-Mar-08 03:03 PM

In the case of Fortune 500 companies paying up to $500 per student per
day, yes.  They don't want their employees sitting there watching a CD
spin.

--
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Jerry Stuckle
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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11-Mar-08 02:03 PM

That will be you then.

The last thing YOU do is listen to product experts - just how many times now
is that you've been corrected and on how many different incorrect and
usually fundemental errors you've made in SQL Server forums?

Definitely sad - definitely true.

--
Tony Rogerson, SQL Server MVP
http://sqlblogcasts.com/blogs/tonyrogerson
[Ramblings from the field from a SQL consultant]
http://sqlserverfaq.com
[UK SQL User Community]

11-Mar-08 02:13 PM

Jerry Stuckle:

What type of trainer would that be, who lets the students sit and watch
the CD spin? I thought good trainers, worth 500 dollars per day per
student, would have someting useful prepared for those twenty minutes
where an installation process runs unattended.

I don't think students would consider their first Oracle installation a
waste of time, assuming that they _learn_ how to do it (and what to do if
a step or two fail) during that time frame.

--
Erick

11-Mar-08 03:44 PM

We don't teach installation.  They come preloaded with a default
configuration and databases.  That way we can concentrate on a DBA's job.

As I said before - installation should only be required once per system,
and if Oracle is that hard to install (or requires multiple
installations to get it right), maybe another product should be used.


--
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Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

I think usually installing Oracle is contractor's job, because it is
very complex and you don't do it often.
That's why many shops don't waste their resources training permanent
employees - bringing in contractors for a relatively short time is
much cheaper.

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

I like DB2 better than Oracle myself, but a lot of that kind of thing
is done with the initial installation and configuration in Oracle.  It
is not easy and you really need to learn to do an install.

Did you notice that one posting you criticize Dan for being too
academic and then for giving too much physical detail?  Please be more
consistent in your attacks.

My previous full-time job was at a for-profit, start-up developer's
university.  We tracked the premium at which our grads are hired.. All
schools track such things in the education and training business and
since you are in the business, I assume that you do the same.
Programmers who get thru Dan's courses are hired at a premium; what
premium do your students command?

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

That is one of the reasons I am not a big Oracle fan; it is complex.
If your people don't learn configuration and tuning (at least at the
basic level), then you will always have contractors doing constant
minor tuning.  And that they are willing to come immediately after
each and every little bump along the way, so you don't lose production
time.

11-Mar-08 05:57 PM

Our customers are mainly Fortune 500 companies, paid for by the company.
Our students are employees of them.  We do not request payroll
information; that is between the employee and his/her employer.

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
==================

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

snip

Jerry both you and I had valid points early on in this thread but this
has gone somewhat off track imho.

Certainly a lot of capable people in the database world and
development world are not familiar with Joe Celko.  Joe noted in his
reply that he had not contributed in any significant way to relational
theory as compared to Codd and Date.  So let's just leave it with what
Joe said.

As for Captain Morgan he will keep replying and replying as he gets to
send out his long signature attached to each reply.


snip



Now that's sounding like the old RAC on Apple stuff.  Yeah you told us
you had people running these systems in production and advocated the
same to others.  Funny ... no patchsets, no new versons from oracle.
Whatever.

11-Mar-08 07:29 PM

You teach all of that in less than an hour. Whoa am I impressed.
In the Oracle world we sometimes take two, even three hours to
teach tuning parameters, explained SQL and to triage performance
issues.

ROFLOL.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

11-Mar-08 07:58 PM

I like DEC Rdb (now Oracle Rdb) -- I have shutdown, backed  up,
installed a new version - converted the 45-50 databases and had them
back into production on the 6-node VMS cluster (A real cluster - not
those toys that are around today) in < 3.5 hrs. - and the backups took a
little more than 3hrs using 16 tape drives. We spooled the biggest
database to 4 tape drives in parallel and split the others similarly...

With Rdb - from time of starting the install to having a database up and
running < 30 minutes.  If you had the database create script it was even
faster.  I created one that was >2Tb in this manner. (no data - but was
able to kick off an ETL process that would push 300M records < 2.5 hrs.

Rdb is also where Oracle ripped out the optimizer, partitioning, ideas
for RMAN ( IMO a kludge from RMU (Rdb Monitor Utility) and access to
some of the best Relational developers in the business.

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

Hey, I forget my anniversary and my wife's birthday.  That would be
Rick van der Lans.  I still recommend his SQL book for intro
programmers (third edition) and I will be speaking at two conferences
his company is hosting this year!


I learned B-5000 Algol in my freshman year.  I remember the
other languages.  We copied the keywords from ADA for SQL.


No, like Ledgard's rules for upper and lower case, indentation, etc.
The Army funded a lot of research on code readability when I worked
for AIRMICS.


Hey, these were all honorable failures; I did not get involved with
dot-coms until later.


It is getting picked up more than I thought it would by DW people


I had a chance to meet Dijkstra here in Austin and I did not drive
over to UT to do it.  I regret that.  I also tried to get the UT Press
to print his papers or at least clean up the website.l  All I got was
a dump letter.  It seems they get more money for Aztec history or
other such things than for IT.

11-Mar-08 11:57 PM

Sorry to hear it takes you so long.

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

I agree with you.  As I remember,  Rdb also had a CREATE DOMAIN and
some other ANSI features before anyone else.  The optimizer was done
in part by an AI guy who was into alpha-beta trees for plan searches
and there was some way to adjust the depth and width of the  search.

12-Mar-08 12:26 AM

I agree with you.  As I remember,  Rdb also had a CREATE DOMAIN and
some other ANSI features before anyone else.  The optimizer was done
in part by an AI guy who was into alpha-beta trees for plan searches
and there was some way to adjust the depth and width of the  search.

14-Mar-08 06:35 AM

OK, this topic seems to gone off the rails in the last week....

Shiffling thru some books(!)  and some more googling armed with better
keywords
has made me realize the solution to my problem is a
custom aggregate function

which turned up this
http://www.oracle.com/technology/oramag/oracle/06-jul/o46sql.html

which sounds perfect for what I want. Since I'll eventually be
migrating my app to Oracle this would seem to be the solution.

So thanks to all the responded,

CASE CLOSED

Still-learning Steve

14-Mar-08 06:35 AM

And it looks like it can be done in MySQL as well
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/create-function.html

So again, thanks to all.

CASE CLOSED

Still-learning Steve

14-Mar-08 06:35 AM

We don't teach installation.  They come preloaded with a default
configuration and databases.  That way we can concentrate on a DBA's
job.

As I said before - installation should only be required once per
system

What do your students do if they need to reinstall due to some
external factor (hardware failure/natural disaster) or if they want to
set up a new server?  Oh wait ...

I think usually installing Oracle is contractor's job, because it is
very complex and you don't do it often.
That's why many shops don't waste their resources training permanent
employees - bringing in contractors for a relatively short time is
much cheaper.

Question answered ... they bring in someone who did DA's course!

Who says the academic and the business world don't work hand-in-
hand :)

14-Mar-08 06:35 AM

[snip]
[snip]


-g

12-Mar-08 08:23 AM

ROFLMAO.  Shows how little you know.

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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12-Mar-08 08:31 AM

Ah, maybe they fix the external factor and restore the system from
backup?  We cover backup/restore, also.  And if they need to install on
a new system, they follow directions.

Oh, wait - I forgot - Oracle is soooo hard and complicated to install,
they can't do that.  Maybe people should switch to DB2 or SQL Server.


Nope, not everyone at a company needs to know how to install a system.
At most one or two may.  And if they're familiar with the product, it
should be no problem.

But DA said he spends an hour on installation.  At least 20 minutes of
that is watching the CD spin.  If a DBA can't figure out how to insert a
CD-ROM and answer some basic questions, either he/she needs to find a
different job or the product needs improvement.  Which is it?

And I found out DA isn't an academician at all - he just likes to make
people think he is.  All he does is teach Oracle for UW's Extension
University.

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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14-Mar-08 06:35 AM

[snip]
[snip]


-g

12-Mar-08 09:09 AM

ROFLMAO!

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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14-Mar-08 06:35 AM

Ah, maybe they fix the external factor and restore the system from
backup?  We cover backup/restore, also.  And if they need to install
on
a new system, they follow directions.

Aah - so your course covers backing up and restoring a system (I'm
assuming it's the whole OS environment including all configuration
settings, not just DB backup/restore ... otherwise you're not meeting
the recovery requirement).  Why does your course cover this non-DBA
function but not DB installation? It's far more likely that a DBA
would just need to set up a new database server than restore an entire
backed up system :-/

Nope, not everyone at a company needs to know how to install a
system.
At most one or two may.

Per site?

If a DBA can't figure out how to insert a
CD-ROM and answer some basic questions, either he/she needs to find a
different job or the product needs improvement.

Hmm ... I guess you're right - for SQL Server anyway it is pretty easy
to just click "Next" on each screen.  I might need to put in my name
and company, but I can manage that too.  Oh what's this bit about
choosing drives and log locations? I'll just leave those as default -
can't be bad right? Collation? I'm in Thailand, but default should be
fine...

Jerry - you are losing credibility with some of these "arguments".  I
can accept that not every good DBA needs to know the names of Cobb and
Date (although I would hope they do), but to say DBA's don't need to
know how to install and configure a database is ludicrous.  Name me 1
Fortune500 company that would employ a full-time DBA that needs to
bring in a contractor each time they need to set up a new server.

Furthermore, the defensive and personal nature of your attacks on DA
et al are embarrassingly immature - and that fact is even more telling
coming from someone who wasn't even alive when you worked for IBM :p

ROFLMAO!

I'm glad to see you still have your sense of perspective :)

J

14-Mar-08 06:35 AM

Putting on my business hat, installing a new system is a planned
event. As such, it can be prepared for and done in a cost effective
way.
On the other hand, a disaster is not planned. If downtime means losing
money, then you want recovery ASAP, so you practice recovery
frequently and must be ready to actually do the recovery at any time.
This is why in some places DBAs are experts in recovery but not in
installation.

14-Mar-08 06:36 AM

Ok - I take your point.  But is it really cost effective to bring in
an external expert every time you need a new system? Or would it be
better to spend a bit up-front on training have DBA's that can do this
themselves?  Then again, I've worked for enough big companies to know
that budget manipulation is a black art best left to the
accountants ;)

12-Mar-08 12:14 PM

No. They prefer their employees spin while watching an endless parade
of PowerPoint slides. Your ignorance is profound. Surveys done by the
university show exactly the opposite. Corporations are sick and tired
of paying for training that doesn't confer real world skills such as
kernel configuration.

But I guess for someone who couldn't wrap their fingers around vi
your response is par for the course.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

12-Mar-08 12:21 PM

Your customers? You are posting from a generic attglobal account.
What training company do you work for?

My "company" is the University of Washington. Our "customers" are
Amazon, AT&T, Boeing, Starbucks, T-Mobile, Washington Mutual Bank,
etc. And we do survey them, at least once a quarter, and we know
precisely what they want and provide it to them in the manner they
find most valuable which is why there is never an empty seat in
the lecture hall. Hasn't been one in 7 years.

But thanks for your obviously sincere concern about how these F500
companies are faring.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

12-Mar-08 12:24 PM

Part of the reason why we make sure students can configure operating
systems and perform installations is so that they will feel comfortable
totally trashing a database installation as part of learning to perform
recovery.

If you don't feel that reinstalling from scratch is trivial you probably
aren't going to feel comfortable opening your system01.dbf in vi and
creating block corruption. And waiting around for single block
corruption to happen on its own is not an award winning skill.
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

12-Mar-08 02:46 PM

Of course, surveys done by a UNIVERSITY would show what the UNIVERSITY
wants done.  Corporations pay well for our classes, because it gives
them what they want.  And have been for over 17 years now.

And you have no idea what the content of our classes are.


You show a complete lack of understanding of the real world.

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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12-Mar-08 02:49 PM

It's in my sig.


You do not have a company.  You "work" part time for The U of W
Extension School.


I could list my customers also, but I don't, especially in a public
forum.  But I will say it's much more extensive than yours.

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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12-Mar-08 02:52 PM

No, it covers DB backup/restore.  System backup/restore is performed by
sysadmins.


Not really.  Installs can be performed remotely, and quite often are.


That's all covered in configuration and performance.


Our customers are happy.  And they don't bring in contractors to do the
installs.  Read again who posted that.


Just calling a spade a spade.  I've found him to be completely lacking
in understanding of the real world.



--
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12-Mar-08 02:53 PM

Oh, so now you're teaching them non-DBA functions also?  Configuring the
OS is not a DBA's job.



--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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14-Mar-08 06:36 AM

[snip]
[snip]

At the risk of causing you to roll around on the floor and laugh your
@rse off again, what if I wanted, as a paying customer, to learn how
to install and configure the product from scratch?

-g

14-Mar-08 06:36 AM

[snip]

[snip]


In my experience this is not true: a good SA and a good DBA will
appreciate that there's a degree of crossover in their skillset in
correctly configuring a database server and will cooperate
accordingly.  How much real-world experience do you have?  Next ->
Next -> Next -> Finish?  You can have any database flavouir you like
as long as it's vanilla, presumably.

-g

12-Mar-08 03:36 PM

We don't teach how to install because our customers (all corporate) do
not wish it.

If you had enough people to fill a class and wanted that, then we could
add it to the course (at an extra charge, of course).

--
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Jerry Stuckle
JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
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12-Mar-08 03:37 PM

A little over 40 years worth of experience.  And yes, there is crossover
- but no decent sysadmin will allow a dba to backup/restore a system.
He'll do it himself to ensure it's done right.

--
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12-Mar-08 10:38 PM

All I have to say is that you must work for some very small companies :)
You ought to try installing 6 or more large E25K class servers
concurrently... If you know how to automate stuff - it is fairly easy...
This goes for Oracle and DB2/UDB.  SQLServer - if you can point/click it
is a no-brainer.

We have LOTS of servers that require either Oracle Server or Client
daily.  (new installs, upgrades etc...)

12-Mar-08 11:46 PM

Virtually all of my customers are Fortune 500 companies.  And that's
what they say, also.

Sorry to hear you have so many installs and upgrades.  Maybe you should
try a more reliable database.


--
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JDS Computer Training Corp.
jstucklex@attglobal.net
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14-Mar-08 06:37 AM

he
-

And I've certainly seen "it's not my job" be the mark of a loser.  In
larger sites, I've seen SA's make very bad assumptions, if they aren't
communicating with the DBA's properly there's going to be a LOT of
problems.  With that sort of communication necessary, they need to be
able to speak and understand each others' language.  Pesonally, I've
found that having been both and at times wearing both hats has enabled
me to easily solve problems that mystify a job-partitioned group of
people.  Sometimes they proclaim me some kinda genius, when it's
really just knowing the basics of both plus the app.  These jobs are
rarely positively recognized, so I'm not going to stop them.  Then
again, I've seen people who've been both and get neither.  For some
reason, they inevitably seem to come from the Windows world.  Perhaps
making it too simple masks incompetance.

I've had a number of experiences where I've had to show things to SA's
and skeptical DBA's.  A goodly amount of diplomacy is necessary when
you are stuck telling people how to do their jobs.  But I guess it
isn't Jerry's job to teach them about the real world.  Glad I'm not an
instructor.

jg
--
@home.com is bogus.
Thank you, Sheriff Whipple.

13-Mar-08 02:14 PM

And I've seen the results of someone sticking their fingers in where
they don't belong.  How much more often do you think that happens?

I agree that DBA's and SysAdmins need to talk.  But in a big shop, they
are two different groups of people.


My job is to teach them the technical aspects of whatever it is -
languages, databases, whatever.  I don't teach them how to do their job.

And being an instructor is actually quite a bit of fun.  Wish I could do
more of it, but I just don't have the time to do much teaching and run a
business.  So I have others doing most of the teaching nowadays.

--
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13-Mar-08 01:22 PM

Jerry Stuckle:


40 posts in just one thread in a couple of days. You appear to have
plenty of time to waste.

13-Mar-08 02:31 PM

Not at all.  I'm on usenet between other duties.

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16-Mar-08 12:43 AM

snip


Ah installing oracle once at some base version is fairly easy.
Keeping maintenance current and patched and tested when there are
multiple oracle homes involved ... not so trivial.

It's been a while since I worked with DB2 ... but it ain't that
different.  Teaching SMPE and receive/apply/accept ... not especially
insignificant ... how about researching the impact of usermods?

You had some valid points here in this thead but seems like you are
using your credibilty here Mr. Jerry.

Of course Captain Morgan with his remarks about taking 3 hours to
cover install and explain plans is equally off target but we expect
that from him in this newsgroup.

e.

This just sounds more like hot air than a real world learning
experience to me imho.


Whatever.

16-Mar-08 12:43 AM

to
e.


Am I understanding you correctly?

You offer "computer training" - presumably including, but not
necessarily dedicated to database systems. You don't however consider
that the build of a server, nor the installation of software, nor the
configuration of an application is of any great importance. You don't
consider that a knowledge of relational theory is of any great use to
practitioners. You do however seem to value stuff people have picked
up along the way. I guess I'll stick to believing that you indeed
offer training whilst Daniel and Joe offer education.

Niall Litchfield
http://www.orawin.info/

16-Mar-08 12:44 AM

On Mar 14, 7:12=A0pm, Niall  Litchfield <niall.litchfi...@gmail.com>
ve to
u

nce.
-

=46rom what I saw in this thread Joe Celko noted that he had not
contributed to advancing relational theory.  Practical stuff perhaps I
don't really know but certainly he has a number of SQL Server related
books out.  I am not aware of anything in the oracle area that he has
published.

14-Mar-08 10:06 PM

Sorry to hear that.  Maybe people should use a better database.


DB2 installation is about 30 minutes.  A few questions to ask - but not
a lot.


I am quite credible with my clients.  And those are the ones I care about.


Not at all.  We spend about 2 hours in lecture and 45 minutes in a lab
on our basic tuning.  Pretty close to three hours.  Of course we have
more advanced topica.


Yep, our clients are not paying to have their employees watch a CD spin.

--
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14-Mar-08 10:09 PM

I said our clients are not asking for basic installation training.  I
also said knowing the name Codd or Boyce is immaterial.  Nothing more,
nothing less.

And we've been doing it for 17 years, mainly for Fortune 500 companies.
They are quite happy with our training.

Don't put words in my mouth.

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15-Mar-08 01:41 PM

Your ignorance is is so profound it is amazing you can inhale.

http://www.secstate.wa.gov/corps/search_results.aspx?search_type=simple&criteria=all&name_type=contains&name=&ubi=602-288-696

And with this unequivocal proof that you are a blivet ... plonk!
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

16-Mar-08 12:44 AM

True: I am "applied math" rather than theory.


NO!  My books are ANSI/ISO Standard, not SQL Server, Oracle, DB2, or
any other product related.  I deviate only when a non-standard feature
is common enough it will port (CREATE INDEX in the X\OPEN syntax, math
functions, some string functions, etc.).

I have been approached by a few vendors to do a "JOE CELKO'S <product
name here> FOR SMARTIES" book, but I have not done so. It is a matter
of professional ethics, not knowing enough about the products and no
bribes big enough (yet).

I also deal with things at a data level -- design of encoding schemes,
statistical analysis, risk and error analysis, data quality and
validation, etc.   My first Masters degree was in math and I have
worked as a full-time statistician and scientific programmer before I
became "the SQL Guy" and stopped doing honest work.

15-Mar-08 11:17 PM

ROFLMAO.  So you registered a company.  And your ONLY customer is the
University of Washington Extension School.  And the only courses you do
for them are Oracle.  And the only way you can get some work is to have
them market your courses for you.

You don't have a real company.  You aren't doing your own marketing.
You don't have multiple customers.  And any smart lawyer would pierce
the sham of your corporate veil in two seconds flat.

You're just a wanna-be with no idea on how to design real courses
companies want.  What does U of W's extension school get - maybe $150
for your course?  Probably not even that much.

Sorry, Daniel. You've been exposed for what you are.

Not that you're any competition to my company - we don't do Oracle.  But
even if we did, you'd be no competition.

--
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jstucklex@attglobal.net
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16-Mar-08 02:32 PM

One foot in your mouth wasn't enough you had to stick the other one in
too: Amazing. The University of Washington does not employ my company.
Those that have include Dow Jones & Company, The Boeing Company, and
a few other small firms you likely have never heard of but that trade
on the NYSE.

What does it take for this blivet to get a clue?
--
Daniel A. Morgan
Oracle Ace Director & Instructor
University of Washington
damorgan@x.washington.edu (replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org

16-Mar-08 02:59 PM

DA Morgan:

Boys, please. You are both adults and believe to be experts. Do you
_have_ to refrain from discussing topics in a serious manner, and do you
really need to insist to claim ownership of the largest...in a public
usenet group?

If so, why don't you two go play outside?

--
Erick

the smallest" - Neil Kinnock

16-Mar-08 04:25 PM

And you said you plonked me.  ROFLMAO!

Good try.  But you've already shown you know nothing about instruction
in a corporate environment.

And FYI, unlike you, I DO teach for Boeing.  And it won't be any problem
to give my contacts a call tomorrow and verify your "claims".

But I also know who's doing the Oracle instruction for them.  And it
isn't you.

--
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20-Mar-08 12:40 AM

[snip]

What is this obsession with CD's spinning?  Have you never heard of a
network install?

17-Mar-08 08:29 AM

Yes, what's your hangup with CD's?  The point is not the CD.  The point
is no matter how you do it, you have to wait for things to happen.

--
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