Re: dba mentor

My informal mentor was a women named Joan Arsenault. The most important thing she showed me was, "If you can't see it, keep looking."

I came across Oracle-L because Tom Kyte recommended it. I check it everyday. The gems of pure brilliance I find (stumble over) here are priceless to me.

Thanks to you all.

Gus

On Wed, Aug 22, 2018 at 12:09 PM Jeff Chirco <backseatdba_at_gmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks everyone for their responses. Oracle-L has been valuable, I read a
> lot on here and post only occasionally. I will try to post more. Chris I
> agree with your list. Twitter has been great to follow certain people in
> the community and finding their blogs or others that they retweet about.
> I've been to Collaborate a few times but sometimes that is just too big.
> Local conferences and Oracle users groups have disappeared in Southern
> California unfortunately.
> Seems like it might be common for DBA's to be thrown in with no one to
> look up to for help. Sounds like I just need to more of what I am doing and
> ask more questions.
>
> On Wed, Aug 22, 2018 at 8:49 AM Chris Taylor <
> christopherdtaylor1994_at_gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I'll chime in here as well.
>>
>> Ask TONS of questions. Always be asking questions. Oracle-L is a
>> god-send in some ways because it's fairly tight-knit and respectful of
>> others - even if the questions seem "simple". If you have a question ask
>> it. Or send someone an email off list asking follow-up questions about
>> something you're interested in being discussed if you don't feel
>> comfortable replying to the whole list.
>>
>> I think the fact you're on Oracle-L shows an immense level of capability
>> by just being involved here. Below are some recommendations and places
>> where I go for 'mentoring' today:
>>
>> - Oracle-L
>> - Reddit
>> - Twitter (individuals and then read subjects they write about if they
>> blog)
>> - Youtube (to some degree - hit or miss)
>> - Oracle Communities (RARELY use because it can be toxic)
>> - GOOGLE (lots of Google)
>> - DBI Blogs (Franck Pachot though he recently left DBI I believe)
>> - Community DBAs (if you're near a local user group: check here:
>> https://community.oracle.com/community/usergroups and
>> http://www.ioug.org/rugs)
>> - Goto Conferences (specifically IOUG, RMOUG and other USER group
>> conferences in place of OpenWorld etc)
>>
>> Chris
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Aug 22, 2018 at 9:34 AM Tim Gorman <tim.evdbt_at_gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> I was a PRO*C/OCI, PL/SQL, and SQL developer (i.e. SQL*Forms, etc)
>>> working for Oracle consulting when my customer fired their entire IT
>>> department in one day. This all happened immediately after the events
>>> chronicled in my chapter in "Tales Of The Oak Table: Oracle Insights
>>> <https://www.amazon.com/Oracle-Insights-Tales-Oak-Table/dp/1590593871>",
>>> which is reprinted (with permission from Apress) online HERE
>>> <https://www.red-gate.com/simple-talk/opinion/opinion-pieces/bad-carma/>
>>> .
>>>
>>> I was moved into the role of DBA, and that very first day, the
>>> production database started crashing, and I brought it back up twice. The
>>> third time it crashed, it stayed down because of media failure. I had to
>>> call Iron Mountain to retrieve the backup tapes, and when they returned the
>>> lockboxes, nobody could find the key, so I had to jimmy the boxes open with
>>> a hammer and screwdriver. We restored production, but were unable to roll
>>> forward to the point-in-time of failure due to a missing archived log
>>> file. After production was back up and running, we ran out of space and I
>>> discovered that we were almost completely out of disk, so I unmirrored all
>>> of the raw logical volumes underlying the index tablespaces in order to
>>> create new logical volumes, mirrored to table tablespaces and unmirrored
>>> for index tablespaces. Then I went home to sleep. I was the DBA for 10
>>> months until the company completed the process of migrating their
>>> mission-critical application from the custom-built Oracle-based application
>>> (i.e. VISION from the book chapter) to a much-older RMS-based VT100
>>> application on VMS. At one point, the previous DBA returned to visit
>>> colleagues, and when he heard that I had brought the database back online 3
>>> times my first day, ending with an incomplete recovery, he called me an
>>> idiot because "he should have left it down after the first crash and gotten
>>> those disks fixed", an assessment with which I cannot argue. As an Oracle
>>> employee, I had the resources of my colleagues and the company, including
>>> an internal email list called HELPKERN. I met people on HELPKERN with whom
>>> I am still in contact today, and it was because of HELPKERN that I joined
>>> ORACLE-L when I left Oracle in 1998.
>>>
>>> The collective expertise on HELPKERN and then ORACLE-L has been my
>>> mentor.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 8/22/18 06:33, Sheehan, Jeremy wrote:
>>>
>>> I went from Super PC Technician to Junior DBA at my previous company. I
>>> had a mentor for about 6 months then he jumped ship at the first sign of
>>> trouble in the company. That left me to fend for myself for about 2 years.
>>> I learned a little from him, but most of what I learned I had to learn
>>> myself. Fortunately, I moved companies and was placed on a team where I had
>>> a number of people that I could ask questions, but never got any real kind
>>> of mentoring. I’ve got 10+ years of experience now, but still feel kind of
>>> shaky on certain topics.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Jeremy
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *From:* oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org <oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org>
>>> <oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org> *On Behalf Of *Jeff Chirco
>>> *Sent:* Tuesday, August 21, 2018 3:51 PM
>>> *To:* oracle-l-freelist <oracle-l_at_freelists.org>
>>> <oracle-l_at_freelists.org>
>>> *Subject:* dba mentor
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> CAUTION - EXTERNAL EMAIL
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Did any of you have a mentor to help you along your DBA career path?
>>> Someone to coach you on what is right/wrong, offer advice for various
>>> projects, etc… I was the first DBA for my company and never had someone to
>>> go to for advice and such. I learned completely on the job besides going
>>> to some classes at the beginning and a couple conferences recently. And
>>> then some consultants over the years. I’ve always reported to a
>>> Programming manager, and they understand some of the job but not everything
>>> that needs to be done. Although I have been a DBA for over 10 years I feel
>>> there is still a ton for me to learn and be better at. I was alone for many
>>> years and did a lot of database development in addition to DBA duties. Kind
>>> of a jack of all trades expert at none. I am a lead now, we have one other
>>> DBA and maybe a third in the near future, but I know I can be a better
>>> leader and hope to advance that further.
>>>
>>> Did any of you have some kind of mentor during your career? For most of
>>> you it probably was someone inside the company but what about outside? How
>>> did you find this person and was it helpful? What did they do for you?
>>>
>>> Another other details or advice?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>>
>>>

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