Oracle DBA role is perceived to very hectic and demanding in terms of both energy and time. It is well understood that Oracle DBA’s will be mostly working in rotational shifts, overtime and few times are deprived of good sleep.
For a moment, let us look at some other profiles/roles which demand similar working styles. How many of our friends and colleagues, in Application support, Technical support or Application Developers work overnights? We can recollect a few in each area who are working hard for doing something good.
I am very honest when I tell you folks, that I enjoy my work and love to be an Oracle DBA. Here are some of the reasons, why I feel so:
My Workgroup:
Though my workgroup is so called database support, but I have never been stacked to the same group all the time every day of my work. It is not something you should be worried of; I feel privileged to be part of a workgroup that can be visualized below.
Woo!!! That’s very exciting to see that I belong to so many teams of IT Infrastructure management. I am further detailing it out how my team work closely with other teams in an overall IT landscape.
Network Team:
When do we need?
- Network setup for your RAC environment.
- DNS server cannot find the appropriate IP.
- Client server cannot find database server in the network.
- Network latency and so on …
Have you ever seen one or all these issues? then certainly you would have reached network team for their support. Before we approach, we would have certainly have understanding about TCP/IP protocols, Subnets, IP address classes etc. to communicate with the network team.
– Temporarily, I become a junior network administrator 🙂 as I understand how the problems are raised and fixed.
Storage team:
When do we need?
- File systems/mount points extension/addition.
- To have clustered file systems.
- Assigning file systems to ASM.
- Snapshot backups of your disks.
- I/O issue on the disk and so on…
I am sure that we should be understanding the storage terminologies like RAID, NAS, SAN storages and their possibilities as we approach storage team.
– Now, I am a junior Storage administrator 🙂
Server team:
When do we need?
- File systems/mount points extension/addition.
- Setup all pre-requisites as root to run Oracle software.
- Configuring mail server.
- Cannot find Crontab.
- Permissions on file systems.
- Heavy resource contention.
- Allow/block ports and on …
You must have added some knowledge on what sort of file system type you need ext4/3, SWAP space, CPU/Memory structure, permission levels etc. to get support from server team.
– Now, I am a junior Server administrator 🙂
Backup team:
When do we need?
- Tape drives setup.
- Tape backups.
- Tape restorations.
- Scheduling and planning and on…
It can be IBM Tivoli, NetBackup, Powervault, Commvault, Iperius or any similar tool; We take efforts to understand retention policies, TAPE sizes, Drive capacities, time lines from backup team.
– Now, I am a junior Backup administrator 🙂
Monitoring team:
We interact for –
- Database server unavailability.
- Database not reachable.
- Monitoring tool configuration.
- Tool access.
- Ticketing and follow ups and on…
BMC monitoring, DHC, HP OVO, Spotlight, OEM and it can be any other tool; Oracle DBA should have knowledge on how the tool works and produces the alerts to the tool.
– Now, I can debug any Monitoring issues 🙂
Application support team:
We interact for –
- Database access.
- Data maintenance.
- Performance issues.
- Application testing.
- Application release/maintenance and on…
For application support, Oracle DBA’s are the main point of contact for any issue in availability, performance even when it is not a database issue 🙂
– Here, I get to understand various aspects of application in terms of functionality and technology 🙂
All that said, I am no more acting just as an Oracle DBA in silos but becoming an all-rounder technically. This summarizes why I love to be an Oracle DBA with exciting activities day in day out.
I am sure, some of you might co-relate to these. But it would be great to know your passion and reasons behind continuing an awesome Oracle DBA role.
Leave your comments – I love to know your versions of the journey.
Amol
Perfectly explained in a nutshell !! 🙂
Kumar
Thank you Amol…
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shiv
Cool 🙂
Vinod
Nicely articulated in every direction and responsibilities of a DBA. Thanks
Pawan Kumar
Thank you Vinod…
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padmalochan
Nice article but one thing missing in the pic… that is upper management 🙂
Pawan Kumar
I wish so, But they are always along with us 🙂
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vamsi krishna
Nice article for DBA lovers : –
Mayank
can anybody tell me how start career in oracle dba
Pawan Kumar Yaddanapudi
If you are very crazy to become an Oracle DBA then the only thing you need to do is to take good training and be SERIOUS and DEDICATED to learn. If you need training go through the training tab in this webpage.
Thanks.
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Charles bate
Good layout and presentation. My oracle skills have changed tremendously since I joined your training you just the best Kumar
Pawan Kumar Yaddanapudi
That’s my pleasure Charles 🙂 Thank you
vivek
can anybody tell me how start career in oracle core dba and SQL Tunning
Pawan Kumar Yaddanapudi
Hi Vivek,
Tuning is something which comes later as it requires full understanding of Oracle database architecture. Please start learning with Core DBA for beginners and then opt further technologies.
Pinto
Very true and i truly appreciate for writing this post…. (y)
Pawan Kumar Yaddanapudi
Thank you Pinto
praveeen
Valuable information thanks for sharing.
Pawan Kumar Yaddanapudi
Cheers Praveen
jupitorberg berg
Hi,
Nice post,
Thanks for sharing this kind of useful information.
It is very useful to me and who want start their career with Oracle DBA online training/a>.
IS IT END OF DBA'S DUE TO AUTONOMOUS DATABASES?
thangaraju
interesting….feeling jealous about how u love ur job
Pawan Kumar Yaddanapudi
Cheers 🙂
Suresh Kamadolli
Being an Oracle DBA I had never thought of my job in this way. Great thanks for sharing this Kudos to you !! 🙂