Who is a DBA!!!
During my initial phase as a DBA, many times, this questions crossed my mind. Over the years I do have some findings.
1) Tough life but very satisfying.
Yes, as a DBA, life is tough. Those endless on-calls, midnight's crisis, n number of alert logs, non-readable trace-files, etc...etc.. but yes at the end of the day your efforts do count which ultimately leads to job satisfaction.
Being a DBA, you are always considered special.
2) Continuous Education
DBA is considered as a most important asset of a team which puts more pressure on us to keep ourselves updated with new technologies, enhancements and all those minute little details.
3) Certifications.
Oracle certification is a great way to gain confidence during your DBA tenure. It does not help technically much as DUMPS being easily accessible but yes, it does make you aware of all the features Oracle provide and the correct way to use it syntactically.
I always recommend to complete at-least one certification every 6 months or 1 year. Preparation should be done in such a way that you go thorough all the topics at least once.
4) Next time you should automate it!!
Yes indeed!! There are many tasks which are quite repetitive as a DBA. So the motto should be to automate whatever you can, as the word "AUTOMATION" makes your client feel really happy and yes it do save a lot of time.
5) A Complete DBA!!
As a DBA, its very important that you know at-least one Linux OS flavor in terms of architecture,commands and most important scripting. Scripting is very handy for your day-to-day activities.
Also its very important to have domain and application knowledge your database is supporting as it gives you an end-to-end picture of what is expected from you. Also, it helps you a lot while making schema level or database level changes.
6) Repository!!
During those unwanted production outages, you don't want to Google those complex commands. Rather make a small repository which will have all your handy sql's you will need most of the time.
I would recommended to follow a directory structure, which each topic having a different folder and related information stored in it. That means, post 5-6 years of experience, you would have your own set of skills developed within each topic and its really quite easy then to find anything you want.
This is what I have till know. Will keep on adding more points. Your comments will help me to improve more. Thanks for reading!!!
Keep Exploring!! Keep Learning!!
