Within the Microsoft platform, most of the enterprise level programs (SharePoint, any of the System Center apps, any of the Dyamics apps, etc) all run on top of SQL Server. For administrators of these programs, SQL Server is often a black box that is installed as a prerequisite to whatever program is their primary focus. As a result, there is very little (if any) planning that goes into the SQL side of the installation, leading to problems that surface somewhere further upstream.
- Transaction Logs that fill drives
- No maintenance plans (or uninformed ones, such as plans that both reorganize and rebuild the indexes)
- Unmanaged autogrowth
- Databases and logs on the same spindles
- Poorly chosen RAID levels
- No backup (or recovery plan)
So… what types of problems do “accidental DBAs” tend to hit, and what resources would best help an accidental DBA get up to speed on SQL planning, administration and performance tuning basics?
Answer
Checkout the series of articles and Q&A columns I write for TechNet Magazine – they’re mostly written with the Accidental (we call it ‘involuntary’) DBA in mind.
Top Tips for Effective Database Maintenance was written specifically as a primer for involuntary DBAs to understand DB maintenance issues.
Understanding Logging and Recovery in SQL Server
Common SQL Server Security Issues and Solutions
Understanding SQL Server Backups – part 1 of a 3-part series. Part 2 will be on using restore (in the Sept 09 issue) and part 3 will be on recovering without backups (in the Nov 09 issue)
You should also checkout my blog and my wife’s blog (not advertizing or anything just info) – we both blog a huge amount on a variety of technical levels.
One good series of posts to look through are the editorials for the results of my weekly surveys. They are usually around a broad topic that would help involuntary DBAs. The editorial posts start with ‘Importance of’ or ‘Important’. In fact this week’s survey is on being an involuntary DBA – very timely!
We understand the involuntary DBA thing really well – in fact Kimberly and I teach a couple of days of the SharePoint Microsoft Certified Masters class so the SharePoint admins know what to do with their SQL Servers (we also teach a full week of the SQL one).
Hope this is useful to you.
Attribution
Source : Link , Question Author : Community , Answer Author :
Paul Randal
