MySQL DBA

[Paul Mooring]

If you'll excuse the shameless plug the company I work for
(http://www.aimitservices.com) does just that and I've never understood
why outsourcing isn't more common for small and growing businesses.  It
allows a much larger and likely more experience staff the businesses
those sizes would have access to, to manage all their IT needs.  But
working in that environment it seems to me that outsourcing is like a
bad word to a lot of business owners.  I think even the ones that know
their current staff can't handle the issues they're dealing with are
much more willing to pay hourly rates to fix things and keep their
current staff rather outsourcing all the IT work.  But then again I
don't really understand much about running a business so maybe there's a
really good reason for this that I just don't get.

-------- Forwarded Message --------
> From: Trent Shipley <tshipley at deru.com>
> Reply-to: Main PLUG discussion list
> <plug-discuss at lists.plug.phoenix.az.us>
> To: Main PLUG discussion list <plug-discuss at lists.plug.phoenix.az.us>
> Subject: Re: MySQL DBA
> Date: Thu, 20 Aug 2009 19:15:15 -0700
> 
> I just finished the Master of Science in Information Management at ASU.
>  I guess there's nothing wrong with hiring a junior level JOAT to run
> LAMP, and there's certainly nothing wrong with doing this early in your
> career.  The main downside is that unless the customer/employer gets
> VERY lucky, they won't get the expert service a large firm would get
> through specialization.  In theory what these little companies should do
> is outsource the IT department. This is especially true of non-profits
> and small government departments where IT isn't strategic.  Outsourcing
> is more problematic for something like a b2c business where the IT is
> strategic.  Then you need a way to reconquer IT if your company grows.
> 
> What this indicates is a need for professional, multi-disciplinary IT
> consulting targeting small and medium sized businesses, non-profits, and
> government units.  The big guys don't want it.  You can charge enough
> and the meals are too small.  The little guys, like Red7 and Data
> Doctors, started as repair shops and may have trouble getting into the
> consultant/contractor rent-an-IT-department mindset.
> 
> I think there's definitely an itch here.  I think it would be fun to get
> together and discuss it.  I'm thinking maybe a professional cooperative
> as an organizational structure.
> 
> 
> 
> <with snippage>
> Michael Butash wrote:
> > In my experience in big enterprise to small offices, either you have
> > "the dude that kinda dabbles with everything", or you have quite
> > separate roles.  Primarily you would have a SQL Admin/Engineer (just sql
> > performance/operations/engineering), Linux Engineer (os, apache, sql),
> > and a Web Dev/Admin/Engineer (php coding, cms, site management).
> > Usually you also have Security and Network folk in the mix too to keep
> > things sane.  Sometimes you have one person that likes to dabble in
> > each, and can varyingly admin them all as so to *get by*, but they're
> > subsequently "jack of all trades", and typically "master of none" kind
> > of people.  
> > 
> > Finding an environment where you can "dabble" professionally in
> > everything is typically going to be a low-pay, thankless job I would
> > say, as a company wants 1 person to do *everything*, but will pay low
> > because they don't know what they really need.  They're often trying to
> > find their magical unicorn employee that will do everything for little
> > pay.  Government agencies tend to be fond of these roles, but pay low
> > enough they really have no expectation of finding someone close, so they
> > settle for the closest that will actually apply.  They learn and cope as
> > they can, and move on once they pick one of those skills to focus on in
> > bigger companies that have already learned the value of the separate
> > skill sets among employees.
> > 
> > -mb
> </snippage>
> 
> > 
> > 
> > On Thu, 2009-08-20 at 16:27 -0700, Trent Shipley wrote:
> >> I am used to seeing jobs involving MySQL as part of positions being
> >> advertised for a LAMP generalist.  I never respond.  Not only am I not
> >> particularly competent in any of the components, I have a hard time
> >> seeing myself as competent to manage that kind of stack.  I actually
> >> doubt many people are really competent at managing a LAMP stack all by
> >> themselves.
> >>
> >> However, I was recently looking for jobs on DICE and I saw
> >> advertisements for dedicated MySQL positions -- with more emphasis on
> >> DBA that development.  I can imagine being a competent DBA.  I taught
> >> myself to work with Oracle and I like database work.
> >>
> >> In the early 2000's Oracle was complex, DB2 somewhat less complex, SQL
> >> Server was almost friendly in comparison, and MySQL pretty simple to
> >> administer -- almost a toy compared to the big boys.  How much more
> >> complex has MySQL gotten in the last five years or so?  What would be
> >> involved in gaining competence.  Do you think you could read up on
> >> MySQL, then find people stupid enough to let you work on MySQL
> >> databases, preferably for money so you could get experience?  How would
> >> you encourage such stupidity?
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