This is the name I give to anyone who, whilst learning a new technology, suddenly thinks it’s the best thing since sliced bread and consequently wants to shoehorn it in to everything.

(think that person who just started learning NoSql)

I’m not singling anyone out here as we are all guilty of this at some point in our careers.

For me, it’s Linux. I’ve been interested in learning the platform for a while and have had tastes in the past when say, installing a redis cluster but I haven’t really delved that deep into it.

All that’s changed over the last year, with me digging into tech such as Kubernetes and of course, SQL on Linux being released. This has give me the chance (excuse?) and the opportunity to really start learning as there are now great resources for me in the shape of We Speak Linux and Anthony Nocentino’s (b|t) Plural Sight courses.

I have shiny tech syndrome so bad that I’m honestly considering buying a Dell XPS 13 with Ubuntu pre-installed as my next laptop.

At first that sounds a bit nuts for me. I’m a SQL Server DBA and want a lightweight laptop that I can use for presenting and writing blogs/demos.

But the more I think about it the more the XPS is appealing to me. I’ve been having some frustrations with Windows 10 recently (if I have to uninstall Candy Crush Saga after an update one more time I’m going to scream) and with the release of SQL Operations Studio & VS Code I can happily do everything that I need on a Linux laptop. Plus I have a Windows 10 Jump Box in Azure that I can always fall back to.

Are there any SQL Server DBAs out there who’ve used a Linux distro as their main working environment? Have you had any issues? I’d love to hear from you.

Have a good week!