First SQl job were you nervous?

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First SQl job were you nervous?

thomashohner

SSCrazy Eights

Points: 9856
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May 3, 2014 at 6:58 pm

#100555

I currently work in a health clinic as a Clinical Applictions Specialist. I do the training, configuring workflows and as of last spring the reporting. I started doing the reporting piece by chance. My boss hated doing the reports so we all know what happened here. Hey its your turn. He used Excel which I absolutley loathe. I discovered Sql Server and SSRS and fell head over heels in love! Needless to say because I had already mastered the front end of the app pulling the information out that our clinic request became very easy.
Here is my conundrum, I love Sql I read 100 pages on Triggers today alone, I'm studying for my first exam for the MCSA. However in the last 6 weeks I have been asked for my resume twice once from the vendor that I currently build reports from their db for our clinic and a third party company that works with the same db. They have already shared 4 of my reports with their community base. One of the senior developers at the third party company is who I feel is my mentor is one of those who asked for my res. My fear as I told him is that I dont feel good enough yet for the big boys.
Anyone else sometimes feel nervous that you wont measure up? They pay me well at my current job, just nervous about living up to expectations.
My favorite part of the day is F5:w00t:
Thoughts?
***SQL born on date Spring 2013:-)

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Jeff Moden SSC Guru Points: 1004329 More actions · Answer 1

If you're nervous about living up to expectations, then you're well on your way to being one of the "big boys". Keep reading about SQL Server. If you don't have the Developer's Edition on your home machine or laptop to play with, spend the less-than $65USD to get a copy. It's worth every cent. So is the nervousness. If the nervousness ever completely goes away, you have a problem.

I'll give you a little secret to success on the T-SQL side of things. If you can't easily make a million row test table at the drop of a hat (any hat) to test your code with, life will be a whole lot more difficult for you. Looking back, it's the one thing that has really made a huge difference in my career. As a man much wiser than I once said, "One good test is worth a thousand expert opinions" and he was correct.

--Jeff Moden

RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.

Helpful Links:
How to post code problems
How to Post Performance Problems
Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

thomashohner SSCrazy Eights Points: 9856 More actions · Answer 2

Thanks so much for your reply Mr. Modden. I got the Developer edition a while back when I knew there were things I wanted to play with that I best not do on our production server. What a great deal on that software! Got mine for $44 Amazon Prime. I have a half a dozen db's now on my laptop. Such as, Adventure Works, JProco( Currently doing the Joes2Pros series labs from Rick Morlean) and several I have created. I even have one named after the wife :hehe:. Along with the books and labs I'm working on I also try to make a point of reading at least 1-2 SQL blogs or articles a week.

On the million record test data... I know what I'm doing today:-D

Thanks again,

Thomas

***SQL born on date Spring 2013:-)

Jeff Moden SSC Guru Points: 1004329 More actions · Answer 3

thomashohner (5/4/2014)
On the million record test data... I know what I'm doing today:-D

Do you use a While Loop or Recursive CTE to make your test data?

Thanks so much for your reply Mr. Modden.

Heh... just a tip from an old dude that has seen a whole lot of water pass under the proverbial bridge... THAT's the one thing that you should absolutely sweat bullets over. While it's good to be humble and thankful, spell the name of your boss, other higher-up, or even a peer incorrectly and see how many points you earn especially if the name has only 5 characters in it. 😉 Personally, I'm not insulted outside the work-place but wanted to tell you that a whole lot of people are much more sensitive to it. I've found that such a simple faux paux in communications will cause many higher-ups to think "Gee... what kind of attention-to-detail does the person really have when they won't even take the time to spell my name correctly?' I also take the time to learn to pronounce even difficult names correctly. While some claim to understand and accept mispronunciation of their complex names simply because they are complex, you can really get their attention and develop incredible working relationships just by taking the time to show them they're important enough to learn to pronounce their difficult name correctly.

--Jeff Moden

RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.

Helpful Links:
How to post code problems
How to Post Performance Problems
Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

Eirikur Eiriksson SSC Guru Points: 182911 More actions · Answer 4

Throwing in my nickles worth, first on the operation side; draw up your worst case scenarios, then think of few ways to make them even worse, how you would tackle those (not including UCR (update CV and Relocate)) and play through those until you are comfortable with it.

On the development, draw a list of things that's commonly referred to as "no can do" in SQL and (work on) solve those!

😎

thomashohner SSCrazy Eights Points: 9856 More actions · Answer 5

@ Mr. Moden, My apologies I guess misspelling your name is not illustrating attention for detail.:blush:

I think I will give a Recursive CTE a try since I have a book on CTE's that I have been itching to crack open.

***SQL born on date Spring 2013:-)

thomashohner SSCrazy Eights Points: 9856 More actions · Answer 6

@Eirikur Eiriksson sounds like great ideas to me!

***SQL born on date Spring 2013:-)

Gail Shaw SSC Guru Points: 1004504 More actions · Answer 7

thomashohner (5/3/2014)
Anyone else sometimes feel nervous that you wont measure up?

Yup. With every new client.

I think I will give a Recursive CTE a try since I have a book on CTE's that I have been itching to crack open.

Cool, and when you do so take note of how incredibly badly it performs.

Gail Shaw
Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

We walk in the dark places no others will enter
We stand on the bridge and no one may pass

Eirikur Eiriksson SSC Guru Points: 182911 More actions · Answer 8

GilaMonster (5/4/2014)
Cool, and when you do so take note of how incredibly badly it performs.

In my books, having to use recursive CTEs qualifies as worst case scenario, do explore the alternatives!

😎

thomashohner SSCrazy Eights Points: 9856 More actions · Answer 9

I did a Google search and yes the Recursive CTE does seem to have a HUGE performace disadvantage compared to a Loop. I'm still very new at this so my next question to research and understand is why.

Off the top of my head is it because a CTE is a derived table and it will have to go back and scan itself over and over to calculate the next proceeding values?

***SQL born on date Spring 2013:-)

Gail Shaw SSC Guru Points: 1004504 More actions · Answer 10

thomashohner (5/4/2014)
I did a Google search and yes the Recursive CTE does seem to have a HUGE performace disadvantage compared to a Loop. I'm still very new at this so my next question to research and understand is why.

It'll probably be faster than an explicit loop. Slower than a proper set-based operation. That's because behind the scenes it is a loop.

Gail Shaw
Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

We walk in the dark places no others will enter
We stand on the bridge and no one may pass

thomashohner SSCrazy Eights Points: 9856 More actions · Answer 11

Do you use a While Loop or Recursive CTE to make your test data?

Niether, I spent this time researching how to do this and stumbled on a article by a very articulate fellow on this forum. However I do believe this comment may have been testing how ingnorant I am on the subject which incidentally is very much so.

Thanks look forward to putting your article in action.

http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Data+Generation/87901/

***SQL born on date Spring 2013:-)

Jeff Moden SSC Guru Points: 1004329 More actions · Answer 12

thomashohner (5/4/2014)

Do you use a While Loop or Recursive CTE to make your test data?

Niether, I spent this time researching how to do this and stumbled on a article by a very articulate fellow on this forum. However I do believe this comment may have been testing how ingnorant I am on the subject which incidentally is very much so.
Thanks look forward to putting your article in action.
http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Data+Generation/87901/

Shucks... first, thanks for the "attention to detail" on one of your previous posts above. And I also say "Thank you" for the very nice complement. :blush: I'm humbled.

Shifting gears, it admittedly was a wee bit of a "test" to find out if you really meant that you already sussed the million row test table thing. If you were stuck on While Loops (mostly because of the poor functionality of RAND()) or rCTEs, I was going to suggest the very article that you posted back. Nicely done and good form on your part.

Just for convenience sake, here are the URLs for both of the "test data" articles.

http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Data+Generation/87901/

http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Test+Data/88964/

Last but not least and as you can see from the resposes that instantly popped up when you mentioned using rCTEs, here are a couple of articles to assist you in your research, if you haven't already come across them.

http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/T-SQL/74118/

http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/T-SQL/62867/

Getting back to the subject at hand and based on what's happened in this thread so far, I think you have the right attitude and will do very well whether it's something new or not. Never lose the nervousness. It's one of your best assets to drive you to success no matter what you do.

--Jeff Moden

RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.

Helpful Links:
How to post code problems
How to Post Performance Problems
Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

Grant Fritchey SSC Guru Points: 398882 More actions · Answer 13

You should be nervous.

You're talking about taking responsibility for what, in this modern age, is arguably the most valuable asset of many organizations, the data. If that doesn't scare the pants off you, you're probably not a good fit for the job.

I get nervous about every new job and every new situation in old jobs. But, how do you deal with the nervousness? Ignore it and plow forward? Run & hide? Or, acknowledge it and try to get as much information as you can so you can be better prepared so that you're mitigating the issue without dismissing it? Do that last thing and you'll be fine (most of the time).

"The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
- Theodore Roosevelt

Author of:
SQL Server Execution Plans
SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

SQL is delicious Ten Centuries Points: 1007 More actions · Answer 14

I'm always nervous, every time. One of my problems is that it's hard for me to articulate exactly how to do something in SQL, or explain it to other people...but if you put me in front of SQL Server with requirements, I'm totally fine. If you give me a query that's performing badly and tell me to make it run fast, I can almost always do that without too much difficulty.

But yeah...nervous? Every time, all the time. I feel like I never know enough.