Earlier this month, I had poll on this blog where I asked question – Are you a Database Administrator or Database Developer? The word DBA (Database Administrator) is very common but DBD (Database Developer) is not common at all. This made me think – what is the ratio of the same.
Here the result of the poll:
Database Administrator 36.6% (254 votes)
Database Developer 63.4% (440 votes)
Total Votes: 694
This is open poll, if you want you can still participate here.
Vote your Voice – DBD or DBA?
I think it is the time when DBD word for Database Developer gets place in our dictionary.
What a Database Developer Does and What to Learn Next
Whatever the dictionary says, the two jobs look different on a normal day. A DBA spends time on backups and restores, security, high availability, patching and keeping servers healthy. A developer on the database side designs tables, writes T-SQL and stored procedures, and makes sure queries return the right answer fast.
The overlap is performance tuning, and that is where the best people on both sides meet. If you are a developer, here is what I would learn from the DBA side:
- How to read an execution plan.
- How transactions and locking work, so your code does not block everyone else.
- Why backups and recovery models matter before you run a big data change.
- How to write a set-based query instead of a cursor that loops row by row.
If you are a DBA, learn to read the code and understand index design, because many server problems start in a single query. Knowing how the application uses the database helps you tune the right thing. Sitting next to the developers for an afternoon teaches more than any document.
My honest view is that the label matters less than the skills. Many of the strongest people I know do some of both, and they switch hats several times a day. Whichever box you ticked in the poll, pick one skill from the other side this year and practice it on a real problem. Job titles will keep changing. The need for people who understand data will not.
Published by Pinal Dave on SQLAuthority. More of my work at pinaldave.com.
9 Comments. Leave new
The poll link is not valid (http:///).
hello sir
i think database administraor
i knew sql server 2005 mean view ,agg function,how to create
backup and restore ,dml,ddl,dcl,qurey
but i donot know use of oracle
i want to become database administrator
sql server is big different according to oracle
becoz your site is very good
i want to study oracle (free)
plz give me some site of oracle
Pinal,
Thank you for the opportunity to voice this opinion – DBA is really confining in that it seems to imply knowledge of storage and optimization techniques for database software/hardware. Developer on the other hand can do all this and work out the details from requirements serving as more of a go-between business people and machines.
Just my two cents,
Chad-c
Don’t forget there’s a third type of SQL Server professional: Us Business Intelligence guys!
;-)
“Us BI guys” – lends itself to a third level as it were in the hierarchy: DBA could be part of DBD which could be part of BID, that is Business Intelligence Developer?
I would have BI over in their own column .. maybe the DUAL table. Most BI, that I work with, have little understanding of what they are doing other than ‘playing in BIG data’ with Tableau. Yes, playing on my server in my database built as DBD.
DBD is more commom.
which one be eassy to learn DBA or DBD
DBA is less easy to learn compare to DBD as this involves logically thinking outside the box.
Thanks.