Below are a list of questions I either hear a lot, or ones I thought of on my own. I am also open to answering any other questions you may have, so please feel free to submit some in the comments below and I’ll do my best to answer them.
Q: Can I see your resume/CV?
A: Knock yourself out
Q: Do you maintain a list of all the stuff you’ve done outside of this blog?
A: Yup! Here’s a custom timeline.
Q: Do you have any impressive certifications?
A: Depends what you consider “impressive:”
Q: Did you go to school for this?
A: Sort of. I graduated from the University of Pittsburgh in 2002 with a BSIS degree from the School of Information Science.
Q: Do you work full-time, or are you a consultant? Where do you operate out of?
A: I am (thankfully) employed full-time, but I love to consult or advise when asked. I own a private consulting company, Dublin Data Solutions, and I’m very selective about who I engage with but by all means reach out if you need my help or advice. I live and work in Dublin, Ohio.
Q: I have a question for you, but I’m not sure if you’ll answer it for free.
A: I like to help where I can for free because I’ve been in a similar position. But if you’re looking for help, you can hire me.
Q: I want to use a script you wrote but I don’t want to give you any credit. Is that cool?
A: Since this is the internet, where everyone takes credit for everything else, I can’t force you. But an ‘atta boy now and then would be nice. Or at least a follow on twitter.
Q: Can I be your friend on social media?
A: Can you?
Q: Hey I downloaded, installed, and used a PowerShell/SQL script you wrote in my production and bad things happened. I blame you, so I need you to fix it or else I’ll lose my job.
A: So you downloaded a script from some random dude on the internet and ran it in production despite me warning you otherwise? I feel like I’m not the problem…
Q: What’s the worst thing you’ve ever done as a DBA?
A: Not validating backups. Just because you’re backing something up doesn’t mean it can be restored. Test, test, test!
Q: Don’t you think there are plenty of SQL Blogs out there already, by people who are way, way smarter than you?
A: Absolutely, and I’m not delusional to think that this blog is any sort of competition with them. If anything I just want my posts to either be discussed, validated, or torn to shreds in front of me. This is just as much a learning exercise for me as the readers.
Q: Why do you use PowerShell for so many things? I can do with T-SQL/DTEXEC.EXE/SQLCMD.EXE already!
A: Because sometimes there’s a lot of different ways to do something, and because I can.
Q: When you’re not scolding developers for writing bad SQL, what do you do for fun?
A: I am a bit of a board game nut, although I enjoying all sorts of gaming. I also do some CrossFit but I’m terrible at it, but my ask me about my mobility and gymnastics.
I love my dog because he’s cute and doesn’t require me to open any tickets for me to do anything with him.