Learn As You Go
How testing, writing, reading, and connecting can be tools for self-instruction
RICARDO PORTILHO PRONI
LISA DOBSON
ZHANG LEYI (KAMUS)
Company: Nerv Informática, a consulting
company focused mainly on Oracle solutions for
database tuning, recovery, and high availability
Job title/description: Consultant and instructor,
providing support and helping customers define
new projects
Location: São Paulo, Brazil
Oracle credentials: Oracle Certified Associate
(Oracle Database 10g), Oracle Certified
Professional (Oracle Database 10g, MySQL 5),
Oracle Certified Expert (Oracle Real Application
Clusters 10g, Managing Oracle on Linux)
What advice do you have for those just
getting into database development? After
you discover how to do something new, post
about it on your blog—even if it happens in
the middle of the night. This doesn’t just
help others; when you blog about something
you’ve learned, you have to test it intensely,
and in the process you discover new aspects
of the technology.
If you were going to the International Space
Station for six months and could only take
one Oracle reference book, what would it be?
Oracle Wait Interface: A Practical Guide to
Performance Diagnostics and Tuning [Oracle
Press, 2004]. If you read only one book on
Oracle tuning, read this one.
What green practices do you use in your
DBA work? Our clients are always concerned
about needing more storage and energy.
With the new Advanced Compression
feature in Oracle Database 11 g Release 2,
we are helping them save energy, because
SQL commands actually take less time to
complete—thereby consuming much less
CPU and causing fewer wait events.
Company: Durham University, an educational
institution serving undergraduate and graduate
students and postdoctoral researchers
Job title/description: Oracle DBA, responsible
for the creation, management, and maintenance
of Oracle databases
Location: Newcastle upon Tyne, England
Length of time using Oracle products:
14 years
How did you get started in I T? Quite
by accident! I was working in a finance
department as an accounts clerk. The
company was upgrading Oracle Financials,
and the IT department needed an end user
from the business side to join the project
team. At the end of the project, I moved to
the second-line support team for financial
applications and then went on to become a
UNIX sys admin and Oracle DBA.
If you were going to the International Space
Station for six months and could only take
one Oracle reference book, what would it
be? Oracle RMAN 11g Backup and Recovery,
by Robert Freeman [Oracle Press, 2010]. I
used to think Oracle RMAN [Oracle Recovery
Manager] was too complex, but this book
changed all that. It’s so clearly written, with
do-it-yourself exercises that really drive the
concepts home.
What’s your favorite thing to do that doesn’t
involve work? Being vice president of the
U.K. Oracle User Group [UKOUG]. I’ve been
volunteering with UKOUG since 2005, and
it’s not something I consider work. I relied
on the user group so much when I was a
beginner and feel strongly about giving back.
Company: Enmo Tech, a technology solution,
remote database management, and outsourcing
company
Job title/description: Technical director,
handling all database tasks for Enmo customers
as well as new software product design
Location: Beijing, China
Oracle credentials: Oracle Certified Professional
(Oracle8i Database, Oracle9i Database), with
10 years of experience using Oracle products
What’s your favorite tool on the job? I’m an
avid fan of Oracle SQL Developer, and I think
it has a lot of potential for growth in China.
What makes it tick is its powerful reporting
features, plus performance monitoring
graphics—it’s just as good as commercial
software in terms of functionality.
Which new features in Oracle Database are
you currently finding most valuable? The
SecureFiles LOB [large object] in Oracle
Database 11 g Release 2 performs very well.
No longer do we need to store unstructured
data such as graphics on file systems—we
can now store them in the database.
What technology has most changed your
life? Computer science and database
technology. My major was Japanese,
and after graduation I went to work for
an offshore I T company with most of its
contracts from Japan, translating the specs
from Japanese to Chinese. I was put on the
testing team, and purely out of interest, I
started to teach myself the programming
language—back then it was Microsoft Visual
Basic. Soon enough I formally entered into
I T as a professional.
Learn more about the Oracle ACE program at oracle.com/technetwork/community/oracle-ace.
