The Google DBA, the GUI DBA and the DBA who does all the work

I often neglect notes and comments on people who divide DBAs into groups and types but this DBA’s Journey into the Cloud is worth commenting on:

The exposé is so short that one does not get the impression if these 3 DBA types are mutually exclusive or not. If not, why would then someone profile DBAs into groups?

You obviously use Google and Metalink (called MOS nowadays). And you use GUIs: Grid Control, Oracle Developer, Toad? Doesn’t look impressive if you cannot make it into the last group, right?

And into which group will the guy hired for this Pre-Sales DBA job fit?

Let me change to another classification method and peek at the The DBA Corner of Craig Mullins. He says that the more common types of DBAs are:

– System DBA
– Database Architect
– Database Analyst
– Data Modeler
– Application DBA
– Task-Orientated DBA
– Performance Analyst
– Data Warehouse Administrator

Too many. I might agree that the system DBA and application DBA are different roles but all those analysts? “The performance analyst is usually the most skilled, senior member of the DBA staff, a role that he has grown into due to his experience and the respect he has gained in past tuning endeavors.” Interesting..

Next, I want to see what Don Burleson has to say. What Type of DBA Are You? Only 3 options here:

– The Scientist DBA
– The Can-do DBA
– The Empathic DBA

Looks like classification on emotional basis. Interesting reading though.

Let us look at what Wikipedia has to say. Déjà vu! 3 types again:

– System DBA
– Development DBA
– Application DBA

Development DBA? Used to be called a programmer years ago. I always thought that the Development DBA takes care of the development databases 🙂

What do people have to say about the DBA types in the internet forums. Let us visit DBA support. Funny stuff at the end! Now, the types are 4, with short descriptions listed below:

– The smart and industrious DBA
– The stupid and industrious DBA
– The smart and lazy DBA
– The stupid and lazy DBA

Up to now, it looks to me that I am always a mixture of some type. A hybrid? Brian Knight figures it out in his article DBA Job Description: What type of DBA are you? 3 types again:

– Production DBA
– Development DBA
– Hybrid DBA

I really don’t know. 10 years ago, he wrote about the Death of the Production DBA and companies still recruit SQL Server Production DBAs.

If you surf the Internet, you will find all type of DBA classifications: the Oracle DBA and the MySQL DBA; the certified DBA and non-certified DBA; the on-call DBA and the 9-to-5 DBA.

There is even a Marketing DBA: “DBA skill needs to sale out software to vendors. To convince customer in technical point of view marketing team requires DBA help. Marketing DBA tries to satisfy each technical queries of customer and help marketing team. There is no database administration and maintenance directly involve in this DBA role.”

Look once more in the text above: A database administrator role such that there is no database administration. No comment.

But eventually, it looks to me that DBAs can be divided into two groups: those who divide DBAs into groups and those who don’t..