RE: DBA Interview Questions

  • From: "Freeman, Donald" <dofreeman@xxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <ryan_gaffuri@xxxxxxxxxxx>, "Oracle-L (E-mail)" <oracle-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 16:15:07 -0500

I agree with all of that.  The contract DBA previous to this one kept getting 
annoyed because I'd read about something and ask him about it.  He was 8i 
certified, we are using 9i, and he hadn't done anything to implement any 
feature of our expensive new software.  After dragging him through every single 
improvement that I could identify, I mentioned that 9i could handle multiple 
block sizes.   His heart about seized up.  He thought he had heard me make the 
stupidest comment anybody claiming the title of DBA could make and really went 
off his rocker.   I went back to my desk and copied and pasted the information 
about multiple block sizes into an email and sent it to him.  He never got over 
that and left shortly afterward. 
[Freeman, Donald] 
 -----Original Message-----
From: ryan_gaffuri@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ryan_gaffuri@xxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Wednesday, November 24, 2004 4:01 PM
To: Les.Hollis@xxxxxx; Post, Ethan; dofreeman@xxxxxxxxxxx; Oracle-L (E-mail)
Cc: Hollis, Les
Subject: RE: DBA Interview Questions



I have worked with alot of people with alot of experience who are useless and 
get in the way. They have done the same thing for 10 years and won't even read 
the new features docs. Every time you have a disagreement its 'in the past this 
worked, so it must work every time' or my favorite is 'i have done this for X 
years and you have done this for X-Y years, so I am right'. 
 
I find that people who respond to questions with 'in my experience 'X' works', 
typically do not look for the general case. it just worked. they don't know 
why, they don't know the most appropriate times to use it. 
 
Bottom line, can the person do the job. A good tech screen will tell you that. 
I ask experience questions only if they pass my tech screen. if they can't, i 
don't care how long they have done something. 
 
I don't believe in memorizing or stock responses either, I also don't believe 
in 'i have to look every single thing up either'. If you do something regular 
and you do reading, alot of stuff will stick in your head. 
 
 
 

-------------- Original message -------------- 

> Hi Ethan.... 
> 
> 
> I tend more towards trying to determine if the candidate has honest to 
> goodness real world experience or is it all book knowledge and passed 
> the OCP. 



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