DBAs are increasingly being asked to manage not only larger numbers of database instances, but multiple database platforms as well.
Cross-Platform database monitoring and management is no longer a trend, it's a reality. But managing it all and addressing challenges presented by the complexity of the database isn’t always easy.
DBTA recently held a webinar with Jason Hall, senior sales engineer at Quest Software, and Pini Dibask, product manager for database performance management at Quest Software, who discussed the top five challenges when managing cross platform database environments and how to address them.
Modern DBAs are under pressure, Hall and Dibask explained. DBAs have to manage multiple database platforms and editions, deliver best performance and stability, and adjust to changing technology.
The first challenge they face is managing multiple platforms. Not only are companies bringing in multiple database platforms, DBA’s are being asked to manage them and some organizations have platform specific DBA’s, others are asking DBA’s to cross-train, according to Hall and Dibask.
To address this problem, Hall and Dibask suggest asking a series of questions such as: What are the basics that need to be covered for all platforms?
Performance tuning, high availability, and security are the three main areas to watch out for.
The second challenge facing DBAs are managing the variety of database editions available. Many companies use less expensive database editions to reduce costs. These editions may have limited performance diagnostics capabilities. DBAs can be frustrated when having limited performance diagnostics capabilities.
Quest’s Foglight Performance Investigator was designed to address this challenge, Hall and Dibask said. Foglight doesn’t access licensed tables/views/procedures/APIs and gives DBAs all the performance diagnostics they need without spending a fortune.
Other issues DBAs struggle with include managing large environments, different database locations, and managing performance with minimal overhead.
An archived on-demand replay of this webinar is available here