T-SQL Tuesday #119 – What changes my mind

T-SQL Tuesday series (the monthly blog party) has been started by Adam Machanic and co-ordinated by Steve Jones. This month’s topic is hosted by my friend Alex Yates. He is keen to know what kind of things change your mind. Something that happened in your IT career, but doesn’t have to be technically tied. Whatever it was and left a permanent mark on your head. Or you purely just remember that.

At the beginning, I started to wonder about what topic I changed or change my mind. Although this doesn’t happen very often, I don’t think I have a problem with it. To be wrong is human nature. To stick to one post all your life – it may seem like a bad idea.

After all, how do they say it?

A wise man changes his mind, a fool never will.

Our lives and experiences are also changing. Constantly. Especially if you work with Azure, or services in the cloud, am I correct?

The Person

Life is a series of compromises. Should I write a blog post or go for a run? But play with my children first, they go to bed in an hour, after all. Damn, I still have to reply to a few emails and prepare a new podcast episode. There is also a session to prepare for the next SQL Saturday. And also this unfinished book that I was supposed to read a week ago. Why am I writing about all this? Because these things are choices. Priorities. And if you have a family, e.g. a wife/husband and children (optionally) then… yes. The partner will help us to change our mind. Believe me.

The people

As I said – our lives are changing. We change these changes ourselves, but also the people we surround ourselves with. Consciously or not – we derive certain patterns from others. I like to be surrounded by many people, I like to observe people, talk about our behaviours and habits because it teaches me something new. It’s worth using the patterns you identify with. In this case, it’s not about what you thought before. I don’t think about it. I think whether the new approach is able to change me for the better, and thus also my surroundings. It’s not easy and the process is long. After all, I think it’s worth it.

The technology

From a technology point of view – I don’t change my mind very often. Generally, I don’t. I also don’t remember any specific situation in which I had to do it. Which doesn’t change the fact that the architecture of the solution I propose can change over time. The technology around us is changing extremely fast. Take just a few examples from the shore: Azure Data Factory V1 – currently deprecated. What can customers do who have already managed to implement this service? Well … migrate to V2? Is this a simple process? Definitely not. In fact, I wouldn’t even call this process “migration|. It’s simply to create this process again – regardless of whether we think of ADF v2, Azure Databricks or something else. There is no migrating application or service which does it for us.
Another example: let’s look at SQL Server. It develops at a dizzying pace. Relatively recently, Microsoft has stated that SQL Server loves Linux. Great. Now, with version 2019 we have Big Data Clusters offering a full cross-section of technologies, including R, Python, Java. Not to mention containers.
Whether you like it or not – this is the direction in which subsequent versions are heading. Either you accept it and start learning or … you will stand still and be left behind.
Do we change our mind in such a situation? I think not – we are simply adapting to the changing environment.

What is your goal? Define it!

The problem remains different. With so many services cooperating with each other – it’s hard to keep up with them all.
And here we come to the point – where I admit that I changed my mind. When at the SQLBits 2018 conference I realized that I was interested in too many technologies. I realized that I could not be good at everything. It’s almost impossible. If you think we can do (MVP people) – then I have to put you right: we don’t.
I changed my mind. I decided to focus only on selected Data Platform services, such as Azure SQL DB, Azure SQL DW, Azure Data Factory, Azure Databricks. These, in turn, entail other languages ​​that should be known: Scala, Python. When I add to this my interest in the SDLC process in the form of Azure DevOps and very helpful PowerShell – it is starting to be too much again.
Nevertheless, I have deliberately decided to give up my interest in other services, although they are really interesting. Don’t get me wrong – it’s good to have an idea of ​​the different services to know when to use them and what they are suitable for.

Thanks for reading. I hope my post gave you food for thought.