Turtles All The Way Down

This has nothing to do with turtles. Just in case you didn’t figure it out, I wanted to make that clear. However, I am really excited to announce that I’m joining Quest Software as a Database Expert. My official job title is still up in the air, but let’s talk a little bit about what I’m going to be doing. I’m going to stay involved in the community. That’s a big one right there. I’m still going to be on the Board of Directors for PASS. I’m still going to run my local user group (until we have elections and I’m voted off the island). I’m still going to speak at SQL Saturdays and the like. I’m still going to blog about all the crazy messed up things that I do with data. (Have I mentioned that I really like data?) I’m going to keep solving problems. One of the things that I enjoyed the most about the last two years at Cass Information Systems is that I wasn’t just a DBA. I worked with a great team of developers to solve a variety of problems. Some days I sat in on meetings with them to just give advice based on prior experience. Some days I would be tuning T-SQL. Some days I would be working to help design the optimal solution to a problem using a combination of C# and T-SQL. Solving problems is something that I love. I never want to stop doing it. In fact, I made things change because of the problems that I would be able to solve; these are problems that have been running through my head for a long time. I love code. I really mean it – I love writing code. There’s nothing like opening up an editor and whipping up some code to solve a problem. I wanted to download a bunch of PDFs, I figured out how. This new position means that I’ll have the opportunity to combine the things that I love – community, problem solving, code, and data – to do some really cool things. I should stop bolding the first sentence of every paragraph, shouldn’t I? Let’s make this a bit freaky for you: I’m not going to be working exclusively with SQL Server. In fact, I’m not even going to be working exclusively with RDBMSes. Did you guess it yet? That’s right: I’m going to be working with cloud databases and NoSQL. Since you’re reading this right now, you’ve probably noticed that I’ve been writing a lot about MongoDB, other NoSQL databases, as well as PostgreSQL lately. I’m exploring the world around me and writing about what I’m finding out. This is an amazing time to be looking at different ways to store data. I’m incredibly excited by all of this new technology. People notice that. You too can have fabulous prizes. A lot of people have said it before. Hell, I’m going to be saying it this Saturday in Nashville: show your passion. People notice it. Even if that passion leads you away from the fold, follow it. When you write and speak with passion, people will take notice. When you share what you’ve learned with passion, people will take notice. I didn’t respond to an ad on craigslist. I’d like to think that this opportunity came about because of the time I spend with you, the community, the time I spend blogging, and the time I spend presenting. These are all things that I love doing and now I’m going to be paid to do them. I’m not sure it gets any better than this….