When Will People (Want To) Learn?

So there I am, sitting in my cube, slaving away in front of my screen, trying to figure out which team to take in this week’s NFL Survivor pool, when the phone rings and interrupts me from my task.

“CrazyDBA speaking.”

“There’s something wrong with the database server”

“Okay, which one?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“No. How many servers do we have? Can’t you just check them all real quick and see which one is wrong?”

[Stunned silence before I can start to utter anything]

“Sure”, I finally reply, “When I find it, I’ll call you right back.”

I quickly check to see if any alerts have popped up recently for any of our production servers. Finding none, I shift gears and go back into my NFL handicapping mode and hope to be given enough time to make my selection. But before that is allowed, the phone rings again.

“Did you find the server for me?”

“No, I do not see any issues with any of the production servers.”

“It’s not a production server.”

“It’s not? How do you know that? You told me you did not know which server.”

“It’s a development server, I think the name is ServerX, but I found out the name of the database, and that is DatabaseY.”

“Okay, I know DatabaseY, and you are right, it is ServerX. So, what do you think is wrong with the server?”

“Not sure if it is a server issue, or just a database issue.”

“Not sure? Before you told me it was a problem with the server. But now you believe it is only a problem with the database?”

“Yes, the database. Something is wrong there. I cannot insert new records into it.”

“No? What is the error you are getting?”

“It says the object doesn’t exist, but I know it is there because I was able to select rows from the database before I dropped it.”

“You dropped the database?”

“Yes. Well, no, just a table.”

“You dropped a table?”

“Yes, I dropped the table, and now it won’t let me insert new records, it says the table doesn’t exist.”

[Stunned silence before I can start to utter anything]

“Okay, let me see if I can find out what the problem is. I’ll call you back when I find the table.”

I do my best to put this all behind me and try to focus on my NFL puzzle, but I am not able to focus. What bothers me most is that I start to think about the two types of people on the other end of the phone line. Clearly, this developer should not be allowed anywhere near a database. Now, I can do my best to explain to this person that there are differences between drop, delete, and truncate, and when it might be best to use each of those commands. And, of course, that is what I will have to end up doing. But I need time to figure out how I want to approach them, lest I come off as arrogant. I truly want to be able to teach them, but are they willing to learn?

The first type of person on the other end is willing to learn. Thankfully, this person is that type, and after I compose myself a little I head over to discuss the situation in person. They assure me that they know what they are doing and they made a simple mistake. Okay, no problem, and I am glad you were open to the discussion.

The other type of person does not care to learn. When you approach them and try to explain you might be told things like “I don’t need to know all that stuff, just fix the problem so I can keep working.” Right. I suppose that if I do fix things so that you can keep working, then I can be assured you will continue to screw things up and need me to keep fixing things, thus giving me some sense of job security. Unfortunately, my Survival pool still needs a selection, and your constant interruptions are not going to allow me to make my pick anytime soon. So, maybe if I delay in fixing things for a while, I can focus on something much more important.

It is quite foreign to me to be surrounded by people that have no desire to learn, or be taught, no matter how badly they continue to screw things up.

By the way…best bet this weekend? Seattle. Trust me.