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When I was very young, I asked my uncle for career advice. He went silent, thinking for a bit, and then said: “People who work sitting down make more than people who work standing up.” I’m not certain how true that really is, but my career as a technology professional has led me to work in a seated position...

This is a continuation of the books I challenged myself to read to help my career - one a month, for year. You can read my first book review here . The book I chose for July 2011 was Rhetoric, by Aristotle. You can read it here for free: http://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/a/aristotle/a8rh/ Why I chose this...

I normally post technical topics here on this blog, but I’m extending this post a bit to include a little professional development. Don’t worry; there’s some tech (and Distributed Computing tech, no less) in this post as well. I recently presented a few sessions on a “ SQL...

I read a lot. I mean a LOT. It seems that computer professionals have much in common with medical professionals – we have to read in order to stay on top of our game. For me, this used to mean web sites, magazines, and other print medium, and of course lots of books. I’ve even written several computer...

I've been asked to explain three major events that brought me to where I am today. That's a tall order for me, since I view everything as a continuum of multiple small events. But there are some "seminal" events that tend to either show or dictate a further direction, so in the context of working with...

As part of my professional "morning ritual", I always parse through various SQL Server Blogs, so I thought I would share a list of those that I follow regularly. Of course, you need to put THIS blog at the top of the list :) - but these are pretty good too: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/sqlserver...

Years ago, "finish" carpenters would travel from job to job to find work. When they showed up on site, they would speak with the foreman, who would ask to see their toolbox. See, in those days, there were no power tools, so the carpenter carried everything with them to the job. And - this is...

I read a lot of blogs, as I’m sure you do. Many of them lately tell me about the author’s New Year’s resolutions – and I’m sure those are important. But I don’t think you care about mine. Neither do I. In fact, as a family, we don’t make any. Since we don’t...

I was thinking about something this morning on the ride into work that I’d like to ask your opinion about. It has to do with the amount of data that could be absorbed and acted on by a unit or system in a given period of time. The idea is that there is only so much information that a unit (such...

I'll be offline for about a week. For those of you reading this blog outside of the US, we have a holiday called "Thanksgiving" where we are all encouraged to be thankful for the things we have. I think this is a great tradition, and one of the things I'm thankful for is a great job - and a chance to...