On Friday I delivered a presentation at SQLBits which was an awesome event attended by about 450 people. There were some really good speakers presenting who know SQL inside out (and even written part of it), so I always feel a bit anxious about presenting about SQL Server, which I don’t use on a daily basis, with and to people who have made it their careers to know better than the next guy.
I presented a session entitled ‘Improving Database Performance by Removing the Database’ (a long title I know) and, in my first slide, emphasising that the presentation was not about NoSQL (pointing people to my previous presentation for a NoSQL overview). Obviously ‘removing the database’ has a NoSQL smell I explained that t he presentation was about the reasons why NoSQL doesn’t die – and went through some of the issues that we have when marrying data exclusively with SQL. I was more about the (often unnecessary) costs and effort in keeping SQL databases running rather than the standard developer/scalability position of the NoSQL movement.
The SQLBits organisers gave me a small room to present in (which I will read something into) and it was literally full to the rafters (the gallery was also full). One positive thing about being in a smaller room is that it was more intimate and I could get immediate feedback from the audience – and it was the nods in agreement that most interested me. From the demeanour of the audience and the people who spoke to me and emailed me after the session I came away feeling that I had succeeded in my desire to get SQL people to think a bit and take serious responsibility for the data in their control.
It seems that I struck a nerve and people were beginning to understand that the stickiness of NoSQL is about the misuse of SQL by ‘database experts’ more than any particular killer alternative technology. I even had one person ask me afterwards if there is a movement that follows the principles that I spoke about. I don’t know of any and suggested we start one – the thing about movements is that they need a good name to start with and I haven’t come up with one yet, so that is as far as I have progressed and am stuck.
For those that attended my presentation, the slide deck is here in pdf (as with so many images it was 10MB) as well as the slideshare link below. The very popular trump cards are here. Keep an eye out on the SQLBits website for the videos if you missed the presentation – I certainly want to have a look at it to check on who I offended (I recall estate agents, Oracle people, auditors and most DBAs) because I may need to watch my back.
I think that I am going to stick to this theme for the next SQLBits in September (probably) and hope to see you there.
Simon Munro
@simonmunro