DBA Roles
On Forgetting Things
Adrien Nayrat has an excellent article that delves into what many have forgotten about the DBA (Database Administrator) role.
Index¶
robots.txt
Care and Feeding of AI
If you would rather not feed OpenAI or Google AI models after midnight …
Here is a good summary of how to use a robots.txt file to limit what OpenAI and Google will ingest from your website for training data.
Kudos to the authors for finding a valid use of the word gauche.
Read more here:
Voyager
Long-Distance Relationship
Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 were launched in 1977 and have been traveling farther from home each year.
Recently, work has been undertaken to update their software to correct bugs in the attitude articulation and control system (AACS) software for both.
Postgres Weekly
A common question from people moving from other databases to Postgres is how can I learn more?
One of the great things about the Postgres community is the excellent documentation!
While I don’t have any affiliation, Postgres Weekly is a great way to learn something new and keep tabs on Postgres news.
New York Cybersecurity Regulation
If you do business within New York State, regulators have introduced changes to cybersecurity regulations for financial services companies.
Both Bloomberg and The Wall Street Journal have summaries, but Bloomberg’s article links to the revised regulations.
Rational Expectations
"If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. If you teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime." ~ Anonymous
While database engineers (and administrators) want to be helpful and answer questions, you should not expect your database engineer to:
- Make “the database” work the way you think it works.
- Teach you how to use Google to answer what a particular SQL error means.
- Magically make database contention go away.
AI Indemnification
Microsoft has agreed to indemnify users of its Copilot service from copyright claims with its new "Copilot Copyright Commitment." This development may ease decision-makers' minds on potential copyright claims stemming from using the service.
Human In The Loop
What if an AI monitored whether you followed all rules and laws that applied to you?
This chilling and dystopian thought is the subject of a guest post by Jon Penney on Bruce Schneier’s blog (link at bottom).
Security Defaults
Security access controls extend into your databases. The principle of least privilege needs to be enforced not only for who can connect but also for what they can do within your databases.
For example, until PostgreSQL version 15, PUBLIC (which all users are a member of) could create tables within the public schema unless REVOKE’d. This is just one example.
It’s important to review what the security defaults are for your database product to ensure you are enforcing the least privilege access model where you explicitly grant access to resources.
WayBack Machine
"I don’t have a photograph, but you can have my footprints. They’re upstairs in my socks." ~ Groucho Marx
An Unexpected Search
Several recent events have had me thinking more about open-source. The same as many people in the 1990s, my introduction to open-source was with Linux. I remember installing Slackware Linux and later switching to Red Hat Linux.