1. Solutions for the Information Project Team • www.dbta.com Volume 22, Number 3 • September 2008
Making Peak Performance a Reality for Today's Databases
In increasingly complex enterprise environ- formance issues often takes time. to optimize the database design up front?
ments, the standard approaches to keeping Keller: Categorically, a DBA's ability to resolve Keller: More than anything else, poor data
databases running at peak performance fall an issue must be measured in hours, if not models are the greatest violator to database
short, especially when multiple types of minutes. If one errant process is executing in a performance! What typically occurs is that a
databases are present. Greg Keller, chief greater than sub-second response and repeat- design is received by a developer from a data
evangelist for DatabaseGear Products at ed thousands of times a day, this spells disas- architect who is less savvy with database
Embarcadero Technologies, Inc. explains why ter for a business within a single 9-to-5 work- performance, but is applying the data model
database performance is important to the ing day. rules verbatim as the "business" sees it - not
business, and describes new solutions that how the application needs to see it. That
keep data environments running at peak per- Q: Could database managers benefit from design is taken as gospel by the development
formance at all times. the kind of profiling technology to analyze team, and implemented nearly "as is." You
performance issues that has been avail- end up with table joins that can grind queries
Q: Why is database performance so able to software developers? to a halt, or are unable to determine where
important to the business? Keller: Java and C++ developers have had critical indexes should be applied. So tooling
Keller: Response time of applications could lit- sophisticated code profiling technology for a to help examine the schema before it is
erally, not figuratively, make or break some decade or more. It’s a complex affair, so the implemented to provide design guidance to
businesses. Think Wall Street, and the hun- most successful implementations require very ensure performance is a must.
dreds of thousands of transactions that occur clear visualization of the profiled code - or
between brokers and customers. An operation database in our case. In other words, graphi- Q: There's a trend where DBAs are put-
doesn't have to fail to be a drag on the busi- cally displaying all operations executing can ting more onus back on developers to
ness. It may execute in longer than sub-second draw the eye to the suspect or likely gross vio- write code and perform database func-
rates, and when compounded by the hundreds lators of the waits. From here, the DBA needs tions, freeing up DBAs for required
of thousands of times a day it executes, hours to be able to examine the activity metrics of SLAs. How can DBAs trust that what
on the day are lost. And with it more transac- the suspect operation, including explain plans they get from the developers will be
tions, and even closed businesses. to gauge the "cost" to the database. It has to "good" code?
be visual to ultimately reduce the "noise" and Keller: DBAs now are becoming less special-
Q: What is the most common issue imped- help the DBA or developer immediately see the ized and more generalized across many sys-
ing database performance? problem. tems and databases. Companies have fewer
Keller: Over-utilization. human resources and more systems to man-
Q: How would such a visual tool be age, and therefore need to ensure that code
Q: Aren't the native tools provided by implemented in a database environment? is written correctly up front, not after the
RDBMS vendors enough? Keller: Tools like this should be "production- fact. The problem is developers also need
Keller: Therein lies the major issue. Some worthy." In other words, they should cause no knowledge on all of the platform nuances to
native tools are enough, and some aren't. There impact to the system vis-à-vis the operations it write highly performant code. They can
is a major inconsistency across these tools. needs to run in order to profile the SQL. They achieve these skills by studying the vendor's
DBAs, who in our surveys are typically manag- should not install anything on the systems they resources, but this can be time-consuming
ing two to three database "types" - Oracle, SQL need to examine. No packages, procedures, or and may require them to learn more than one
Server, DB2, and so forth - need consistency to code of any kind. No intrusion. The product database platform. A better option is to rely
ensure optimal job productivity. Further, and should be available to all the DBAs to "point on productivity tooling that shows them how
more importantly, consistency on the "depth" and shoot" and get reliable information back in to write this "pre-optimized" code as they
and validity of the diagnosis is absolutely criti- minutes, so decisions can be made quickly. type it. Clearly, this is the fastest way.
cal. DBAs need precision in analysis consistent-
ly across all of the platforms they oversee. Q: Performance may not always be an Q: What are the benefits to the business
issue of hardware or SQL. How can of having higher-performing databases?
Q: Tracing and resolving database per- developers and DBAs work more closely Keller: The benefits range from internal to
1 Database Trends and Applications September 2008 Subscribe today at www.dbta.com/subscribe

2. Making Peak Performance a Reality for Today's Databases
external with all points leading to positive the key to success in meeting business
C O N TA C T I N F O R M AT I O N
results for the business. Internally speaking, objectives.
optimized databases will reduce physical
resources and assist with consolidation plan-
ning and virtualization. Reducing end-user Embarcadero Technologies, Inc. empowers
wait time frustrations ultimately ensures that application developers and database profes-
DBAs meet their prescribed SLAs. Externally, sionals with tools to design, build, and run 100 California Street, 12th Floor
partners of systems interfacing via Web serv- software applications in the environment San Francisco, CA 94111
ices making calls to database systems will they choose. A community of more than three
Phone: 415.834.3131
also benefit from processing optimization on million worldwide and 90 of the Fortune 100 Fax: 415.434.172
the database (and application server). Beyond rely on Embarcadero CodeGear and Email: info@embarcadero.com
business process improvements such as DatabaseGear product lines to increase pro- www.embarcadero.com
workflow and execution engine implementa- ductivity, openly collaborate, and be free to
tions, pre-optimization of database assets is innovate.
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