The Viking DBA - Making Strong Bodies and Databases

 Deload week: Do the Unfun Part. Working out in the gym, as in the database world as well, is not always flashy, fun or impressive. Sometimes its about doing the mundane, the trivial, putting effort into the little things that don't draw attention but ultimately make you better. In my current workout program, I'm in Deload week. I am still executing the same movements as the previous 4 weeks, but decreasing the weight to about 75-80% of my maximum values, slowing down the movement focusing heavily on the form and technique to make sure I'm still executing it properly. My body is still working, exerting effort, but more so it's working on solidifying the movement so that when I start increasing the weight again, it know what to do.  I used to get pretty in my own head during Deload week. "Worried" about how others in the gym would perceive my lifts. "Oh man, he's only lifting X amount of weight. Pfff, weak." That's an absurd thought of course....

Foreign Keys and Referential Integrity Today's post has nothing to do with the gym. I couldn't think of a good analogy and I encountered a problem with Foreign Keys this week. Thought it would perhaps make for an interesting read. Let's start with some basics. If you're in the database space or even just beginning your journey, chances are you're familiar with Primary Keys. A primary key is a completely unique field within a table or combination of fields that make the data unique to the table. If you ever attempt to insert a record into a table with the same value, you receive the good ole' "VIOLATION" statement in red. When you create a primary key, the database engine will automatically create a Primary Key index. So at the very least, you have one on your table for purposes of locating data quickly. Your primary key oftentimes but not always be clustered. Meaning that the data in your primary key field is in sequential order. It does not have to be...

Deadlifts and Execution Plans How in the world could I possibly relate these two things? At first blush they appear to have nothing in common with each other. But let us look a little deeper. This article is less about performance tuning today and more focused on the gym movement. However I'd like to get you thinking about how you setup for success in both. The Deadlift This is one of the core movements in the gym and also one of the more complex to setup for. There's a couple of ways to begin setting up for a deadlift; conventional and sumo. In a conventional style, the lifter sets up feet about shoulder width apart and your arms will come down on the outside of your knees. You don't want to go too wide here, the elbows should brush the knee. Squat down low and roll the bar to your shins. Pull your shoulders up and back, thing about squeezing the lats applying just enough tension to the bar. Keeping your backside low begin the lift by simply standing up. Don't let thos...