The Day the DB Died

I have a habit of writing parody songs about things I like, and Oracle is one of those things. I’ve never seen a full on Oracle parody song, so I will make the claim that this is the first. If it’s not, I’m sure it’s the first of this magnitude!

Now, the tragic epic of a DBA that allowed his system to go on without backups, to the tune of American Pie by Don McLean. It’s a bit long, so I have it with a “read more” link. Enjoy!

—
A long, long, time ago…
I can still remember
How an index used to make me smile.
And I knew if I had my chance
The database would be enhanced
And maybe it would run well for a while.

But doing upgrades made me shiver
With every version I delivered
Bad news in the GUI
The progress bar was screwy.

I can’t remember if I cried
When the data dictionary came out fried
I just wanted to run and hide
The day the DB died.

So bye bye to the database guys,
Sent a TAR to MetaLink,
But we got no reply
And the managers asked, “Is that all you can try,”
I said, this will be the day that it dies…
This will be the day that it dies.

Do you have a backup plan,
And does it run nightly in RMAN
If Tahiti tells you so?
Do you believe in hot or cold?
Can archive logs save your job role?
And do you monitor it like a pro?

Well I know that you read on a site
That Oracle’s system is locked tight
So you kicked off your shoes
You thought you had nothing to do!

I was a lonely teenage DBA
With a couple scripts and a decent pay,
But I updated my resume,
The day the DB died.

I started singin’,
Bye bye to the database guys,
I sent a TAR to MetaLink,
But we got no reply
And the managers asked, “Is that all you can try,”
I said, this will be the day that it dies…
This will be the day that it dies.

Now for ten years I’ve been on my own,
And my list of tips and tricks has grown
But that’s not how it used to be
When Burleson was writing book fifteen
About how to optimize your machine,
And some things that should help you and me.

Oh, but when I thought I knew it all,
My database went and took a fall
The redo logs were trashed,
I don’t know how it crashed!
Oh, and while I looked for control files,
Managers gathered all the while,
And pretty soon it got hostile
The day the DB died.

We were singing,
Bye bye to the database guys,
I sent a TAR to MetaLink,
But we got no reply
And the managers asked, “Is that all you can try,”
I said, this will be the day that it dies…
This will be the day that it dies.

Undo redo I bid you adieu
Alert log is open and being reviewed
Server’s up but it wont last
Use the stuff you learned in class,
SMON recovers another pass
Hope your mean time to recover’s pretty fast

Now the NOMOUNT mode was sweet perfume
So I whistled me a happy tune.
We all got up to dance,
Oh, but we never got the chance!
‘Cause the DB lost a control file;
We have no backup that’s worthwhile.
Do you recall my bitter smile
The day the DB died?

We started singing,
Bye bye to the database guys,
I sent a TAR to MetaLink,
But we got no reply
And the managers asked, “Is that all you can try,”
I said, this will be the day that it dies…
This will be the day that it dies.

Oh, and there we were all in one place,
My backup disks ran out of space
With no time left to start again.
So come on, boss be nimble, boss be quick!
Buy me hardware and buy it quick
‘Cause disk is a DBA’s greatest friend.

Oh, and as I watched them walk away
My hands were clenched in fists of rage.
No guru in the field
Could get my DB healed!
And as downtime went long into the night
We’re losing money left and right
And I saw my job slip out of sight
The day the DB died.

I was singing,
Bye bye to the database guys,
I sent a TAR to MetaLink,
But we got no reply
And the managers asked, “Is that all you can try,”
I said, this will be the day that it dies…
This will be the day that it dies.

I looked into V dollar views
And I asked them for some happy news,
But they had no good news to say
I looked into the data store
Where I’d put my backups weeks before,
But the cron scripts hadn’t run in many days.

And in the office, people screamed
Developers cried, managers reamed.
The whole damn thing was broken,
But not a word was spoken.
And the three things that I feared the most:
Failed backups, a crash, and a dead host.
Servers were down and I would roast
The day the DB died.

And we were singing,
Bye bye to the database guys,
I sent a TAR to MetaLink,
But we got no reply
And the managers asked, “Is that all you can try,”
I said, this will be the day that it dies…
This will be the day that it dies.

We were singing,
Bye bye to the database guys,
I sent a TAR to MetaLink,
But we got no reply
And the managers asked, “Is that all you can try,”
I said, this will be the day that it dies…
This will be the day that it dies.