Blog | Pythian (44)

Microsoft SQL Server

SQL Server COMPILE Locking and Encryption Keys

Introduction The morning begins with this page: "a large number of sessions are blocked on one of your managed SQL ...

Oracle

What's New in 11i TXK AutoConfig and Templates Rollup Patch S

Context You might have already seen the blog update on Steven Chan's site. TXK AutoConfig and Templates Rollup Patch S ...

Oracle

Oracle 11g -- Audit Enabled by Default, But What About Purging?

Introduction If you have created a new Oracle 11g database using DBCA and opted to use by default 11g's enhanced ...

Oracle

Undocumented parameter _fix_control: How to break your database

Introduction Beware this parameter can prevent your database from starting. Indeed it can prevent your instance from ...

Oracle

Tuning 'log file sync' Event Waits

In this blog entry, I will discuss strategies and techniques to resolve 'log file sync' waits. This entry is intended ...

Oracle

Does Oracle's Block Change Tracking File Shrink?

Intro Just a quick post to get myself back into blogging mode. Recently in IRC ( #oracle on freenode, to be precise), a ...

MySQL

Audit a MySQL Instance with MySQLTuner

Quite often we need to perform a so-called "MySQL instance audit". This common DBA procedure should give you a general ...

Oracle

Oracle RAC and gv$ Views: A Second Look

Context I decided to reprise my commentary on Oracle RAC and the gv$ views after reading Patrick’s comments on my ...

MySQL

MySQL Back to Basics: Analyze, Check, Optimize, and Repair

It felt like the right time for us to look back at some useful commands for table maintenance that some of us may not ...

MySQL

MySQL: Replacing URL Escape Sequences

Requirement So you want to store URLs in MySQL, and the URLs have those annoying %20%27%7C%26%5E%2B%2D%25 symbols? And ...

Oracle Silent Mode, Part 6: Removing a Node From a 10.2 RAC

This sixth post describes how to remove a node from a 10.2 RAC cluster in silent mode. It differs from the associated ...

Oracle

ORA-01450 During Online Index Rebuild

Background We hit an ORA-01450 error today trying to do online rebuild for an index in an unusable state. This was a ...

MySQL

Using mysqld_multi to Manage Multiple Servers

I recently needed to set up multiple MySQL servers on a test computer to simulate a master-slave setup. I had never ...

Oracle

Oracle Silent Mode, Part 8: Add a Node to a 11.1 RAC Database

The process of adding a node to a 11.1 RAC is very similar to the 10.2 process described in Part 5 of this series. For ...

Oracle

Oracle RAC, v$, and gv$

According to wikipedia, “The rack is a medieval torture . . . which induces excruciating pain as the victim’s joints ...

DevOps

Emacs Keybindings in Bash

How to Be a Command-Line Commando Does it surprise you to learn that I’m a Linux guy? I’ve been using Linux, to the ...

Oracle

How to Find Objects Creating nologging Changes

In an Oracle-l thread, this question was raised: how can you find objects creating nologging changes? First, what is a ...

Oracle

Standby Log Apply Elapsed Time

This has been discussed before by my colleague Paul Moen in his article on Oracle standby recovery rate monitoring, but ...

Oracle

How to Tie OS-level PIDs to Oracle Database Sessions

About once a week, our team gets a request from the server admins to provide some information on why a database server ...

Microsoft SQL Server

SQL Server: Understanding and Controlling Connection

I got the idea for this article when one of our clients complained that their server’s performance was degrading during ...

Oracle

Oracle Application Server: How to Bounce AS from One Location

In this post and some upcoming posts, I’m going to write more about Oracle application servers, a subject we have ...

Oracle

Resolving High Water Enqueue Contention

Recently, I had a few email exchanges — on the Oracle-l list and offline — about HW enqueue contention. A few ...

Oracle

Oracle Silent Mode, Part 1: Installation Of 10.2 And 11.1 Databases

This post is the first of a series of ten posts that will explore some of the Oracle Universal Installer (OUI), Network ...

Database

Multi-Node to Single-Node Cloning in R12 and 11i

Introduction Anybody who has tried this multi-node to single-node cloning in 11i knows that it’s difficult and very ...

Microsoft SQL Server

How Do You Edit a dump/exp/script File?

Problem Statement If you work with databases long enough, you run into a certain problem. You have a mysqldump file* of ...

Oracle

Identifying SQL Execution Bottlenecks Scientifically

Background A few days ago, a developer and I had an interesting conversation. The developer was trying to tune an ...

Oracle

Consistent Gets not the Best Way to Look at Query Performance

This post is for those who think Consistent Gets is the only thing that matters. It’s not. That’s why Statspack and AWR ...

Oracle

Oracle 11g ASM Diskgroup Compatibility

Back in April I was at COLLABORATE 08 and delivered a presentation on 11g — Oracle 11g New Features Out of the Box, ...

Oracle

Tuning Latch Contention: Cache-buffers-chain latches

Recently, I had an opportunity to tune latch contention for cache buffers chain (CBC) latches. The problem was high ...

Oracle

FLASHBACK TABLE vs. DBA_OBJECTS . LAST_DDL_TIME

A little over a week ago, a teammate and I were trying to use Oracle’s FLASHBACK TABLE to undo an “oops” UPDATE ...

AI Related Latest Blogs

Analytics

Oracle AI World: The Pragmatic Leader’s Guide to the Autonomous Enterprise

Leading up to Las Vegas, I laid out what the C-suite needed to watch for at Oracle AI ...

8 Best AI Automation Consulting Companies (2026 Guide)

It is undeniable that AI is embedded in every conversation we have and is restructuring ...

Analytics

First Look: Deep Insights Agents in Oracle Analytics AI Assistant

If you have followed our research or attended our conference sessions over the past two ...

View All →

Analytics related blog posts

Analytics

Oracle AI World: The Pragmatic Leader’s Guide to the Autonomous Enterprise

Leading up to Las Vegas, I laid out what the ...

Analytics

First Look: Deep Insights Agents in Oracle Analytics AI Assistant

If you have followed our research or attended our conference sessions over the past two years, you have seen how rapidly Oracle Analytics AI Assistant ...

Analytics

Using Multi-Agent Reasoning for NLP-to-SQL

As data-driven decision-making becomes essential, access to that data shouldn’t require deep technical ...

View All →

Build a scalable data foundation to accelerate with AI.

Get started today →

SQL Server COMPILE Locking and Encryption Keys

What's New in 11i TXK AutoConfig and Templates Rollup Patch S

Oracle 11g -- Audit Enabled by Default, But What About Purging?

Undocumented parameter _fix_control: How to break your database

Tuning 'log file sync' Event Waits

Does Oracle's Block Change Tracking File Shrink?

Audit a MySQL Instance with MySQLTuner

Oracle RAC and gv$ Views: A Second Look

MySQL Back to Basics: Analyze, Check, Optimize, and Repair

MySQL: Replacing URL Escape Sequences

Oracle Silent Mode, Part 6: Removing a Node From a 10.2 RAC

ORA-01450 During Online Index Rebuild

Using mysqld_multi to Manage Multiple Servers

Oracle Silent Mode, Part 8: Add a Node to a 11.1 RAC Database

Oracle RAC, v$, and gv$

Emacs Keybindings in Bash

How to Find Objects Creating nologging Changes

Standby Log Apply Elapsed Time

How to Tie OS-level PIDs to Oracle Database Sessions

SQL Server: Understanding and Controlling Connection

Oracle Application Server: How to Bounce AS from One Location

Resolving High Water Enqueue Contention

Oracle Silent Mode, Part 1: Installation Of 10.2 And 11.1 Databases

Multi-Node to Single-Node Cloning in R12 and 11i

How Do You Edit a dump/exp/script File?

Identifying SQL Execution Bottlenecks Scientifically

Consistent Gets not the Best Way to Look at Query Performance

Oracle 11g ASM Diskgroup Compatibility

Tuning Latch Contention: Cache-buffers-chain latches

FLASHBACK TABLE vs. DBA_OBJECTS . LAST_DDL_TIME

Recent news

Pythian Announces Integration with Gemini to Help Accelerate Cloud Migration for Oracle Applications

Pythian Leaders Earn Three Finalist Honors in 2026 CRN Women of the Year Awards

Paul Lewis, Chief Technology Officer at Pythian Featured in CIOReview on Why AI Adoption Is the Metric That Matters

Pythian Named to DBTA 100: The Companies That Matter Most in Data

Pythian Ranked on CRN's 2026 Solution Provider 500 List for Seventh Consecutive Year

Pythian Recognized as a Top AI & Data Consulting Firm for 2026

Pythian Recognized as Silver Winner in UKOUG Data Integration Partner of the Year Awards 2026

Pythian Leaders Recognized on CRN’s 2026 Women of the Channel List

Pythian and Three of Its Leaders Named Finalists for the 2025 CRN Women of the Year Awards

Pythian India Earns “Great Place to Work” Certification for Fourth Consecutive Year

Pythian’s Vanessa Simmons and Donna Williston Again Named to CRN’s 2025 Women of the Channel List

Pythian Positioned as Oracle Database @ Google Cloud Leader with Acquisition of Rittman Mead

Pythian Doubles Down on AI-Readiness, Expanding AI Practice with Valuable Services and Expertise

Pythian Launches Agentspace QuickStart

Pythian Wins 2025 Google Cloud Databases Partner of the Year for North America

Pythian and GigaOm Announce AI Partnership

Pythian Named Top Employer in Canada's National Capital Region for 2025

Pythian Welcomes Shawn Gandhi as Senior Vice President, Customer Engineering, and Country Managing Director for Canada

Pythian Announces New Oracle Database@Google Cloud Migration Services

Pythian India Earns “Great Place to Work” Certification for Third Consecutive Year

Pythian Recognized on CRN’s 2024 Solution Provider 500 List and DBTA’s 100 Companies That Matter Most in Data for 2024

Pythian Welcomes Brooks Borcherding as Chief Executive Officer

Pythian’s Vanessa Simmons and Donna Williston Honored by CRN on 2024 Women of the Channel Lists

Pythian Recognized as a Top Employer in Canada’s National Capital Region in 2024

Pythian Announces Generative AI Strategy and Offerings to Accelerate Enterprise Innovation

CRN Names Pythian’s Vanessa Simmons a 2023 Women of the Channel Power 80 Solution Provider

Award-Winning Marketing Veteran Christina O’Reilly Joins Pythian Services as Senior Vice President, Marketing

Pythian Makes Database Trends and Applications’ List of Trendsetting Solution Providers for 2023

Pythian Celebrates 25 Years of Enterprise Data, Analytics, and Cloud Success

Pythian India Achieves “Great Place to Work” Certification After Building High-Trust, High-Performance Culture

Pythian Named One of ‘The Companies That Matter Most in Data’ by Database Trends and Applications Magazine

Vanessa Simmons from Pythian Named on CRN’s 2022 Women of the Channel Power 70 Solution Providers List

Pythian Named Partner in Launch of Google Cloud Cortex Framework

Pythian’s SAP Services Practice Grows by 300 Percent in 2021

Pythian Renews Google Cloud Infrastructure Specialization in the Google Cloud Partner Advantage Program

Pythian Services Recognized on CRN’s 2022 MSP 500 List

Pythian Renews Machine Learning Partner Specialization in the Google Cloud Partner Advantage Program

Pythian Sets Company Record with Over 100 New Customers in 2021

Pythian’s CTO Paul Lewis Featured Commentary Published by InformationWeek

How to Modernize Backup Without Breaking the Bank

Pythian Launches FinOps Managed Services

Pythian Acquires SAP MSP Partner ManageServe

Pythian Taps Seasoned Cloud and Data Expert Paul Lewis as CTO

Pythian Achieves Managed Services Provider Status In the Google Cloud Partner Advantage Program

Keith Angell: Accelerating Enterprise Growth With Data And Analytics Through Remarkable Leadership

Pythian Achieves the Data Management Partner Specialization in the Google Cloud Partner Advantage Program

Pythian Adds Snowflake Data Cloud Services Suite

New CEO Keith Angell: Pythian Services A ‘Golden Nugget’

Pythian Appoints Keith Angell As CEO