How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?
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I'm very serious, how is it possible that any, let alone most, IT Professions can't identify what an application or a database is? This has always been mind boggling to me and appears to only be in the SMB sector, but still. We all have to learn about databases at every stage of our education and careers, I thought. We work with applications thousands of times per day. How are things that are so common, so basic and so critical to everything that we do able to be confused?
Had "yet another" thread of someone asking about building or buying a database for his company. But he isn't talking about a database in any way, he's only talking about an application (that may or may not then use a database itself.) He's talking about GUIs and such, but calling it a database.
How does this happen? How do we fix problems so basic? This is the software equivalent of calling the full computer the "hard drive". Remember when grandma did that? But this isn't grandma, these are IT professionals!
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First off, I'm guessing those people aren't really in IT. And even if they are, it's because they knew how to program a VCR so management put them in charge of some project and called them IT.
Along these lines, I wonder how a 10+ year office worker (someone who works on a computer daily as their job) can't do simple windows operations like finding a network share or copying/moving files around.
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Well America has the answer. They just elected Trump as president so the worlds going to end soon so who cares
But yes I agree, it's one of the reasons I hardly look at SW forum now, so many basics being missed.
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It's all the same, right?
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@hobbit666 said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
Well America has the answer. They just elected Trump as president so the worlds going to end soon so who cares
FFS
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I don't think SW is for IT personnel only. Anyone who is looking for answers for something like this will probably bump into SW and post their question. Then we get back to my previous x2 post.
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Fast forward a few years and the next wave of IT pro's will be lamenting how the "old guys" can't tell the difference between a container, an application and a VM.
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@crustachio said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
Fast forward a few years and the next wave of IT pro's will be lamenting how the "old guys" can't tell the difference between a container, an application and a VM.
Sadly I'm there right now.
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@Dashrender said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
First off, I'm guessing those people aren't really in IT. And even if they are, it's because they knew how to program a VCR so management put them in charge of some project and called them IT.
Along these lines, I wonder how a 10+ year office worker (someone who works on a computer daily as their job) can't do simple windows operations like finding a network share or copying/moving files around.
They seem to always be people identifying as the "IT Manager."
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@Dashrender said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
I don't think SW is for IT personnel only. Anyone who is looking for answers for something like this will probably bump into SW and post their question. Then we get back to my previous x2 post.
They are good about deleting those. They have pretty strict "IT Pro" only rules. And, in their case, it's defined as someone who is studying to become or is drawing a paycheck working on computers.
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@crustachio said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
Fast forward a few years and the next wave of IT pro's will be lamenting how the "old guys" can't tell the difference between a container, an application and a VM.
We've been lamenting that for decades already
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@Dashrender said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
@crustachio said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
Fast forward a few years and the next wave of IT pro's will be lamenting how the "old guys" can't tell the difference between a container, an application and a VM.
Sadly I'm there right now.
It's a funny feeling, isn't it? Knowing that technology will absolutely pass you by, if it hasn't already, in some respects. And being able to do little about it.
Not saying we can't learn about containers or whatever the technology du jour is. But the momentum, the "push" of the industry just tends to slide past us when we're not looking.
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A database is the plastic feet under my desktop PC, right?
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@RojoLoco said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
A database is the plastic feet under my desktop PC, right?
Wait, you mean the harddrive?
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But seriously, I get that databases might be a tad confusing to people who've not studying anything about IT. But for people who work in IT, often for years, and work with applications every day to not know what an application is? I just don't get it.
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@scottalanmiller said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
But seriously, I get that databases might be a tad confusing to people who've not studying anything about IT. But for people who work in IT, often for years, and work with applications every day to not know what an application is? I just don't get it.
I know you said that SW removes non IT posts - but how can they tell this is a manager of some team who was just tasked with finding a solution and is an actual IT person? Link?
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@Dashrender said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
@scottalanmiller said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
But seriously, I get that databases might be a tad confusing to people who've not studying anything about IT. But for people who work in IT, often for years, and work with applications every day to not know what an application is? I just don't get it.
I know you said that SW removes non IT posts - but how can they tell this is a manager of some team who was just tasked with finding a solution and is an actual IT person? Link?
They really don't remove non-IT pro posts or users. I've reported hundreds of them just to be told "well, there are answers on the thread, so we're gonna leave it up..." or "we can't prove that the obviously incompetent user isn't an IT pro". But their mods hate me, so it might just be that I reported it vs. someone else.
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I worked for a 45 branch retail chain that did everything for years in quick books. Active directory, firewalls, network, troubleshooting, and Excel was more than enough for a full time job, but never really had to use SQL for years. It happens a ton in small business 1-3 person IT shops.
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@Dashrender said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
@scottalanmiller said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
But seriously, I get that databases might be a tad confusing to people who've not studying anything about IT. But for people who work in IT, often for years, and work with applications every day to not know what an application is? I just don't get it.
I know you said that SW removes non IT posts - but how can they tell this is a manager of some team who was just tasked with finding a solution and is an actual IT person? Link?
I'm not trying to shame the guy that mentioned it today, it's something that I see all of the time. Today's was just part of the pattern.
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@s.hackleman said in How Do So Many People in IT Not Know What a Database Is?:
I worked for a 45 branch retail chain that did everything for years in quick books. Active directory, firewalls, network, troubleshooting, and Excel was more than enough for a full time job, but never really had to use SQL for years. It happens a ton in small business 1-3 person IT shops.
Yes, but they ALWAYS use an application, not a database. Always, without exception. QuickBooks is an application. So the question is, how do they use QB and other applications and think that they are not applications?
