Official Pythian Blog - three streams, three perspectives

Datascape Podcast Episode 44: Snowflake with Kent Graziano

Episode 44: Show Notes Snowflake is the only data platform built for the cloud for all your data and all your users. Today we have Kent Graziano, Chief Technology Evangelist at Snowflake, here on the show to discuss how this…

The Top 10 Reasons to Add Pythian to Your Team

Let’s start with the obvious: Technology has changed a lot in the past ten years. And as technology has changed, so too have the reasons for augmenting your IT department with the expertise of a managed services provider (MSP). Ten…

How QAD workers get access to Pixelbooks in minutes, using Grab and Go

This article was originally posted on Google Cloud Blog, click here to read the original. Author’s note: Today’s post is by Scott Lawson, Director of IT Architecture at QAD, provider of cloud-based software and services for global manufacturing companies. QAD…

8 Questions To Ask When Choosing A Database Managed Service Provider

If you’re searching for a database managed service provider, congratulations are in order. You’re one step closer to being able to focus more fully on the strategic priorities of your business. But bear in mind that choosing the wrong provider…

DBAs and the Cloud: Evolving Roles and New Challenges

Do businesses have the right skills and expertise internally to take full advantage of both the tactical and strategic benefits of the cloud? To help you determine what skills are needed on your team, we’ve developed a list of 5 key skills of modern DBAs in the era of cloud. And for a complete picture of what cloud means for your DBA team, Warner Chaves, one of Pythian’s principal consultants, has written a white paper outlining how database management is different in the cloud, and the key skills the modern DBA must have.

Keep Your Teams On-Track During COVID-19 and Beyond

It could be that your organization was working remotely long before the arrival of COVID-19. Even if that’s the case, you’re now dealing with challenges you couldn’t have imagined back in March. But here’s some good news: Agosto, a Pythian…

Hands On Transfer Learning with Keras

Transfer learning is an approach where the model pre-trained for one task is used as a starting point for another task. It’s extremely useful in scenarios where there are limited data available for model training, or when training a large…

OATUG Forum Online (or, the 2020 Version of Collaborate Las Vegas)

Hi everyone! It’s been a very busy year for me, so I haven’t had much time to blog. But, here we go! This isn’t a technical post, but more of an opinion piece. I’ve split this post into two parts….

How Pythian and Google helped reduce pesticide use in high-value crops

Semios is a Vancouver-based data analytics company for growers of high-value crops such as almonds and apples. It uses a combination of machine learning, in-crop wireless networks and half a million IoT sensors across 80,000 acres to offer real-time monitoring…

Datascape Podcast Episode 41 – Choosing a Public Cloud for Oracle Database

You can run Oracle anywhere. It’s very flexible, which means anywhere you can get a VM, you can run it, including a virtual box on your laptop. There’s even have a free edition (XE) if you don’t have large data…

Tips that Help Alleviate Pressures on DataOps

Data is hard. Its always been hard, and it’s not getting easier. We always have more of it, there are more sources to integrate, it changes all the time, the quality is questionable, and the business wants it all right…

How Pythian Is Flattening the IT Disruption Curve

COVID-19 is creating a perfect storm of disruption, chaos, and challenges for organizations in both the private and public sectors. The current pandemic is almost certainly adversely affecting every institution, while a few might be able to draw a few…

Infographic: What is Data Governance?

An explainer on achieving consistency, trustworthiness, and accessibility across your data estate. The Wild West might be entertaining in movies or TV, but it’s the equivalent of a horror show when it comes to your organization’s data. That’s why strong…

Our Commitment to You During COVID-19

In light of the continued spread of Coronavirus (COVID-19) globally, we want to let our clients know how Pythian is prepared to continue providing the high standard of service you’ve come to expect. Our leadership team has developed an action…

The top 5 reasons you need a data governance strategy

The concept of good governance is key to any high functioning society and economy. It helps establish and maintain trust between constituents and their representatives, along with setting the stage for people and organizations to operate within a well-defined framework…

Advice for Remote Work Planning

With many companies investigating or enacting remote work options in response to the COVID-19 outbreak, the Pythian team would like to share their best advice to those companies considering a move to remote work. Here are some of our remote…

Defining “real-time’ or ‘streaming’ analytics and its use cases

This is the first in a series on real-time or streaming data analytics best practices, including terminology, system design and examples of real-world success. In this initial post, we’ll focus on terminology and possible use cases. When launching a multi-part…

Datascape Podcast Episode 39 – February 2020 Cloud updates

In this episode, Warner Chaves, Stephane Frechette, Pierig LeSaux and I distill the most interesting, recent updates from Google, Amazon and Microsoft.

Cloud Maturity: How cricket, fashion and mining organizations adopted cloud for data success 

Lynda Partner, Pythian VP Marketing and Analytics, is presenting tales of cloud analytics success at the Big Data and Analytics Summit Canada in Toronto. It’s not often said that cricket batsmen, luxury fashion buyers, and mining engineers have much in…

Are reverse cloud migrations a thing?

At Pythian, we spend the vast majority of our time helping our customers take full advantage of the public cloud. But there is always that tiny percentage that comes to us asking if we can move them from the cloud…

More Articles >

Mining Statspack and AWR Repositories for Historical Trends

There are various ways that we can approach the analysis of a past database performance problem. The initial steps usually differ based on their scope. Is it limited to a certain SQL/process/task, or is it perceived as a database-wide slowdown?…

Postgres Covering Indexes and the Visibility Map

Covering indexes in Postgres came up in our weekly tech call because of a query optimization review one of the teams has in progress. It seemed like some covering indexes weren’t working. I’ve been reading a book called Curious Moon,…

Five ways to migrate your on-premises SQL database to Azure

There are currently three deployment options for SQL Server Database on the cloud. Well, four, if you count Azure SQL Databases in elastic pool. But Azure SQL DB in elastic pool is essentially just Azure SQL Databases grouped into an…

The OCIDTAB – A solution to make OCI CLI scripting easier

This article is about working effectively with multiple OCI Environments via OCI CLI and encourages the use of an environment variable file called ocidtab, however before we look into it’s working the next couple of sections would give an understanding…

VPN Options with Azure, Part 1: Azure to Site

As business entities move some of their services to Microsoft Azure Cloud (Azure), we see hybrid networks emerge that can span multiple physical sites and multiple cloud environments. Connecting those network segments securely can present some challenges. I’ve encountered two types…

PostgreSQL Backups

There are at least four ways to back up a Postgres database: SQL dump, filesystem snapshots, continuous archiving, and third-party tools. For each, notes on the recovery point objective (or RPO, which is a measure of how up-to-date your application…

SQL Encryption 101

Over the past month, I organized #DataSessions for the Singapore SQLPASS group. Singapore SQLPASS is the data platform user group community in Singapore. In June, we held free live webinars every Tuesday and live-streamed it on Facebook and YouTube. I…

Migrating SQL Server On-Premise to Azure SQL

Let’s revisit our options when moving your SQL Server workloads to Azure and check out ways to migrate on each of them. Let’s break them down into sections in case you want to jump to specific ones. Deployment Options SQL…

Migrating to Microsoft SQL Server or Azure SQL Database

Migrating to Microsoft SQL Server or Azure SQL Database – a webinar by Warner Chaves Register today Are you considering a migration to Microsoft SQL Server or Azure SQL Database? Before you go any further, join Warner Chaves, Pythian’s Microsoft…

Datascape Podcast Episode 43 – July 2020 Cloud Updates

Welcome to the July 2020 episode of the Datascape Cloud Update Podcast. This is the podcast where we distill the latest Cloud announcements from the leading public Cloud vendors and help to inform you about what matters and what to…

Migrate Postgres Database from EC2 instance to RDS using AWS DMS (Data Migration Services)

In this post, we will explore one approach to Migrate PostgreSQL DB on EC2 instance to RDS instance using AWS Data Migration services. Amazon Relational Database Service (Amazon RDS) is quite popular because of its easy setup, operation, and auto-scalability….

The Brand New Exadata X8M Deployment Process Revealed

Here we will see how the deployment process of the new Exadata X8M works.   RoCE issues from the factory Exadata X8M servers are coming from the factory with the RoCE private network disabled. In case the Field Engineer assigned…

Upgrading a Large Cassandra Cluster with cstar

I recently did an upgrade of 200+ nodes of Cassandra across multiple environments sitting behind multiple applications using the cstar tool. We chose the cstar tool because, out of all automation options, it has topology awareness specifically to Cassandra. Here…

The things I hate about Apache Cassandra

Intro First, let me start by saying I do not hate Cassandra. I love Cassandra. In its place, Cassandra is a powerful tool designed well to scale to millions of operations per second over geographically distributed locations operating in a…

Spark + Cassandra Best Practices

Spark Overview Spark was created in 2009 as a response to difficulties with map-reduce in Hadoop, particularly in supporting machine learning and other interactive data analysis. Spark simplifies the processing and analysis of data, reducing the number of steps and…

Docker Orientation

This weekend, I gave an orientation to Docker for a developer friend of mine who works in an enterprise environment and was preparing to take on new development projects using Docker. I have given several Docker 101 workshops, but it’s…

Cost Optimizations: It’s Time to Rethink your Cloud Architecture

Cloud technology brings a lot of flexibility, agility, and resilience to your business. Your ability to adjust to the demands on your business matters more than ever in the COVID-19 world, a world where we’re forced to adapt to the…

Oracle Database and Two-Factor Authentication (2FA)

Background A common question from Oracle customers is whether they can configure the Oracle Database to use: Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) A “Time-based One-time Password” (TOTP) code, which is usually a six-digit code generated from a hardware or…

Global Analytics with Azure Cosmos Db and Synapse Analytics – SQL On The Edge Episode 21

A few months ago, Microsoft revealed that they were looking into adding a capability of querying Cosmos Db data through Spark and this immediately got me thinking into the new scenarios this would enable. The most ambitious is the capability…

Datascape Podcast Episode 42: Recapping Microsoft Build 2020

In this episode Warner Chaves and Chris Presley discuss the most exciting announcements from the Microsoft Build 2020 Virtual conference.

More Articles >

We Need More Women in Tech!

Two years ago, I joined Pythian. This was my introduction to working in “tech.” The only hint of what working in tech might be like came from binge watching TV series such as “Silicon Valley” and movies like “The Social…

What to Expect When Interviewing with Pythian

Welcome to Pythian’s recruitment process! We haven’t met yet, but if you’re considering a role here at Pythian, you’ll likely be speaking with me or one of my colleagues on the Talent Acquisition team.  What We Do Our purpose at…

Ten Tips When Working from Home During These COVID-19 Times

During this COVID-19 time, business is no longer as usual. Recently I have had a few contacts asking me for tips on how to work remotely. Why? Well, I have been working from home for ten years now. Working remotely, …

22 Ways to Make Remote Work, Work!

If I offered you a job that would allow you to live anywhere you wanted, where you could wake up and start work at any time, and never be stuck in traffic… would that check some of the boxes on…

Achieving rock-solid maintenance with template-based action plans

Pythian has always been serious about reducing human mistakes. Our consultants have always been required to log all terminal outputs for the work we execute so that the information is available to our clients, and to make sure the same…

A day in the life of a Red Cross volunteer

In addition to my day job working as a team manager at Pythian, I am fortunate to be part of a specialist Red Cross volunteer team called an Emergency Response Unit (ERU). There are many of these ERUs around the…

First time presenter, what a feeling!

It’s been a couple weeks now, and the dust has settled but not the sentiment. I am talking about my very first public presentation performed at Spain Oracle Users Group (SPOUG) during the Technical SPOUG Day 2018 on September 25th….

Mentorship can be a valuable tool for professional growth

Mentoring has been defined as a professional relationship between a mentor (more experienced) and a mentee (less experienced) to develop certain skills and knowledge that will enhance personal and professional growth. Mentors are usually assigned to junior members of a…

The life of a happy remote DBA

Life is a balancing act between the personal and professional. It is a journey and this journey should be filled with joy and happiness. It should also give you a chance to learn, to grow and to cherish moments, spending…

Technical training – good for business and career

Whether you are just starting out or have been working with technology and want to expand your skill set, training never hurts anyone. In some situations, your own company encourages it and wants to help you excel. You may be…

Pythian BORG: bringing on recruited gurus

When university graduation was rushing up on me and I hadn’t the first idea how I would start my career, my parents gave me the best advice I’ve ever received: Find meaningful work that you’re passionate about and collaborate with…

The life of a Pythian road warrior

I’m sitting here on March 16th, the day before Saint Patties day and I am thinking about what I will need for my trip to Salt Lake City next week. I work for Pythian in the Principal Consulting Group. We are…

The value of lifelong learning

When I was asked to write a blog post about two conferences I attended this year, I had to sit down and think. Think about how learning is such an essential aspect of my life, both personally and a professionally….

A Team Manager’s perspective on success at Pythian

To all managers out there, especially in the IT sector, to be truly successful you don’t need to be the most technical savvy person on your team.

Diversity: pursuing your dreams

Seven months ago, I was fortunate to start a new career journey with Pythian. At first I found working in IT intimidating as I was working with such a wide variety of technical subject matter experts on a daily basis,…

Kickstart your career

Working at Pythian has probably been one of the best decisions I could have made towards developing my technical skills as well as growing my skills as a person. When I first got the interview, I knew nothing of the…

From co-op to full time!

My experience with Pythian was like a co-op fairy tale. As a 4th-year student entering my last co-op term, I was looking for something more than just a regular administrative job. I was seeking a role in which I could…

The Pythian community gives back: movember and the holiday food drive

They say you can’t create an org culture, you can only guide it. As a growing IT services company with 400+ employees spread across 35+ countries, one of our biggest opportunities is not technological but cultural. An inherent challenge we…

My internship experience at Pythian

I remember nervously walking out of one of King’s Cross St Pancras Station’s numerous exits searching for the 7 Stanley Building. I wandered through the morning rush in the heart of London, and I was overwhelmed, out of place and…

Pythian at All Things Open 2017

All Things Open 2017 is coming up fast, and Pythian is proud to be supporting one of the largest open source-focused conferences in the US! All Things Open is a conference in Raleigh, North Carolina on October 23-24, 2017. ATO…

More Articles >