VividCortex Leading Edge Forum Study Tour

How We Innovate Baron Schwartz, CEO, VividCortex

Leading Edge Forum Study Tour

VividCortex

Baron Schwartz

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• World-famous MySQL expert and community member. Deep connections in several database communities

• Created the software tools for MySQL; wrote the MySQL book

VividCortex

• Database Performance Management — “APM for the Database”

• X-Ray vision into the work the database is doing, the resources it needs, and where it spends its time

The Pain: Distributed Apps, Polyglot Persistence

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• Polyglot persistence is now reality: diverse data-layer technologies (relational, document, key-value, unstructured, graph, search, etc)

• Large-scale distributed apps drive adoption of opensource DBs with poor tooling

• Dev:ops ratio up to 100:1; server:ops ratio up to 1000:1; budgets and ops headcount still flat

• DevOps/SRE/DBA staff becomes IT bottleneck; IT becomes business bottleneck

Data Growing 50% YoY

Polyglot Persistence

DevOps/SRE Shortages

Continuous Delivery

Cloud, SOA Architecture

Docker, Virtualization

Ops/DBA Interruptions Per Day

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Interruptions from Devs

6%8%

41%

45%1 to 23 to 56 to 1011+

Length of Interruption

9%

44%39%

8%

< 5m5-15m15-30m30+m

• Developers interrupt Operations/DBA staff avg 54 min per day

• Devs wait for ops, ops become reactive, and IT productivity plummets

• Cost: $22k/year/head in DBA time alone, not counting devs, delayed IT objectives, etc

Source: VividCortex survey of hundreds of DBAs at webscale MySQL users.

Monitoring Tool Burden

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Resp

onde

nts

25

50

Percent of Time Spent Maintaining

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%

Resp

onde

nts

0

12

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Number of Days Spent Deploying

1/2 1/2-1 1-2 2-5 6-10 11-20 21+

Open-source and in-house monitoring tools are slow to deploy. Maintenance averages 30% of ops staff time; that’s $60k / head / year.

Source: VividCortex survey of hundreds of DBAs at webscale MySQL users.

Monitoring Is Obsolete (And Never Worked Anyway)

• The world has changed but tools haven’t

• Health checks and time-series charts don’t measure system work, time, and resources

• Legacy tech+companies are taking a beating

• Solution for tomorrow’s tech doesn’t exist today; it’s all legacy in disguise

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Seek Out Underlying PrinciplesThe universe is governed by laws and structure.

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/a_perfect_heart/8717538337

Prototype ManuallyAutomation is just an efficiency.

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/bernatcg/2215433121

Beware ComplexityEvery feature compounds the cost of every other.

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/70023venus2009/6032939635

Build A Self-Managing TeamHire and train independent thinkers.

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/tjblackwell/

There is no Talent ShortageTalent is inborn. You don’t need skill to innovate.

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/ginnerobot/3102623100/

Don’t Fear The Leading EdgeYou might find great advantages in being a pioneer.

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/da100fotos/465868860/

Challenge Conventional Wisdom“You can’t do that” can be treated as a dare.

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Seek Multiplier EffectsWhat makes the whole more than the sum of the parts?

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/tzofia/843491313/

Work From StrengthsChasing competitors’ strong points is just playing catch-up

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https://www.flickr.com/photos/xshamethestrongx/6111053153/

Find Mentors"Well, I sort of made it up," said Pooh. "It isn't Brain," he went on humbly, "because You Know Why, Rabbit; but it comes to me sometimes."

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"Ah!" said Rabbit, who never let things come to him, but always went and fetched them. "Well, the point is, have you seen a Spotted or Herbaceous Backson in the Forest, at all?"

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VividCortex is Database Performance Management

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