ORCL: Case Study Published on Metalink

My only other blog post related to Oracle has been beefed up, cleaned up, and converted into a Case Study (Metalink DocID 369427.1). Actually that happened a couple of weeks ago, but I thought I'd mention here eventually.

I have to thank a couple of people on my team (Hector and Vickie) for pointing out the typos and suggesting improvements and finding some statspack snippets for me.

I think this is the first article on Metalink that I have actually authored myself. Okay, there is also an ancient article from 1991 on Distributed Queries that is likely obsolete and should be archived away (plus I knew even less about what I was talking about back then anyway). It is a boring challenge for me to write serious, technical articles for an external audience, but I have been asked to do more of these and I usually follow orders.

As far as future ORCL related postings go, I may still publish first drafts of potential Case Studies on my blog first to get wider feedback. If I feel safe, I may even disclose non-technical yarns about life as a front-line technical support person working in a fast-paced software company in the early 90's. Hopefully enough has changed since then that I will not expose any proprietary information or individuals even indirectly. I might even write about my theories about the origins of misconceptions or antiquated ideas about an Oracle database such as

- rebuild your indexes frequently
- keep tables and indexes separate for balance IO
- increase enqueue_resources if you see high enqueue waits
- no writes to datafiles that are in hot backup mode
- the shared pool can be too big

But such postings might be rare since I'd like to think about something other than work once in a while.

TV: American Idol

After the final 12 contestants were announced, I predicted that Katherine McPhee would win and never tuned back in until the last 10 minutes tonight. I hate being wrong, but hopefully, a Taylor Hicks victory will lead to a rise in popularity for prematurely gray haired, pudgy dudes. That will make me feel much better in the long run.

TMI: Bay to Breakers Memories

I neglected to run the Bay to Breakers race this past Sunday. A weather report of high humidity with a chance of showers and lack of training because of tendonitis in my Achilles heel were my primary excuses for skipping this. I think since my first race in 1987 I've only participated in about 40% - 50% of the time, so it has not become some "can't miss"” ritual.

I actually did manage to finish in the top 10,000 one year despite running quite slow that year. That helped me realize that the most significant determinator of final placement was how close I could get to the starting line before the gun sounded. In high school, I could run at a 7-minute pace but always arrived really late, and started near the back of the pack. I'’d be lucky if I crossed the starting line before the winners crossed the finish line. And it would take two miles of walking before the crowds were dispersed enough to allow for some jogging. Many years and 50 pounds later I consider lucky to maintain a 6 MPH pace. But I showed up over an hour early and squeezed my way to the front. This time people were passing me up like crazy but I could start jogging much earlier, and had my best finish. I suppose this is proof that experience and ability do not always go hand in hand, but given one of the two, experience is more important.

After finishing in the top 10,000 and seeing my name in the paper, I've been satisfied with starting in the back again. It allows me to spend more time tossing tortillas like they were Frisbees. I can sit back and enjoy the music from the garage bands who set up mini-stages on balconies or driveways all along the route. It'’s also a more fun to pass people than to be passed while seeing more of the regular characters who participate in this public parade each year. There is a group that runs with a tiki hut made of bamboo and grass stocked with several forms of alcoholic refreshment. There is a caterpillar team of land sharks. They wear shark fins on their heads and you can watch those fins undulate above the sea of thousands of other racers. There is always at least one group of Elvis impersonators. There are lots of people wearing costumes that represent topical humor. One favorite a couple of years ago was a guy who was inside a huge cardboard box painted metallic grey. It had a fairly well made paper mache head resembling Arnold Schwarzenegger. Finally it had two extensible arms with foam rubber hands that could reach out and touch unsuspecting runners from behind, and was particularly fond of runners in Hooters uniforms (some of questionable gender). It was called "The Gropernator."” There usually are even runners with no costume at all, but at least 99% of them should keep covered for asthetic reasons.

This brings me to my oddest encounter with the "Rich and/or Famous"” or in this case, Infamous. After finishing the Bay to Breakers in 1993, I found myself standing right next to a man who looked vaguely familiar to me. He was taller than me but slouching a bit. He was wearing a light-blue button-down wool sweater because it was rather cold and foggy by the ocean. I thought it was still sort of an odd thing to wear while running even for this crazy race because it was so conventional. But I did not spend too much time trying to remember who he was. I was too busy catching my breath and checking out the other runners. Then I spotted a large group of teenage girls on the other side of the road. Half of them stood motionless looking in our direction with their eyes wide open and jaws dropped while the other half giggled uncontrollably and pointed us out to even more of their friends who would then have a shocked look on their face as well. At first, I guessed they recognized the "celebrity" standing next to me too, but then again, their eyes and fingers were not exactly directed at his face, but seemed to point further downward. Then they ran off and hid when they caught me looking back at them. So I suddenly had to make sure I didn't misjudge the finger pointing, so I checked if I was the one experiencing a very embarrassing wardrobe malfunction. When I looked down, I noticed out of the corner of my eye that the man standing next to me only wore a pair of leather sandals with his sweater.

I realized it was the Berkeley Naked Guy! He had made many headlines the year before with his "nude-in" protests at UC Berkeley, but the race was the first and last time I had met him in person. By that time, he was already yesterday's news -- until the day before this year'’s race, when I saw this tragic news story.

TV: Amazing Race 9 - Finale

Better late to post than never.

The hometown Hippies (though I guess only one member of the team is from San Francisco) win The Amazing Race. After racing around the world, it came down to remembering the flags of every country they had visited in the correct order faster than the Frat Boys. I probably would have gotten stuck on Russia as well, since I was used to seeing the Soviet Union flag. The geography puzzle at the end of the Family Edition was one of the few things I liked about that race, so it was nice to see a variation of that end this one.

The winning team showed up on the CBS Morning Show the next day to collect their check. BJ stayed in character by wearing royal garb now that he was rich. I wonder how hard it must be to win a million dollars but have to wait a few months before you could talk to anybody about it or even spend the money. Also on “live television” (tape delayed on the West coast), Ray proposed to Yolanda. Fortunately, she accepted because all the other teams appearing that morning showed up with cake and champagne. MoJo also says they will get married one day but will wait until they are older. So I suppose some people out there can still hope for a break up. Or MoJo may follow the path of Kurt Russell and Goldie Hawn and just remain partners forever.

The final leg of the race started in Thailand with an overt plug for a cell phone service company. It gave the racers another chance to work with animals. This season may have been a record for beasts, and I’ve lost track of them all (camels, crocodiles, spiders, monkeys, crickets, grasshoppers, and elephants, oh my).

After that, they were off to Tokyo (and the first city on the race that I’ve been to before). After a couple of weeks of having a good sense of direction, Ray and Yolanda were going to spend the rest of race pretty much lost. If there had been more flight choices at the airports, they could have easily fallen a day behind (which did happen a couple of times to third place teams in the past). I think I’ve been to that same intersection in Tokyo and I don’t know if the TV cameras captured just how mesmerizing all those signs can be. The closest was looking at the Frat Boys blank stare as they looked for a clue among those signs. Times Square in NYC still has a way to go to produce similar sensory overload. It was funny that the teams spotted the man who held the next clue wearing the yellow and orange scarf easier than the statue he was sitting next to. I wonder how long it takes to stop going to things of that color after the race ends.

The capsule hotel looked crazy and I’d only heard of them briefly before. Fortunately, the company I work for has not decided to cut costs that much yet, so I’ve gotten to stay at a decent hotel in Tokyo. I was amused that the Frats brought up the idea of time capsules. The teams remained pretty friendly at that rest stop despite the stakes.

I haven’t had the opportunity to visit Mt Fuji. I’ve only seen it from an airplane that practically flew right over the top of that volcano. It was always too smoggy and cloudy to see it from Tokyo itself, and I don’t know if Fuji would be as visible on a clear day as Mt. Rainier is around Seattle. Ray made an interesting observation that he had to talk fast for Japanese to understand him. It does seem kind of true. It was just tragic to see them lose their toll road ticket. Their cameraman (or the editors) did not reveal how it could have been misplaced. To add insult to injury, Ray got patted on the butt when he least expected it.

Were the Frat boys actually checking out schoolgirls at the Amusement park or just suffering from withdrawal pains? The rides looked kind of tame but it was funny to hear Tyler say that he might be regurgitating the crickets he ate earlier. Then the biggest upset of the race occurred when the Hippies beat the Frats in the paddleboats. Those things must have been rigged with speed restraints.

Team RaYo finished last and lost their possessions, but the Hippies did leave them some money. Then they got lucky and ran into some inebriated and generous businessmen at some random restaurant. They were at least 3 hours behind but caught up at the airport. The Frat boys copied a comedian whose name escaped me (and also a gag on Wayne’s World 2) by performing a decently funny fake “poorly dubbed movie” routine. The Hippies meanwhile lied like crazy about the Internet access at the hotel. Not sure how they got the hotel lobby employees to play along. It was almost as good as a Romber tactic but it would not pay off.

The teams were still pretty much tied arriving in Anchorage. Somehow RoYo scored some pretty heavy coats. Perhaps the producers bend the rules a little (or they just didn’t want any teams to die from frostbite). The Detour ended up not being much of a detour at all since the weather was too had for flying. RoYo showed their unintentionally psychic abilities again by describing how they just had to keep “grinding” to stay in the race not knowing that they would literally be doing that later. Then the Hippies temporarily started to “channel” Fran and Barry by walking right past a bunch of snowshoes several times.

Finally, the teams pretty much ended the race where they started with the aforementioned puzzle separating the men from the boys and favoring brain over brawn. The final funny moment happened during the victory speech. The Hippies mentioned the race could be like couples therapy, and suddenly they cut to a shot of Lake. Hilarious.

Hopefully the ratings, while lower, still encourage CBS to fund more races in the future.

TV: Amazing Race 9 - Ep 11

Apologies for being very late in posting about the show this week. I was staying at a hotel with pretty poor Internet access (though that may have been true across the whole island I was on) and even poorer TV reception. I probably could have scheduled things better to watch the show on time, but I guess I needed a break from the hectic world by going low-tech and sauntering at a 28.8 kbaud pace.

This week's show began with a repeat of the exciting 3-way finish from last week with several shots of Monica giving the Hippies the evil eye accompanied by a wicked nose scrunch. Once again the Hippies relied on the other teams to bail them out, though they also were resourceful in asking the hotel if they had anything in "lost and found" to give away. It was funny to see BJ actually wear Yolanda's spandex pants and Eric lie about donating the sandals. MoJo incurred the Bad Karma this week by holding a grudge much too long.

Australia must have a bustling night life. It was probably 3am when the Hippies went out begging for money and had no problems finding people. "Last Call" in SF is 2am, effectively shutting down the partying relatively early in this little corner of the planet.

Persistence is the lesson for this week. The Hippies used it to grab seats that opened up on a previously full flight that was scheduled to land earlier than the flight taken by the other teams. That did not quite work out, but they were willing to check out ALL the ticket counters at the bus terminal and still catch up with the other teams. This may be where MoJo lost the race. Despite Joseph's gut warning him there might be shady business going on, they decided to listen to people who said that the bus to Lopburi would not leave until the morning. [I suspect one bus company did not want to lose more business to the other, so they may have lied to Team MoJo. I wonder how much business the company with the blue signs will lose to the one with the red signs because of tourists who have seen this episode.]

Yolanda displayed her "ESPN" abilities by divining that a Fast Forward challenge with a clue of "an after school favorite" would involve cricket. Of course she was thinking of the sport rather than eating a bowl of stir-fried insects. At first I thought BJ would have a harder time eating that stuff but it was Tyler who ended up vomiting more frequently. BJ got through things by comparing the ordeal to a Turkish prison and lamenting that he thought he had ordered Pad Thai (one of my favorite Thai dishes). They both persisted at that task and won the leg of the race. I'd never be able to each that much any food in one sitting.

Back at the road block, the team had fun with monkeys. It's unfortunate the losing contestants do not appear on David Letterman's show. Dave's assistant, Stephanie, used to always ask the Survivor losers, "Did you get to see or touch any monkeys?" The Frat Boys got to do both while subtly advertising a snack food in the process. I guess Eric found a good reason to wear a T-shirt with a tuxedo design while serving food to the cute but voracious monkeys. Then kudos to the editing team for piecing together a funny shot of Monica cursing at the monkeys, then stuffing huge handful of trail mix into her mouth.

MoJo once again had a chance to stay alive in the race but had trouble finding the next clue while Ray-Yo continued to improve their sense of direction and find the clue earlier. From watching the post-game interviews it sounds like MoJo completed the physical task in less time than it took the other teams to apply slivers of gold leaf to a Buddha statue. They finished about 15 minutes behind Ray-Yo but started their task later and lost another 20 minutes locating a taxi.

- The flight from Darwin to Bangkok involved going south to go north. I hate those kind of flights.
- The finish was not as exciting as the two weeks but that would have been asking too much.
- MoJo never won a leg or a prize the whole race, but it sounds like they will be happy to just have each other (no mushy tears from me though).
- Next week, Mt Fuji, and the coolest shots I've seen of Tokyo since Lost in Translation.
- For once, I have no idea who will win this thing, but I suspect I'd be part of a majority if I bet on the Hippies. The previews show a final task involving some physical work in the ice and snow, and that might favor the Frat Boys.

TMI: Too Much Television

For a blog that is supposed to be filled with random thoughts, I guess it should be unusual to have so many posts about TV [though there's nothing about random number generation that prevents this from happening either]. The topic of how much television I watch has even been raised quite often this week as I've interacted with separate circles of friends (childhood, college, work, ex-coworkers) and family who've never had much chance to intermingle. [I guess that's George Costanza's colliding worlds theory raised to a new level -- oops another TV reference.]

The topic may not be a complete coincidence as I'm probably the one who either brings up a TV show or is the first to answer a question about what's going on with the TV shows heading into their season finales this May (plus a couple of people from each circle are now aware of my blog).

So here's my current DVR recording schedule (actual viewing time varies):
Sunday: The Simpsons, The Sopranos, desperate Housewives, Grey's Anatomy
Monday: Prison Break, 24
Tuesday: House
Wednesday: Amazing Race, Alias, Lost
Thursday: The OC, CSI (though I've somehow forgotten to record the last few episodes)
Friday: nothing (until Sci-Fi Fridays resumes with new episodes)
Saturday: Saturday Night Live

But that's just the Must-See List...

I'll also occasionally stop flipping channels for shows like The Office, My Name is Earl, Scrubs, Las Vegas, The Apprentice, The 70's Show, Cops!, Real Time with Bill Maher, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, South Park, Love Monkey (unwisely cancelled by CBS, but VH1 is airing the remaining episodes), Ghost Whisperer, Numb3rs, Without a Trace, CSI: Miami, CSI: NY, The Unit, Nova, Austin City Limits, Project Runway, CNBC, Headline News, Fox News, MSNBC, E!, ESPN, Fox Sports Net, movies that I didn't watch in theaters, and syndicated reruns of very old shows that I may have missed for some reason or other. However, the general role of this "B-list" is to break the silence of my apartment (or hotel room) while I do other things like read magazines, surf the Internet, or catch up on e-mail / junk mail / bills. [I stopped watching The Shield a few years ago because I couldn't do 2-3 other things at once while that was on.]

When I see/hear the late night info-mercials about how to get rich without spending your own money, the latest workout equipment, natural cures for maladies I've never heard of before, or "Girls Gone Wild" videos, then I know I've been awake too long.

This Wednesday made me realize that I have to make a New Year's Resolution to add no new shows from now on (and let attrition take care of the existing list). Alias, The Amazing Race, and a special episode of House were all airing at the same time. My DVR allowed me to record two of those shows, and I had to do some intricate rewiring to attach the VCR to a separate cable line and record the third show blindly. Fortunately a SF Giants vs. Brewers game ended quickly or I would have gone more insane than I already am.

At least I should be able to cease obsessing over TV once summer rolls around provided none of these series end with a "Who Shot J.R.?" cliffhanger.

TV: Amazing Race 9 - Ep 10

This was the most intense non-elimination leg ... ever. (Minus the first season of this show, which I completely missed) I don't recall so many teams finishing so close together in such a late leg. Wow! I'll never complain about "bunching" again if it results in these types of endings more frequently. It was fun to watch the tensions mount as the teams begin to feel they've got a chance for the million-dollar prize. I found it hard to even blink (even though I could always hit rewind on my DVR) because even some tiny details were having major implications in the race, though I can't recall many of them anymore.

- What was a random guy doing just hanging out around the Pitstop at midnight? I wonder how long the racers would have had to stand around for a taxi otherwise.

- I guess $70 gets you around quite a bit in Australia. Granted, I guess they only had to spend money on a couple of taxi rides, maps / guides, and maybe a random meal here and there.

- I guess that part of the country is fairly sparse population-wise. The Frat boys did not seem to have any locals to hit on, so they had to resort to the remaining females in the race. So Eric flirted with Monica (while hoping Joseph would become a crocodile's dinner), and Jeremy complimented Yolanda (perhaps while hoping Ray's parachute would fail).

- Did Jeremy just pull the name Doug Brubaker out of thin air? The movie "Brubaker" seems before his time. It was a classic Romber move to cancel the other team's taxis and frame Mojo in the process, but even they felt they got hit by bad karma as a result (or the Amazing race editors caught that theme in my last couple of blog entries..)

- What was up with the airline ticket guy's expression when Monica offered a kiss in exchange for him withholding info from the other teams? I guess it was sort of a, "Sorry, you're kind of cute, but you're definitely not 'worth losing my job over' cute." Meanwhile Yolanda (under the impression that Mojo had canceled the taxis) dissed Monica by calling her a plastic Barbie doll that the crocodiles would choke on if they tried to eat her. Ouch.

- Hippie jokes, "Goodbye wallets, er.., crocodiles" and the stuff about the termites and the peg leg kind of fell flat for me, but maybe the pressure and exhaustion is ruining their sense of humor.

- Once again Mojo comes in second place. This time while racing to the Yield against the Hippies (they'd finally get revenge later). My advice to Joseph -- learn how to empathize! Of course, this is coming from someone's whose total knowledge of relationships came from reading "Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus"

- Fortunately, Mojo overcame the Yield by correctly assessing which Detour could be done faster. The Frat Boys and Hippies strangely thought they could hike / wade a mile down a stream faster than a car could drive six miles. The also seemed less intimidated with confronting poisonous spiders and plants [seems like just about everything in Australia can be fatal] than learning to play an instrument. Mojo was also wise to ask for directions and grab a map at a local info center.

- Yolanda has a pleasant laugh. And this is coming from a guy who has a whole repertoire of annoying laughs and giggles.

- I was surprised the Frats didn't try to give the Hippies wrong directions to the Pitstop, but may be they decided it wasn't worth risking more bad karma, and they probably would have had the Hippies tailgating them anyway.

- Great camera and multi-angle slo-mo replay work at the Pitstop. BJ reminded me of a recent Tour de France bike rider that inexplicably went off the road and down a mountain side (fortunately neither were hurt). Maybe the adrenaline rush during the sky dive was still clouding his judgment. So he finally got to do a fun Roadblock, but I wonder how he'll get around now that I imagine his shoes have been taken away.