SQLSimon.com

'Twas the night before Christmas in the data warehouse
Not a feature was stirring, nor a click of a mouse.
Overclocked by the technicians, the machines had been with care
In hope of better performance, warranties voided with fanfare.

The managers were nestled all snug in their beds,
With visions of Vista dancing in their big heads.
And Ops in the data centre, and I in my flat,
Had just settled down for a well deserved night-cap.

When out of the blue the pager went off,
I sprang from my chair to turn the damn thing off.
I picked up the phone as quick as a flash,
To the data centre now, I had to dash.

The moon on my car, all covered in snow,
I brushed it aside, but before I could go,
When what should I see,
But Bill Gates and co taking a Wii.

With a non-Windows driver, so lively and quick,
For my digital camera and my Linux laptop,
More rapid than Windows, his curses they came,
And he whistled and shouted and called out some names:
"Hydra and Sphinx, Shiloh and Yukon,
Katmai and Longhorn" are the words that he'd spoken.

I switched on the torch, to the night bare he all,
Now crash again, crash again, crash again did they all.
To the data centre now, like a hurricane fly
When I met with an obstacle, I mounted the pavement and flew through the sky
Past the house-tops, my car of course flew,
Like a 747 heavily-laden and wings broken too.

And then in a moment, I landed on the roof
of the data centre building with one giant "boof"
As I opened my door, and was turning around
Bill Gates again, came with a bound.

He was dressed in jumper and jeans
His clothes were surprisingly clean,
A bundle of toys wrapped in a sack
He was a peddlar of Backgammon and Minesweeper in this Service Pack.

His eyes how they twinkled, his dimples how merry
His cheeks were like roses, in his hand a BlackBerry.
His droll little mouth was wide open in smile,
His chin jutting out like a cabinet file.

The stump of a pencil he held tight in his teeth,
And his breath encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook, when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly.

He was chubby and plump, making a prat of himself,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself.
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had something to dread.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the buffers; then turned what a jerk,
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, the servers they froze.

He sprang off the roof, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew and the snow came down like rain drizzle.
Then I heard Ops exclaim, with Bill Gates out of sight,
"The servers have crashed, this has not been a good night."

Once upon a nightmare query, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious part of code,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a hacking,
Someone gently hacking, hacking at my network node.
"'Tis some colleague", I muttered, "knocking at my network node -
Only this," I did decode.

Ah, DISTINCT I remember, was the key word in that code,
And each separate statement in that fact, was the purpose of that hack,
Eagerly I wished the morrow; vainly I had sought to follow,
Another book I need to borrow - borrow for another data mining crack,
For the rare and faintly used, as a developer not amused,
And fear I couldn't keep on track.

And then there came the hacking, hacking louder than before,
"Sir", said I, "Or Madam, use the correct password I implore"
But the fact is that I was napping, and so gently they came a hacking,
That in my slumber, I was even dumber,
That scarce was sure it true - I opened wide the door,
And in stepped the hacker, where he remaineth evermore.

But before I could stutter, with heart a little flutter,
In there stepped the hacker, like Bill Gates in height and stature,
"No!" said I, "That will erase my database!"
Too late the command was entered, and my resignation would be tendered,
And the hacker, the little slacker,
Remaineth evermore.

Once upon a database,
Some tables did aface,
A view or two,
it could be true,
improve the app with grace.

If upon an Insert,
A Trigger may be set,
The data you try to enter,
May instead reject.

A cursor it would seem,
Had blocked my code routine,
Had it not been for the Governor,
I'd have said something obscene.