Posts by Phil

SQL Server 2008 SP1 washes ashore

I call FUD

Reboots are not required by SP1 - although the install dialogue could be a little clearer: http://sqlblog.com/blogs/aaron_bertrand/archive/2009/02/26/sql-server-2008-sp1-setup-is-a-little-confused.aspx

I can't remember when I last had to reboot Windows following a SQL Server service pack. I would guess it would have been SQL 2000 service pack, about 6-7 years ago, but I could be wrong - it might be even further back.

As for new features - its a service pack, not a revision. Since when were new features required for a service pack?

101 uses for a former merchant banker

Re: Perikles

You won't get any rebuttal from me - its well documented that real wage increases (ie wage increases minus inflation) have been much lower over the last 10 years than the previous 30, so Tim is being disingenuous with his figure of 1.8-2%. This has been to a variety of factors - migration, changes in labour laws, women working amongst others (mentioned by previous posters). According to the Office for National Statistics real wages actually fell into negative territory in 2007/8 thanks to the increase in inflation to 4-5%.

This is important because as Bill Bonner and Dr Kurt Richebacher have pointed out the low levels of real wage increases in the US and UK couldn't sustain the level of consumption taking place. In order to carry on consuming (once most households already had 2 or more earners) personal debt ballooned to the levels we have now - which is as it turns out unsustainable.

This leaves the more interesting (quasi-Marxist) question, than what to do with merchant bankers (who will probably carry on being merchant bankers in reality). How does the UK grow its consumer-based economy at the long-term trend of 2-2.5% when wages are growing at 1.5% or less, and there's no more credit?

Bet against the bubble - how to head off a subprime crisis

Market failure

It was a the market in Collaterilised Debt Obligations that triggered this whole mess in the first place, in turn fuelled by artificially cheap money. It's always puzzled me that even the 'red in tooth and claw' capitalists from Adam Smith don't suggest a 'free market' in Bank base rates. Why let the Fed mess it up by setting interest rates? Why not let the market decide? Err..because they don't work...

As for housing no-one has mentioned the obvious point that a market in land does fail since you can't realistically make more of it - hence supply is capped. This becomes painfully obvious to people in the UK forced to buy new builds on flood-plains. That being the case adding more speculation is hardly going to help.

A comparison with the German housing market is instructive - what's really needed is a change to people's expectations around home ownership. Sorting out the dismal lot of private tenants in the UK would go a long way to address this.

Time to rewrite DBMS, says Ingres founder

RAMSAN

>"Storing databases in RAM?"

Yes you already can, and no clever RDBMS rewrite required:

http://www.superssd.com/products/tera-ramsan/

Actually this is real world

Hang on. Whilst I'm a dyed-in-the-wool DBA even I accept that you need to tune and even reconfigure database servers for different jobs. Take Datawarehouses for example; bulk-loaded and therefore no need for full or even partial redo logs. Is what Stonebraker is talking about so different? Maybe the existing RDBMS systems need to be more configurable so that DBA's and developers have more options for their particular application? As for alternative query languages there's already MDX and soon LINQ.