Thread: Bolder vision of pg certification

Bolder vision of pg certification

From
"Mudy Situmorang"
Date:
I believe postgres may expand faster and stronger if we move to a more
bolder vision in certification.

While Drake moving pg certification to the new server, I think it is still
appropriate to talk about some cert topic in advocacy, since I have some
view outside the boundary of pg cert.

After reading the archive.

IMHO, we shouldn't follow BSD's certification project as a model. Not to
undermine those great folks who has done great job in BSD's cert. There are
substantial difference between an OS and a Database Server.

I believe we should take the path of Oracle. The database company that
become an Information Company, by their strength in education and
certification.

More over, we can expand way over. Something more scary:

PostgreSQL Global Institute (PGI)
Community driven education, standardization and certification of data
management based on products developed by PostgreSQL Global Development with
focus on enhancing application, utilization, commercialization of
PostgreSQL.

PGI might contain three body:
1. Board of PostgreSQL Certification
Oversight the certification process.
2. Board of PostgreSQL Standardization
Oversight the process of creating standard, and legalize a standard.
3. Board of PostgreSQL Education
Oversight the postgreSQL education product created by the community.

In order to make it work, what we need is creating a business model that is
compatible with PostgreSQL community value, and able to attract commercial
institution, as well as other organization to involve in the PGI based
certification, standardization and education. In other word, a business
model that might generate profit for organization so that those organization
might spare their resource to run the PGI concept.

In this case I should've titled "Where PostgreSQL should learn from MySQL"
:-)... from Sun perhaps.




Ok, don't curse me on that... lets talk about PgCertification.

PgCertification

Prior to talk about exam, we're talking about Certification Object Type (let
say PgCOT). I believe survey is not the right tools to decide PgCOT.

Certification Object Type (PgCOT), defined as type of object that can be
certified by PGI... I mean Pg Certification, or cert.postgresql or
something, suppose to be object that is commonly certified.

Therefore, I propose 3 PgCOT:
1. Database Server
2. Product
3. Engineer

Why?
1. Some evil commercial company out there wants to utilize PostgreSQL
technology as their database server and they feel no need to pay a high
salary PostgreSQL engineer. However, they need to know that their mission
critical database server already installed according to the required usage
purpose (by an engineer with unknown skills).

2. Community might want to know which product already conform with
PostgreSQL standard for Administrator Tools, so that they might choose
between EMS SQL Manager, Navicat, or PostgreSQL Maestro. ABBTTRO
(all brand belong to their respective owners). Or perhaps someone might
create an MRI with embedded PostgreSQL technology.

3. Engineer... you know, we need to get those company pay more money...
I mean, your company needs to know whether you're paying someone too much
money.



This is only some thoughts, I'll support and shall contribute in pg
certification whatever the strategy is.


Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
Andrew Sullivan
Date:
Hi,

On Wed, May 07, 2008 at 08:57:39AM +0700, Mudy Situmorang wrote:
>
> I believe we should take the path of Oracle. The database company that
> become an Information Company, by their strength in education and
> certification.

That's not the only thing that Oracle did.  There is an important
difference with Oracle: Oracle Corp can restrict what any of its
customers say about the database system by virtue of the license those
customers agreed to, and it can also control what any employees say
about the system.  This contrast is important, because it puts
practical limits on what an effort in the community can do.

Furthermore, Oracle Corp had large amounts of money to spend on this
certification effort.  The programs you are discussing are expensive
to operate and extremely hard to develop.  This isn't something you do
in a weekend with your friends, and still have it be valid.

Finally,

> PostgreSQL Global Institute (PGI)

[ . . . ]

I think you need to go back to the -certification list archives and
look at the discussion (or, depending on your view, flamewar) about
governance.

In any case, this discussion belongs on the other list.

A

--
Andrew Sullivan
ajs@commandprompt.com
+1 503 667 4564 x104
http://www.commandprompt.com/

Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
Dan Langille
Date:
On May 7, 2008, at 10:12 AM, Andrew Sullivan wrote:

> Hi,
>
> On Wed, May 07, 2008 at 08:57:39AM +0700, Mudy Situmorang wrote:
>>
>> I believe we should take the path of Oracle. The database company
>> that
>> become an Information Company, by their strength in education and
>> certification.
>
> That's not the only thing that Oracle did.  There is an important
> difference with Oracle: Oracle Corp can restrict what any of its
> customers say about the database system by virtue of the license those
> customers agreed to, and it can also control what any employees say
> about the system.  This contrast is important, because it puts
> practical limits on what an effort in the community can do.
>
> Furthermore, Oracle Corp had large amounts of money to spend on this
> certification effort.  The programs you are discussing are expensive
> to operate and extremely hard to develop.  This isn't something you do
> in a weekend with your friends, and still have it be valid.

The Original Poster has big plans.  Very big plans.  Such plans
require very large
wallets.  We are not a company.  We do not have the funding Oracle
has/did.  Mind you, if the OP has these funds, we're willing to
accept them.

I was going to reply in more detail to the OP, but I find myself
occupied with real things in the next three weeks.  Not hypotheticals
and nice-to-haves.  :)

We need people willing to do heavy lifting.  Not heavy thinking.

--
Dan Langille -- http://www.langille.org/
dan@langille.org





Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
"Greg Sabino Mullane"
Date:
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Hash: RIPEMD160


> I think you need to go back to the -certification list archives and
> look at the discussion (or, depending on your view, flamewar) about
> governance.

Got a link to said archives?

> In any case, this discussion belongs on the other list.

I think general discussions about certification belong on this list,
certainly seems the best list of those listed here:

http://www.postgresql.org/community/lists/

- --
Greg Sabino Mullane greg@turnstep.com
PGP Key: 0x14964AC8 200805071101
http://biglumber.com/x/web?pk=2529DF6AB8F79407E94445B4BC9B906714964AC8
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Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
Andrew Sullivan
Date:
On Wed, May 07, 2008 at 03:03:20PM -0000, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:
>
> Got a link to said archives?

http://lists.postgresqlcertification.org/pipermail/cert/

> > In any case, this discussion belongs on the other list.
>
> I think general discussions about certification belong on this list,
> certainly seems the best list of those listed here:

I thought the _previous_ round of discussion around this determined
that it was its own project, going on over there, and therefore should
have its own list.  Since it has its own list, the discussion belongs
there (for the same reason that bucardo and slony related performance
problems don't go on -performance).

A

--
Andrew Sullivan
ajs@commandprompt.com
+1 503 667 4564 x104
http://www.commandprompt.com/

Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
"Joshua D. Drake"
Date:
Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: RIPEMD160
>
>
>> I think you need to go back to the -certification list archives and
>> look at the discussion (or, depending on your view, flamewar) about
>> governance.
>
> Got a link to said archives?

http://lists.postgresqlcertification.org/mailman/listinfo/cert/

>
>> In any case, this discussion belongs on the other list.
>
> I think general discussions about certification belong on this list,
> certainly seems the best list of those listed here:
>
> http://www.postgresql.org/community/lists/

The current PostgreSQL community certification project is being held
over a http://www.postgresqlcertification.org/ .

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake



Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
Robert Treat
Date:
On Wednesday 07 May 2008 11:20:28 Andrew Sullivan wrote:
> On Wed, May 07, 2008 at 03:03:20PM -0000, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:
> > Got a link to said archives?
>
> http://lists.postgresqlcertification.org/pipermail/cert/
>
> > > In any case, this discussion belongs on the other list.
> >
> > I think general discussions about certification belong on this list,
> > certainly seems the best list of those listed here:
>
> I thought the _previous_ round of discussion around this determined
> that it was its own project, going on over there, and therefore should
> have its own list.  Since it has its own list, the discussion belongs
> there (for the same reason that bucardo and slony related performance
> problems don't go on -performance).
>

Ah, but what is at the heart of the original posters email? It sounds to me
like they don't want to discuss the communities current effort (the slony in
your example), but want to discuss the idea of doing certification with a
different model (ie. let's say the topic of synchronus replication, again
following your example).  If that's the case I see nothing wrong with
discussing that here, except to the extent it isn't an advocacy related
topic, it might be worth discussing on -general instead.

--
Robert Treat
Build A Brighter LAMP :: Linux Apache {middleware} PostgreSQL

Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
"Santiago Zarate"
Date:
There was a discussion some time ago on advocacy and included -general
at some time... and these interested... got involved on it (the cert
list) and there werent  that many... (i've seen only like 10~ persons
arround), so calling -general... i dont see why... may be putting a
link on the postgresql.org site for the comunity to see and or
participate on the cert stuff... but... it would then... make more and
more people go on the list... and well IMHO, in Venezuela we say that
many hands on the food... makes the food taste bad...

2008/5/8 Robert Treat <xzilla@users.sourceforge.net>:
> On Wednesday 07 May 2008 11:20:28 Andrew Sullivan wrote:
>  > On Wed, May 07, 2008 at 03:03:20PM -0000, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:
>  > > Got a link to said archives?
>  >
>  > http://lists.postgresqlcertification.org/pipermail/cert/
>  >
>  > > > In any case, this discussion belongs on the other list.
>  > >
>  > > I think general discussions about certification belong on this list,
>  > > certainly seems the best list of those listed here:
>  >
>  > I thought the _previous_ round of discussion around this determined
>  > that it was its own project, going on over there, and therefore should
>  > have its own list.  Since it has its own list, the discussion belongs
>  > there (for the same reason that bucardo and slony related performance
>  > problems don't go on -performance).
>  >
>
>  Ah, but what is at the heart of the original posters email? It sounds to me
>  like they don't want to discuss the communities current effort (the slony in
>  your example), but want to discuss the idea of doing certification with a
>  different model (ie. let's say the topic of synchronus replication, again
>  following your example).  If that's the case I see nothing wrong with
>  discussing that here, except to the extent it isn't an advocacy related
>  topic, it might be worth discussing on -general instead.
>
>  --
>  Robert Treat
>  Build A Brighter LAMP :: Linux Apache {middleware} PostgreSQL
>
>
>
>  --
>  Sent via pgsql-advocacy mailing list (pgsql-advocacy@postgresql.org)
>  To make changes to your subscription:
>  http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-advocacy
>

Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
"Mudy Situmorang"
Date:
"Andrew Sullivan" <ajs@commandprompt.com> wrote in message
news:20080507141206.GH34820@commandprompt.com...
> Hi,
>
> On Wed, May 07, 2008 at 08:57:39AM +0700, Mudy Situmorang wrote:
>>
>> I believe we should take the path of Oracle. The database company that
>> become an Information Company, by their strength in education and
>> certification.
>
> That's not the only thing that Oracle did.  There is an important
> difference with Oracle: Oracle Corp can restrict what any of its
> customers say about the database system by virtue of the license those
> customers agreed to, and it can also control what any employees say
> about the system.  This contrast is important, because it puts
> practical limits on what an effort in the community can do.

That ofcourse we wont follow.


> Furthermore, Oracle Corp had large amounts of money to spend on this
> certification effort.  The programs you are discussing are expensive
> to operate and extremely hard to develop.  This isn't something you do
> in a weekend with your friends, and still have it be valid.

That resource requirements (time, money, engineer) IMHO, might be provided
by companies and institutions as part of community. As I said, what we need
is to create a sound business model to accomodate their interest without
threatening PostgreSQL core values.



> Finally,
>
>> PostgreSQL Global Institute (PGI)
>
> [ . . . ]
>
> I think you need to go back to the -certification list archives and
> look at the discussion (or, depending on your view, flamewar) about
> governance.
> In any case, this discussion belongs on the other list.

I've read all list description. The concept of PostgreSQL Global Institute
is absolutely totally extremly exacly not related to certification list nor
general list. It is related to how postgres expand its advocacy effort. Its
an alternative of postgres advocacy strategy in an extreme approach that I
think possible.

Currently some education company sell postgresql certification for US$
2.600. Others got thousands of dollars for installing Postgres.
It is a matter of time before people start to offer proprietary PostgreSQL
Database Server certification (sounds funny:-) and education.
I think you guys from Postgres Global Development core and contributors
should receive some share of that while at the same time expand profit for
those companies, not reducing. That's what I think PGI might do.


Just consider please...


> A
>
> --
> Andrew Sullivan
> ajs@commandprompt.com
> +1 503 667 4564 x104
> http://www.commandprompt.com/
>
> --
> Sent via pgsql-advocacy mailing list (pgsql-advocacy@postgresql.org)
> To make changes to your subscription:
> http://www.postgresql.org/mailpref/pgsql-advocacy
>


Re: Bolder vision of pg certification

From
Dan Langille
Date:
On May 8, 2008, at 2:30 AM, Mudy Situmorang wrote:

> Just consider please...


We have many things to consider.  We also have many talkers.

What we do not have enough of are the doers.

--
Dan Langille -- http://www.langille.org/
dan@langille.org