22-25 April 2026 
The DBA of the Future: Hands-on with Automation
2017TL; DR
With each passing year, data professionals are asked to do more with less. Attend this session and learn how the DBA of the future will leverage automation to make their tasks more like a boogie wonderland and less like a disco inferno.
Session Details
With each passing year, data professionals are asked to do more with less. We manage more servers, more databases, and more data today than ever before. Automation allows for DBAs to achieve the necessary level of scalability to maintain the ever increasing workload.
DevOps and Continuous Integration demand high levels of automation throughout a database development process. In response, Microsoft has embedded automation into everything, including Azure services and SQL Server 2016.
In many shops today, traditional automation and scripting remain a largely reactive task. While being responsive and responsible are admirable qualities for any professional, the future of automation for DBAs must have an element of proactivity.
In this session, we'll look at the ways a modern professional DBA must be automating their job in order to keep their job. Topics discussed will include the following:
- High availability and disaster recovery
- Performance tuning and monitoring
- Data security, privacy, and compliance
- Monitoring and alerting
- Standardizing installation, configuration, and inventory
The day will include lecture style format as well as interactive discussions and lab exercises.
Attendees will leave this session with an understanding of the following:
- Advanced automation features in SQL Server 2016 and Azure SQL Database
- How to architect and prioritize automation tasks in the modern hybrid enterprise
- Key differences between automation tools and features
Attend this session and learn how the DBA of the future will leverage automation to make their tasks more like a boogie wonderland and less like a disco inferno.
Attendee prerequisites: Hands-on experience with SQL Server (any version). Familiarity with scripting features including T-SQL, PowerShell and SQLCMD. Basic understanding of database administration concepts. Familiarity with basic Azure and Data Platform features.
DevOps and Continuous Integration demand high levels of automation throughout a database development process. In response, Microsoft has embedded automation into everything, including Azure services and SQL Server 2016.
In many shops today, traditional automation and scripting remain a largely reactive task. While being responsive and responsible are admirable qualities for any professional, the future of automation for DBAs must have an element of proactivity.
In this session, we'll look at the ways a modern professional DBA must be automating their job in order to keep their job. Topics discussed will include the following:
- High availability and disaster recovery
- Performance tuning and monitoring
- Data security, privacy, and compliance
- Monitoring and alerting
- Standardizing installation, configuration, and inventory
The day will include lecture style format as well as interactive discussions and lab exercises.
Attendees will leave this session with an understanding of the following:
- Advanced automation features in SQL Server 2016 and Azure SQL Database
- How to architect and prioritize automation tasks in the modern hybrid enterprise
- Key differences between automation tools and features
Attend this session and learn how the DBA of the future will leverage automation to make their tasks more like a boogie wonderland and less like a disco inferno.
Attendee prerequisites: Hands-on experience with SQL Server (any version). Familiarity with scripting features including T-SQL, PowerShell and SQLCMD. Basic understanding of database administration concepts. Familiarity with basic Azure and Data Platform features.
3 things you'll get out of this session
Speakers
Karen Lopez's previous sessions
Graphs Are Everywhere - Graph DB Support in SQL vNext
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7 Databases in 70 Minutes
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5+ Database Design Blunders and How to Avoid Them
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Thomas LaRock
thomaslarock.com
Thomas LaRock's previous sessions
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