Database administrators (DBAs) use specialized software to store and organize data.
The role may include capacity planning, installation, configuration, database design, migration, performance monitoring, security, troubleshooting, as well as backup and data recovery.
Skills of a DBA
- Knowledge of database queries
- Knowledge of database theory
- Knowledge of database design
- Knowledge about the RDBMS itself, e.g. Microsoft SQL Server or MySQL
- Knowledge of structured query language (SQL), e.g. SQL/PSM or Transact-SQL
- General understanding of distributed computing architectures, e.g. Client–server model
- General understanding of operating system, e.g. Windows or Linux
- General understanding of storage technologies and networking
- General understanding of routine maintenance, recovery, and handling failover of a database
Duties of a DBA
- Installing and upgrading the database server and application tools
- Allocating system storage and planning storage requirements for the database system
- Modifying the database structure, as necessary, from information given by application developers
- Enrolling users and maintaining system security
- Ensuring compliance with database vendor license agreement
- Controlling and monitoring user access to the database
- Monitoring and optimizing the performance of the database
- Planning for backup and recovery of database information
- Maintaining archived data
- Backing up and restoring databases
- Contacting database vendor for technical support
- Generating various reports by querying from database as per need
- Managing and monitoring data replication
- Acting as liaison with users