The Challenge of Variable Seasonal Database Usage

by Dec 4, 2020

Categories

Tags

Administration agent-based monitoring Agentless Monitoring alert responses alert thresholds alerting Alerts Amazon Aurora Amazon EC2 Amazon RDS Amazon RDS / Aurora Amazon RDS for SQL Server Amazon Redshift Amazon S3 Amazon Web Services (AWS) Analytics application monitoring Aqua Data Studio automation availability Azure Azure SQL Database azure sql managed instance Azure VM backup Backup and recovery backup and restore backup compression backup status Backup Strategy backups big data Blocking bug fixes business architecture business data objects business intelligence business process modeling business process models capacity planning change management cloud cloud database cloud database monitoring cloud infrastructure cloud migration cloud providers Cloud Readiness Cloud Services cloud storage cloud virtual machine cloud VM clusters code completion collaboration compliance compliance audit compliance audits compliance manager compliance reporting conference configuration connect to database cpu Cross Platform custom counters Custom Views customer survey customer testimonials Dark Theme dashboards data analysis Data Analytics data architect data architecture data breaches Data Collector data governance data lakes data lineage data management data model data modeler data modeling data models data privacy data protection data security data security measures data sources data visualization data warehouse database database administration database administrator database automation database backup database backups database capacity database changes database community database connection database design database developer database developers database development database diversity Database Engine Tuning Advisor database fragmentation database GUI database IDE database indexes database inventory management database locks database management database migration database monitoring database navigation database optimization database performance Database Permissions database platforms database profiling database queries database recovery database replication database restore database schema database security database support database synchronization database tools database transactions database tuning database-as-a-service databases DB Change Manager DB Optimizer DB PowerStudio DB2 DBA DBaaS DBArtisan dBase DBMS DDL Debugging defragmentation Demo diagnostic manager diagnostics dimensional modeling disaster recovery Download drills embedded database Encryption End-user Experience entity-relationship model ER/Studio ER/Studio Data Architect ER/Studio Enterprise Team Edition events execution plans free tools galera cluster GDPR Getting Started Git GitHub Google Cloud Hadoop Healthcare high availability HIPAA Hive hybrid clouds Hyper-V IDERA IDERA ACE Index Analyzer index optimization infrastructure as a service (IaaS) infrastructure monitoring installation Integrated Development Environment interbase Inventory Manager IT infrastructure Java JD Edwards JSON licensing load test load testing logical data model macOS macros managed cloud database managed cloud databases MariaDB memory memorystorage memoryusage metadata metric baselines metric thresholds Microsoft Azure Microsoft Azure SQL Database Microsoft PowerShell Microsoft SQL Server Microsoft Windows MongoDB monitoring Monitoring Tools Monyog multiple platforms MySQL news newsletter NoSQL Notifications odbc optimization Oracle PeopleSoft performance Performance Dashboards performance metrics performance monitoring performance schema performance tuning personally identifiable information physical data model Platform platform as a service (PaaS) PostgreSQL Precise Precise for Databases Precise for Oracle Precise for SQL Server Precise Management Database (PMDB) product updates Project Migration public clouds Query Analyzer query builder query monitor query optimization query performance Query Store query tool query tuning query-level waits Rapid SQL rdbms real time monitoring Real User Monitoring recovery regulations relational databases Releases Reporting Reports repository Restore reverse engineering Roadmap sample SAP Scalability Security Policy Security Practices server monitoring Server performance server-level waits Service Level Agreement SkySQL slow query SNMP snowflake source control SQL SQL Admin Toolset SQL CM SQL code SQL coding SQL Compliance Manager SQL Defrag Manager sql development SQL Diagnostic Manager SQL Diagnostic Manager for MySQL SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server SQL Diagnostic Manager Pro SQL DM SQL Doctor SQL Enterprise Job Manager SQl IM SQL Inventory Manager SQL Management Suite SQL Monitoring SQL Performance SQL Quality SQL query SQL Query Tuner SQL Safe Backup SQL script SQL Secure SQL Security Suite SQL Server sql server alert SQL Server Migration SQL Server Performance SQL Server Recommendations SQL Server Security SQL statement history SQL tuning SQL Virtual Database sqlmemory sqlserver SQLyog Storage Storage Performance structured data Subversion Support tempdb tempdb data temporal data Tips and Tricks troubleshooting universal data models universal mapping unstructured data Uptime Infrastructure Monitor user experience user permissions Virtual Machine (VM) web services webinar What-if analysis WindowsPowerShell

If the past year has taught us anything, it is that we can never know what’s coming next. Just to survive, we may need to reevaluate our actions and be flexible enough to adapt to a rapidly changing situation. Database administrators can suddenly be tasked with keeping things running under tremendously adverse conditions that lead to increased system usage. Sometimes these usage spikes are totally unpredictable and need to be handled with ad-hoc techniques.

Many database teams working for companies in diverse market sectors have to deal with the challenges of seasonal peaks in database usage. You might immediately think of retailers and the pressures of satisfying customers during the holiday shopping season. But numerous other businesses also have to address seasonal fluctuations in demand on their database environment. A failure to maintain reasonable performance and accessibility can spell disaster for an organization.

An example is a system used by a university to process admissions, tabulate grades, and facilitate course registration. For a good part of the calendar year, the databases are used sparingly to handle students changing classes or transferring from other schools. At other times, such as the weeks before a semester begins and during its final few days, the system is expected to process a substantially larger amount of queries and requests.

The professional sports market has been negatively affected by the pandemic but offers another example where databases experience demand spikes related to certain parts of the year. Systems devoted to ticket sales will be used very heavily before the season, especially if a team has made some news by adding a star player to their roster. Often, the majority of tickets are sold fairly quickly and the database behind the sales applications soon returns to a more normal usage pattern.

The DBAs responsible for these databases have a good idea when demand will start to ramp up and should not be caught off guard. They can take some proactive measures that will help them maintain performance during these periods of heightened database usage.

Preparing for an Uptick in Database Usage

Providing additional capacity is the first step toward ensuring that database performance remains viable during seasonal usage spikes. One of the benefits of housing SQL Servers with a cloud provider is that it is usually easier to add capacity to address fluctuating database demand patterns. Adding capacity can be done in an in-house data center as well as the cloud, but the on-demand nature of cloud provisioning facilitates an efficient method of only using what is needed to get the job done. 

Organizations that have defined seasonal spikes in demand for their database applications can use this knowledge to their advantage and be prepared for the surge in user activity. The database team can make the necessary modifications to satisfy the increased number of queries and transactions that need to be processed before their systems are overwhelmed. Some characteristics of your environment should be at the top of the list when looking to address increased database activity.

  • Network capacity is a crucial factor that can limit the ability of users to get to your system and transfer information efficiently. This issue can be resolved with a temporary increase in network bandwidth. 

  • Space considerations for database objects may need to be adjusted to handle an increase in transactions and the need to process larger temporary files. Space could be permanently allocated to these systems but may sit dormant for most of the year, waiting for the spike. Adding and removing storage capacity to reflect the systems’ needs is a more cost-effective solution.

  • Adding CPU power and memory can help address ill-performing queries that may have been running fine under normal database usage. Here again, a cloud provider will be able to more easily address a changing environment than a traditional data center. 

Monitoring Databases Under Stressful Circumstances

Even the best capacity planning efforts will not guarantee that SQL Server systems will perform up to expectations when faced with significantly increased demand. Database teams still need to monitor their systems and be prepared to handle problems on the fly. SQL Diagnostic Manager for SQL Server provides a versatile tool that can be used to monitor physical and virtual SQL Servers in your data center or the cloud. 

During a database’s peak usage season, there is likely to be an increased focus on system performance by all levels of the organization. C-suite executives that never make an appearance may show up at database team meetings to voice their concerns and make everyone a little more nervous. The information available from SQL Diagnostic Manager will help ensure that enterprise DBAs know exactly where to look if problems arise and satisfy management anxiety with quick resolutions. 

SQL Diagnostic Manager lets your team monitor and alert on database performance issues so they can be addressed before they impact the user community. Its diagnostic and reporting functionality can help plan for next year’s spike by identifying areas that could have been configured more effectively. It’s a tool that will benefit an organization by enabling better SQL Server performance no matter what kind of demands are put on enterprise databases.