Meet The Experts: Oracle Master Syed Jaffar Hussain

This week's featured expert is Oracle Certified Master, OCP, OCE and the first Oracle ACE from Middle East, Syed Jaffar Hussain.

Syed Jaffar is currently working as a senior Oracle DBA at a large commercial bank in Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Syed Jaffar is the elder brother of our featured expert, Sabdar Syed.

Such an impressive family of Oracle experts!

OCP Advisor (OCPA): Please share with us your background and professional experience.

Syed Jaffar Hussain (SJH): Syed Jaffar Hussain (SJA): I started my IT career way back in 1992, when I was probably just 18 yrs old. I was working on WordStar, Wordperfect and Lotus applications and did small programming with FoxPro. Now,I have 16+ years of IT experience in which Over 8 years as an Oracle DBA. I am currently working for a big bank in Saudi Arabian country as Sr. Oracle Database consultant on 16 node RAC setup with over 50 databases projects on HPUX Superdome ,EMC DMX4 Symmetric SAN storage.When I look back at my career, its was really a tough journey to become what I am today. I have enjoyed all the challenges that I have faced during my professional tenure.

OCPA: You have achieved OCE, OCP and OCM Certification credentials. What motivated you to achieve this spectacular success?

SJH: After 4 years of Oracle experience, I got my first Oracle certification credentials as an OCP on Oracle 8i OCP. I always believe that having practical knowledge is more important than simply passing certification exams and I still stand by my view. In those early days when I started working with Oracle products, I used to spend almost 12 hrs a day working with databases and almost 4 hrs reading Oracle books and documentation.Achieving Oracle Certified Master (OCM) was one of my long cherished dream. I appeared for the exam during August 2008 and waited almost a month to get the result. In my 8 years of Oracle experience every day I learn new things in Oracle and this keeps me motivated to learn more about Oracle database technologies.

OCPA: Based on your certification experience, what is your advice, tips, suggestions for candidates preparing for the exams?

SJH: I always suggest adequate practical experience is very important. Even when one is preparing for a new release and and one is not exposed to a production environment, practice on demo or test instances and databases and then pursue Oracle certification. Without hands-on experience, most employers will stop believing in the value of Oracle certification.

Another emphatic suggestion is NEVER use any dumps for passing the exam. Dumps demoralizes, demotivates and decreases one's passion towards learning something by referring books and documents. I am a great admirer of Oracle documentation as they contains all the information that is required for certification exams.

OCPA: Oracle is constantly releasing new versions and technologies. How do you keep updated with he changes and upgrade your skills?

SJH: This is the very competitive world and one must be up to date with Oracle skills and knowledge in order to cope with the challenges in IT market. I always like to have a look at the new release features , whether they are applicable to my current production environment or not. I believe practice makes a person perfect.

OCPA: Which Oracle technologies excite you most?

SJH: For the past one year I have been extensively working with Oracle RAC technologies. I have been excited about performance tuning, RMAN and Data Guard (standby database). Presently, my work involves implementing 8+ node RAC production environment. I have also given one day exclusive RMAN seminars on behalf of Oracle EMEA in Denmark and Sweden. Recently, I was appointed Oracle RAC SIG representative for Saudi region.

OCPA: You are also a very popular blogger. Please tell us what you blog about.

SJH: I discuss about the problems that were faced the production environment and how I resolved the issue or implemented a workaround. I feel sharing such knowledge would be useful to my blog readers.Please visit my blog at http://jaffardba.blogspot.com

OCPA: On behalf of OCP Blog community, I want to thank you for setting aside your some time within your busy work day for this interview feature.

SJH: Thank you, OCP Advisor, for this opportunity to share my Oracle certification experience with others. Keep the hard work going mate!

Take the Oracle University Salary Survey

Oracle University has just released an online salary survey which I highly recommended that you should take today. It should take less than 10 minutes to complete.

Click here to take the survey

The survey is being conducted with the following objectives:

• Understand the salaries that certified individuals earn
• Compare salaries globally
• Has holding one or more Oracle certifications benefited earnings

The survey is open to all Oracle Certified Associates (OCA), Professionals (OCP), Masters (OCM) and Experts (OCE) worldwide as well as those preparing for certification.

The survey is available till May 12, 2009.

Yet Another Featured Expert Wins Oracle ACE

Somehow I had missed the big news that one of our featured experts won the Oracle ACE award a few days ago. One of the most brilliant sparks of Oracle genius I have come across, Chen Shapira truely deserves the award.

On behalf of OCP Blog Community, Heartiest Congratulations Chen!

Additional Reading:

• "Look - I'm an Oracle ACE" from Chen Shapira's blog
• Meet the Experts - Oracle OCP Chen Shapira

Featured Expert Wins Oracle ACE Award

The blog editor is delighted to announce that one of our featured experts, Ben Prusinski, has won the prestigious Oracle ACE Award.

Heartiest Congratulations, Ben!

Our OCP Blog community is very proud of your achievements.

In the past few months we have featured Oracle experts who have received Oracle ACE award just after the 'Meet the Experts' interview was published.

Is this sheer coincidence or a hidden criteria to win the Oracle ACE Award?

Please read the following Oracle ACE related blog posts too:

• Interview with Oracle ACE Ben Prusinski


• Featured Expert Wins Oracle ACE Award


• Meet the Experts: Oracle ACE Patrcik Gresham


• Oracle ACE - For those with an ace up their sleeves

Blog Author to present second session at COLLABORATE09

The blog author was informed by the OAUG paper selection committee that one more whitepaper has been selected for presentation at COLLABORATE09 conference. This is the second whitepaper to be presented by the blog author. The first one was reported last month.

The session was first proposed on Oracle Mix. For OCP Blog readers, here is the presentation abstract for Service Contracts Life Cycle Management - Pathway to Higher Profits:

Release 12 introduces Service Contracts life cycle management. I would be discussing R12 new features for Order Fulfillment Suite focused on Service Contracts that should be on your implementation shortlist. The contracts renewal to quote acceptance workflow now incorporates contracts negotiation cycle for effective interaction with the customer. Automated contract renewal followed by scheduled reminders can be configured to ensure that there is minimum contract leakage and maximum recurring revenues while reducing operational costs. Incorporate these R12 process flows and firmly position your organization on the pathway to higher profits!

For a complete list of sessions, please click here