OK, so due to some... interesting developments at work (that's interesting in the ancient Chinese curse sense of the word, see below), it would be really good for me to blow the rust off of my SQL skills, in a Business Intelligence capability sense. My wife and I may be going from "We'll move this July, no wait, we don't have money, we'll move next July" to "We gone, yo" within the next month. I can either be extremely pissed/depressed at this possible turn of events, or I can see it as an opportunity to move on to bigger and better things, and my Wellbutrin is allowing me to see it as an opportunity.
Now, I have probably 2 years of experience with SQL with a heavy daily amount of use. I know the language but it's been 2.5 years since I've used it, and I've forgotten a fair few things that are pretty important. However, I know my ability to relearn software/languages/etc., and I'm confident that given a couple of weeks of practice, I should be good to go.
My problem is, I need a large data-set to practice on. I can download Microsoft SQL Server Express and Visual Studio whatever's current and build an interface if need be, but does anyone have any sample data-sets, or know where one can be obtained, that I can practice pulling various sets of queries off of?
Now, I have probably 2 years of experience with SQL with a heavy daily amount of use. I know the language but it's been 2.5 years since I've used it, and I've forgotten a fair few things that are pretty important. However, I know my ability to relearn software/languages/etc., and I'm confident that given a couple of weeks of practice, I should be good to go.
My problem is, I need a large data-set to practice on. I can download Microsoft SQL Server Express and Visual Studio whatever's current and build an interface if need be, but does anyone have any sample data-sets, or know where one can be obtained, that I can practice pulling various sets of queries off of?
So, to make a very long story less long, I'm a vendor working at Microsoft, for a company called Society Consulting. Society used to be called Pentad, and it was an awesome company. Since the switch to Society, when they "merged" with another "company" and the sole employee of the other company, the company that had been in existence for a grand total of 1 month, miraculously became the President of the newly merged company, things have gone to shit pretty fast - for the employees, at least.
Society doesn't like Microsoft, doesn't think that the way forward has anything to do with taking on vendor roles at Microsoft, and Microsoft doesn't like Society. An example of just how much Microsoft doesn't like Society is that this new president was the Director of Business Intelligence at Microsoft up until a month before he became the president of our company. Microsoft needed to hire a consulting firm to provide vendors for BI following the director's resignation. They did not choose to hire Society.
This shouldn't really impact me, because my contract with Society runs through the middle of April, and my contract with Microsoft runs through the end of June (which would pretty much guarantee me another year's contract with Society), but it does impact me because Society appears to be doing their damnedest to bail on Microsoft. Vendor companies have to pay to lease space at Microsoft for their employees to work in, and apparently Society has failed to renew their lease. That space has since been purchased by another vendor, and as of today at 5:00pm, I have no where to work. I still have a job to do at Microsoft, but I don't have a place from which I can do that job. I can't do my work from Society's office, or from home, because the way I do my job isn't compliant with Microsoft's standards for working remotely. In order to make my job compliant, we have to get approval from higher than my manager (who's a senior manager, basically a step below director, or two steps below VP level) and products group has to devote programming hours to develop tools that we could use; which they won't have time to do until after a major release that's coming up sometime around (or after) when my contracts expire. And, even if my job was compliant, I still couldn't work from Society's HQ, because they recently moved offices and whereas the old office had space for 60+ vendors, the new office has space for fewer than 10. Oh yeah, and I'm hourly, so even if I could work from home from a compliance standpoint, I couldn't work from home from a payroll standpoint.
So, basically, I still have a job, I just can't do my job because I don't have anywhere from which to do my job, and I won't until after my contract expires.
Society doesn't like Microsoft, doesn't think that the way forward has anything to do with taking on vendor roles at Microsoft, and Microsoft doesn't like Society. An example of just how much Microsoft doesn't like Society is that this new president was the Director of Business Intelligence at Microsoft up until a month before he became the president of our company. Microsoft needed to hire a consulting firm to provide vendors for BI following the director's resignation. They did not choose to hire Society.
This shouldn't really impact me, because my contract with Society runs through the middle of April, and my contract with Microsoft runs through the end of June (which would pretty much guarantee me another year's contract with Society), but it does impact me because Society appears to be doing their damnedest to bail on Microsoft. Vendor companies have to pay to lease space at Microsoft for their employees to work in, and apparently Society has failed to renew their lease. That space has since been purchased by another vendor, and as of today at 5:00pm, I have no where to work. I still have a job to do at Microsoft, but I don't have a place from which I can do that job. I can't do my work from Society's office, or from home, because the way I do my job isn't compliant with Microsoft's standards for working remotely. In order to make my job compliant, we have to get approval from higher than my manager (who's a senior manager, basically a step below director, or two steps below VP level) and products group has to devote programming hours to develop tools that we could use; which they won't have time to do until after a major release that's coming up sometime around (or after) when my contracts expire. And, even if my job was compliant, I still couldn't work from Society's HQ, because they recently moved offices and whereas the old office had space for 60+ vendors, the new office has space for fewer than 10. Oh yeah, and I'm hourly, so even if I could work from home from a compliance standpoint, I couldn't work from home from a payroll standpoint.
So, basically, I still have a job, I just can't do my job because I don't have anywhere from which to do my job, and I won't until after my contract expires.
