Alfonso G.

Even the best applications, the ones that work from day one, have growing pains. Nowadays, nobody can predict the future usage patterns of an applications, not even accurately project the growth of data volumes. Sometimes even this cannot be realistically predicted during the system sizing stages of a project. Fact is, business applications always need more speed. Either because the current performance is not enough to satisfy business process requirements (such as "invoicing must be done in a batch by night so that every morning the account department can check the billing") or because they cannot handle future growth ("what if we sign a deal with this 100 outlet supply chain retail store?") I'm now often being called to do performance analysis and review of database applications, which is something I've done extensively in environments ranging from ERP/CRM applications (SAP/Siebel), OLAP/ROLAP DW systems (Oracle) and web apps. Drop me a note if you want to start a conversation.