Interview with a Wiki Ninja: Roger Doherty, Author of SQL Server 2012 Early Adoption Cook Book, and Customer Validation Programs PM in SQL Server
Today's interview is with a Wiki Ninja who shares a lot in common with both a chef and a rock. Here is...
Who are you, where are you, and what do you do? What are your specialty technologies?
I’m Roger Doherty, and I exist as a beam of electrons in the cloud. They send my snail mail to Philadelphia, but I find myself wandering the halls of Building 35 in Redmond quite often. I put together customer programs to encourage developers to build on new and emerging technologies that are part of Microsoft’s Data Platform, including SQL Server, Windows Azure SQL Database, and Office/SharePoint BI.
What are your big projects right now?
Right now I’m responsible for driving customer feedback into engineering about our recently announced support for running SQL Server in Windows Azure Virtual Machine. There is a lot of pent up demand for this so it’s like handing out candy at Halloween.
Besides your work on TechNet Wiki, where do you contribute?
I do some blogging at https://blogs.msdn.com/b/rdoherty, I publish a lot of videos on Channel9 at https://channel9.msdn.com/Niners/rdoherty and https://channel9.msdn.com/Shows/DataBound, and you can find me on Twitter @doherty100.
What is TechNet Wiki for? Who is it for?
For me, it’s a great alternative to blogging that allows you to get technical information into the community’s hands early and in a more structured way. Blog posts become dated pretty quick, but using TechNet Wiki you can put together some “poor mans” documentation quickly, then progressively make it better and better. Once a wiki takes off, the community jumps in there and helps you make it better. For example, we published a bazillion SQL Server 2012 video and demo transcripts on https://bit.ly/sql2012cookbook, and the international community jumped in there by themselves and started localizing them. This got more eyeballs on the content and drove more global adoption of SQL Server 2012.
On what articles have you collaborated with other community members on #TNWiki? What was that experience like?
I have two big collections of articles at https://bit.ly/sql2012cookbook and https://bit.ly/sqliaascookbook. The community actively goes in there and edits away my goofs and adds new stuff. It’s a beautiful thing.
On what Wiki articles do you spend most of your time?
Right now most of the new stuff is going into https://bit.ly/sqliaascookbook.
What are your favorite Wiki articles you’ve contributed?
I’m proud of https://bit.ly/sql2012cookbook, it’s a huge body of work from a big virtual team that spanned a couple of years. I love it when people discover it and realize the wealth of information and resources there.
Who has impressed you in the Wiki community, and why?
I was blown away by the TechNet Wiki Translation Challenge. The fact that people were willing to jump in there and do this themselves was a real eye opener for me.
What does success look like for TechNet Wiki?
For me, when my TechNet wiki articles are near the top of a Bing search I know I’ve published my content in the right place.
Do you have any comments for product groups about TechNet Wiki?
Continuity, continuity, continuity. This can only be successful if people can count on this service being there for a very very very long time.
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Thank you to Roger for the interview and for the fantastic SQL articles you've contributed to TechNet Wiki! Please feel free to continue this conversation (and ask Roger more questions) in the comments!
- Ninja Ed