If you’re worried about your next database migration or upgrade, you’re not alone. A survey revealed that 90% of DBAs are worried too. It’s not surprising, these projects are a serious source of stress and must be performed speedily and with minimal downtime.

There are several reasons why migration projects fail. Typical pitfalls include:

The database is at the heart of every application; when applications are having performance issues, there’s a good chance the database is somehow involved. The greater the depth of insight a federal IT pro has into its performance, the more opportunity to enhance application performance. Every federal IT pro collects (or, should collect) database performance information. Yet, there is a dramatic difference between simply collecting data and correlating and analyzing that data to get actionable results.

There’s been a lot of buzz about blockchain in 2017. It was only a few months ago in March 2017 that Betanews predicted that blockchain would be the buzzword that would take 2017 by storm. And it did, expanding beyond the financial community where it’s had a home for several years and breaking into other enterprise sectors.

But few foretold that blockchain would have such a hand in government digital transformation in 2017. In fact, the two go hand in hand.

What is Blockchain?

“Big data” and the rise in demand for database services puts increasing pressure on IT departments. End users demand access to data at higher speeds and management wants that data delivered and managed at a lower operational cost.

Data stores are expanding at an exponential rate, compromising the performance of servers and applications. This growth also adds to the daily challenges and pains that administrators face – maintaining database health while meeting ever-evolving mission requirements.