In a world where the DBA role has been repeatedly predicted to vanish, our experience tells a different story. This session brings insights from supporting hundreds of customers and managing thousands of databases across on-premises, cloud, and managed services environments. We will explore real-world case studies from the past year that highlight how seasoned DBAs continue to play a pivotal role in solving complex challenges.

Attendees will hear detailed accounts of scenarios, including on-call emergencies and planned work, such as:

- Performance incidents: on Exadata and single instance
- Datacenter migrations: simple and complex approaches
- Deployment automation challenges
- Patching fun in a large RAC environment
- Upgrading with minimal downtime

Each case study illustrates technical expertise and strategic thinking that is still relevant in an era dominated by automated tools and self-service platforms.

Join me to see examples that challenge the narrative and demonstrate the enduring value of database specialists, and learn about a few interesting solutions to problems we've recently solved.