Data Like Burning!!

OK, time for a post, becuase if I don't, Some of you will assume that I'm dead. (I love you, Mom!)

Nothing too interesting to report. Right now, I'm learning about all the tables we have in our databases. There are:
- Tables that have every call made on our towers within the past 6 months, complete with phone number, phone ID (referes to the phone itself), duration, account number of who would get billed, and bunch of odd data for internal use.
-A record every phone, head set, belt holster, battery, and any other product we might sell to a customer, each with a modelnumber, maker, product code, phone associated WITH that accessory, list price, price after promotional/contract discount, and information about whether or not it has been discontinued.
- A list of phone numbers that have been on our lines, if they are still in use, about 100 different codes that tell us why we can or can't use those for a new customer, and two or three other ID number associated with that phone number (used to cross reference and join to other tables).

A query will grab data from 2-6 of these tables at a time. There are different tables each for land lines, cellular, and telular phones, and different tables for personal, business, and other lines. Payphones (we have only a few of these) and toll free numbers are grouped into one of those tables, which can throw off certain stored procedures, depending on what you are looking for.

Then, we'll port that data into crystal, from where we translate it into Excel for someone in a different department. And between this all, there's a program who's essential function is to make it tougher to get to any one file in order to keep two or more people from tinkering with it at once, and make sure there's always a backup at hand.

For contrast, at my previous job, I used ONE database, as opposed to at least 3 that I know about so far (not counting the historical data). we have many tables, but only used about 3-5 regularly, and I've never ran data at more than 10 of them, I think. not 10 tables at a time. 10 tables EVER.

Seriously, if you mis-type a query, you could change EVERYONE'S phone number to 307-555-2273. (ok, it won't affect the phone line's themselves, but you can seriously wreck the DB for billing purposes. which is kinda important.)

this is what I'm doing this week. Next week is Help Desk, which has about 3 data systems of it's own.

This is the kind stuff I always wanted to get into. I hope this doesn't turn into one of those "be careful what I wish for" things.