In a scene in History of the World, Part 1, Mel Brooks portrays a caveman painting and describes the scene as the “first artist.” He follows this scene with a non-flattering comment about the first art critic. Since the movie, made in 1981, is not longer appropriate (truth be told, it probably was inappropriate in 1981… but that was part of Brooks’ goal in making it). You can find the (Not Safe For Work) scene by searching for it, if you are curious and / or interested.
Grant Cardone on Critics
I’ve learned a lot from Grant Cardone. Several of his videos cover the topic of “haters.” In one video titled The Truth about Haters – Grant Cardone (language warning), Grant makes the point that critics (haters) are speaking to themselves.
Like Grant, I let almost every negative comment on this blog stand. Why? There are a couple / three reasons:
- Negative comments most often say more about the person leaving the comment than they say about me. Often, the commenter is having a bad day. We never know what others are going through. I try to help by responding and not reacting. I sometimes fail. Consider this: This blog is now over 14 years old. That’s 14 years of a negative commenter’s negative comments reaching tens of thousands of people. To quote Dr. Phil, “How’s that working out for ya?”
- Critics provide free advice! Not everyone is going to like what I write and most of those who do not like my content are going to post a negative review. Of those who do like what I write, only ~10% are going to post a positive review. There’s always room for improvement in my content, and critics are awesome at finding that for me – for free, even!
- Over and over again, on this blog and other content, I’ve shared Why I Write: I write because I like to write. I choose to believe reviews – be they positive or negative – are not personal. My response? I’m going to continue producing content because I enjoy producing content. I am not discouraged in the least. If anything, I’m energized by criticism. It means people are consuming my content! Maybe I’m weird… Ok, definitely… I am definitely weird!
Responding
I will not post the review here because Amazon allows individuals to update reviews should the reviewer’s opinion change later. I will share my that my first response is to pray for the reviewer. Why? I am uncertain what else they may be dealing with or going through. I pray more for people are less flattering in their words.
I next read the comment carefully to identify inaccuracies. I do this for two reasons. First, I may not have explained myself well-enough. I am the King of Missing and Poorly-Worded Introductions. Ask my editors. They have my back on this claim. Second, the reviewer may be unaware of why I created the content I did; what motivated me. Part of that’s on me; but if I covered my “why” and they missed it for some reason, that’s on the reviewer.
My Response to One Comment:
In this day and age, sharing critical thoughts in writing is more difficult than communicating in person. I therefore extend an invitation for you to reach out to me personally so that we may schedule a constructive conversation. I am not allowed to post my email address, but I have contact forms at Enterprise Data & Analytics and at my professional blog.
We agree that the SSIS Catalog is a framework. Based on your review, it sounds as if you use and admire the SSIS Catalog, as do I.
You may be unaware that many enterprises – most enterprises, in fact – execute SSIS packages from the file system; even in late 2020. I mention this in chapter 5.
You may be unaware of the Azure-SSIS integration runtime’s support for executing SSIS packages from Azure File Shares, developed in the dark ages. I kid! Execution from Azure File Shares was released a little over a year ago; 30 Jun 2019 (AD). This is why this particular solution is included “in a text released late in 2020.”
It’s ok if you don’t have experience using Azure Data Factory or Azure-SSIS integration runtimes.
It’s less-than-optimal to miss a use case and label it “objective.”
The last few chapters are dedicated to migrating an on-premises file-based execution framework to an Azure-SSIS IR. Azure-SSIS is neither “deprecated nor discouraged.” I hope you will update your review with more information or a link to support your claim; or perhaps this is something we can cover in our call.
File-based SSIS execution is “supported, for now,” but I am uncertain you understand why: File-based execution of SSIS packages will remain supported because conversion from pre-2012 SSIS projects is supported.
Please reach out to me. I would enjoy a conversation with you to learn more about how you use SSIS in your enterprise.
Regards,
Andy Leonard
Conclusion (at least for now)
I hope the reviewer reads my comment and reaches out. If they do, I will update this post.
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