How to Solve Queries with AI

Tired of slow queries? Artificial intelligence tools promise to be the answer to all your database performance problems. However, if you are a DBA, DevOps, or Infrastructure Manager, you know that the reality is more complex. An IDC report indicates that 56% of companies that adopted AI without a clear strategy faced unexpected performance and security issues. The promise of AI for query optimization is seductive, but the truth is, without the supervision and knowledge of a specialist, you may be creating a silent nightmare for your infrastructure.

HTI Tecnologia, with its nearly three decades of experience in database consulting and support in Brazil, understands that AI is not a silver bullet. It is, in fact, a powerful tool that, when misused, can lead to millions in losses. This article will delve into the discussion, revealing the three most common and fatal errors when using AI to optimize queries and, more importantly, show how the combination of artificial intelligence with the wisdom and experience of a senior DBA is the only way to achieve the performance, availability, and security that your medium or large company needs in its query management.

The False Shine of Total Automation: Why AI Is Not the Complete Solution

Generative artificial intelligence, like advanced language models, is trained on a vast universe of data, including code, design patterns, and technical documentation. This makes it excellent for routine tasks, such as generating code snippets or answering questions about syntax. However, query optimization requires something that AI, by definition, does not possess: the context of your business, the structure of your environment, and the intuition of a specialist.

Using AI as a complete solution for query optimization is the first and most dangerous misconception. AI cannot audit a database’s history, understand the dependencies between different applications, or predict the impact of a small change in a query’s execution plan in a high-load environment. It operates based on probabilities and generic patterns, not on the complex and unique reality of your company.

Error #1: Ignoring Business Context and the Database Ecosystem

Imagine asking an architect to design a building without knowing whether it will be a hospital, a shopping mall, or a residence. This is exactly what happens when AI is used to optimize queries in isolation. AI doesn’t understand the criticality of a financial transaction versus a daily report query. It doesn’t know if the peak use of your queries occurs at 10 AM or 3 AM.

Query optimization goes beyond SELECT, FROM, and WHERE. It involves:

Workload Analysis: What is the transaction volume? What is the concurrency? HTI Tecnologia’s DBA uses advanced tools to map your database’s behavior, identifying the real bottlenecks in your queries.
Schema Evaluation: AI might suggest an index that, technically, would be great for a query, but which, in a complex and legacy schema, can halt the entire write operation. A specialized DBA will perform a deep analysis of your table structure and how they relate to each other to optimize the queries.
Performance vs. Resource Consumption: An optimized query can solve one problem but create another: excessive CPU or memory consumption, increasing infrastructure costs and overloading the server. Query optimization is not just about speed, it’s about efficiency.
The Query Lifecycle and Schema Evolution: Optimizing a query is not a one-time event but a continuous process that follows the application’s lifecycle. AI may not recognize that a query, perfect today, will become a problem tomorrow with an increase in data volume or the addition of new functionalities. A DBA from HTI understands that optimizing a query in a production environment must be a strategic decision, considering schema evolution and future business requirements.

Error #2: The Silent Threat to Security and Data Integrity

The rush for a quick solution can lead to dangerous negligence. Using AI to rewrite queries without due care is a recipe for disaster. The vulnerabilities that can arise in optimized queries are alarming and, often, invisible to non-specialists.

Data Leaks: By inserting queries containing data or metadata from your architecture into AI tools, you are transferring sensitive information to third-party servers. HTI Tecnologia operates with strict security and privacy protocols, ensuring your critical data is never exposed through queries.
Doors to SQL Injection Attacks: A simple error in a query rewrite can open a gap for SQL injection attacks, allowing intruders to access, modify, or delete crucial data from your company. AI doesn’t audit its own code for security flaws; a DBA does. SQL injection attacks, such as union-based or time-based injection, are subtle and difficult to detect without a meticulous analysis of the queries. Trusting an AI tool to rewrite critical code can introduce a vulnerability that goes unnoticed for months until it’s too late.
Lack of Traceability and Governance: Who reviewed the change? What is the real impact on security? The lack of a clear governance process, which can only be enforced by specialists, creates a chaotic and insecure environment for query management. Furthermore, regulatory compliance, such as LGPD, requires you to have total control over the handling of sensitive data. A qualified DBA from HTI not only optimizes the query code but also ensures that security and auditing practices are aligned with standards, protecting your company from fines and sanctions.

Error #3: The Limited View of the “Now” and the Absence of Proactivity

AI can optimize a query for the current moment. But what about tomorrow’s query? And the next version of your application? Query optimization is a dynamic process, not a static event.

One of HTI Tecnologia’s biggest differentiators is our 24/7 support. While AI can give you a specific answer, a senior DBA from HTI works proactively, using continuous monitoring to:

Identify and Prevent Problems: Our specialists analyze trends and usage patterns to predict bottlenecks and take preventive measures before a problem affects your operation.
Ensure Operational Continuity: With 24/7 support, we ensure that any query anomaly is identified and resolved in record time, minimizing downtime and losses.
Plan for Scalability: AI does not plan your business growth. Our DBAs are focused on architecting solutions that scale, ensuring that your data infrastructure can support the growing volume of queries without collapsing.

To understand the importance of proactivity, read our success case on how HTI Tecnologia helped a fintech recover from a cyber attack, a problem that AI would never have predicted or solved alone.

The Perfect Synergy: AI as a Co-pilot for the DBA

AI, on its own, is not a complete solution, but it can be an excellent co-pilot in the hands of an experienced professional. HTI Tecnologia uses AI tools to enhance the work of its DBAs, automating repetitive tasks and providing insights that speed up query diagnosis.

Log and Pattern Analysis: AI can process large volumes of database logs to identify anomalies and suggest query optimizations more quickly. However, it is the DBA who interprets these insights, contextualizes them with the business reality, and decides on the action plan.
Advanced Performance Tuning: Our senior DBAs use AI to speed up the profiling and execution plan analysis process, identifying bottlenecks in complex queries that would be nearly impossible to trace manually. This allows for a deeper analysis and the implementation of more effective solutions.
Intelligent Automation: We use AI to automate backups, system health monitoring, and maintenance tasks, freeing the DBA to focus on what truly matters: strategy, architecture, and critical problem-solving.

In short, AI is a powerful tool for optimizing queries, but its potential is only fully unleashed when it is used as an extension of a specialist. Outsourcing the DBA to a company like HTI is not about replacing your team, but about strengthening it, giving it access to an elite team that combines artificial intelligence with human wisdom and experience to ensure excellence in your query management.

Don’t Leave Your Application’s Performance to Luck.

Query optimization with AI may seem like a shortcut, but in reality, it’s a path full of risks. The performance, security, and availability of your data infrastructure are assets too valuable to be entrusted to a technology without supervision.

The true solution for resolving queries with AI is to combine the power of automation with the expertise of a senior DBA.

Schedule a meeting now with an HTI Tecnologia specialist and discover how our hybrid approach can transform the performance, security, and availability of your business.

Schedule a meeting here