Does your company ignore indexes? 3 serious performance problems that can be costly

Have you ever seen your database slow down, causing frustration for your entire team and, worse, for your customers? This is a common scenario, but the cause is often hidden in plain sight: indexes. They are the key to your database’s performance, and ignoring them is like driving a race car with the handbrake on. Most companies only realize the importance of indexes when the sluggishness is already causing losses, and the emergency fix can be much more expensive and complex.

In this article, HTI Tecnologia will delve deeper into why indexes are crucial for database performance. We’ll discuss the most serious problems caused by poor index management and show how outsourcing your DBA service can be the solution to maintain the availability and security of your data.

What is an Index and Why is It So Important?

Think of an index like a book’s table of contents. Instead of flipping through every page to find a specific term, you consult the index to go directly to the right page. In the world of databases, indexes work in a similar way. They are data structures that help the database engine locate information quickly, avoiding the need to read the entire table, row by row.

Without proper indexes, every search query has to scan all rows in a table (a process called a full table scan). In small tables, this might not be an issue. But in databases with millions or billions of records, this operation is extremely inefficient and slow, resulting in unacceptable response times.

3 Performance Problems Caused by Poor Index Management

Ignoring the creation, maintenance, and optimization of your indexes is a mistake that can lead to serious and costly headaches.

1. Slow Queries and a Poor User Experience

The most obvious problem with missing or poorly configured indexes is the slowness of queries. For the end-user, this translates to pages that take forever to load, reports that take minutes (or hours) to generate, and a system that always seems to be “thinking.”

• Business Impact: A poor user experience can lead to customer loss, a drop in sales, and damage to the brand’s reputation. In e-commerce environments, for example, every second of slowness on the checkout page can mean thousands of dollars in lost sales.
• Optimization: Creating indexes on columns frequently used in WHERE, JOIN, or ORDER BY clauses is crucial. An experienced DBA knows exactly which indexes to create and how they interact with the query execution plan.

2. Server Overload and High Infrastructure Costs

When queries are slow, the database and application server have to work much harder to process the information. This leads to increased CPU, RAM, and disk usage, resulting in a server overload.

• The Vicious Cycle: A slow system demands more resources, but increasing resources doesn’t solve the root cause (poor index management). Companies end up spending a fortune on hardware and software upgrades that don’t solve the problem, only temporarily mask it.
• The Smart Solution: Instead of investing in expensive hardware, HTI Tecnologia works to optimize your database, ensuring that your server uses resources efficiently. A well-optimized database with proper indexes can run on more modest hardware with much better performance.

3. Deadlocks and Database Access Concurrency

In environments with a high volume of transactions, a lack of indexes can contribute to deadlocks. A deadlock occurs when two or more transactions block each other, each waiting for the other to release a resource. Without indexes, transactions take longer to complete, increasing the probability of conflicts and deadlocks.

• Operational Continuity at Risk: Deadlocks can completely lock up the application, making the system unavailable. This directly affects the business’s operational continuity, with severe impacts on productivity and customer satisfaction.
• The DBA’s Role in Prevention: A DBA (Database Administrator) is the professional who actively monitors these conflicts and implements strategies to minimize them, such as creating indexes that accelerate transactions and reduce blocking time.

Why is DBA Outsourcing the Most Effective Strategy?

Maintaining an internal team of DBAs, specialized in multiple platforms (SQL and NoSQL), can be a challenge and a high cost. HTI Tecnologia offers a DBA outsourcing model, which has become the preferred solution for companies seeking high performance, availability, and security for their databases without the cost and complexity of an in-house team.

• Specialized Technical Focus: Our team is made up of specialists in various technologies, such as MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL, Oracle, SQL Server, MongoDB, Redis, and Neo4J. This means you get the knowledge of an entire team, not just a single professional. Our expertise in index management is just one of many areas where we can make a difference.
• Risk Reduction: A database is one of a company’s most critical assets. Poor management can lead to data loss, information leaks, and unplanned downtime. With 24/7 support from HTI, your company ensures constant monitoring, preventive maintenance, and a quick response to any incident, minimizing risks and guaranteeing database security.
• 24/7 Operational Continuity: The HTI team is on call to ensure your database is always available, regardless of the time or day of the week. This is crucial for companies that operate on a global scale or depend on continuous availability for their business.
• Cost-Benefit: Outsourcing eliminates the need to hire, train, and maintain an internal team. You get access to a high-quality service for a predictable cost, with measurable results in performance and availability.

How Can HTI Tecnologia Help?

If your company is dealing with slow queries, server overload, or deadlocks, the cause may lie in index management. HTI Tecnologia offers consulting, support, and maintenance services that identify and solve these problems at their root.

In our case study, we demonstrate how database optimization can solve performance bottlenecks and improve the efficiency of critical systems. A health plan cooperative began using HTI’s proactive monitoring to ensure the availability of its services, proving that outsourcing DBAs is a smart and strategic investment.

Our specialists use advanced analysis tools to identify underutilized or missing indexes, proposing the best strategy for your specific environment. To delve even deeper into the topic and understand how HTI can protect your company against database failures, check out our article on Database Log Management.

Is your company ready to stop ignoring indexes?

The performance of your database is a direct reflection of the health of your IT infrastructure. Don’t wait for the slowness to turn into a crisis.

Schedule a conversation with one of our HTI Tecnologia specialists now and discover how professional index management and DBA outsourcing can transform the performance, availability, and security of your business.

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