Mar 12
21
So I got Inspired by Leonids post about questions to ask a BizTalk developer during interview. I decided to create the same for administrators. If you have the answers add them as comments.
1. What jobs do you need to configure when you install BizTalk
2. What is thresholds
3. Why do you have automatic throttling states and what can it be used for
4. What does a “high available environment” mean
5. What is NLB
6. What is host architecture
7. How do you route messages by receive port name
8. How do you measure performance for BizTalk
9. What are the four most important BizTalk databases
10. What are the dangers of filters combined with send port groups and multiple send ports
11. What needs to be backed up for a complete disaster recovery
12. What is an orphan message
13. What is a zombie message
14. what is a DNS server
15. How can you improve performance for BizTalk
16. What is ment by “parties”
17. Which default adapters cannot run with 64 bit OS
18. Which default adapters can only run with a single host instance
19. What is TDDS
20. What are best practices for tracking in production
21. What is global tracking and what does it track when global tracking is on
22. What is the difference between BizTalk 2009 and 2010
23. What is a Cumulative update
24. how many BizTalk versions is there
25. What is the BizTalk Adapter Pack
26. What is the ESB toolkit
27. What is required to install the Sharepoint adapter
28. What is special about the BizTalk Backup job?
29. What SQL agent job came in BizTalk 2010?
30. What tool were removed in BizTalk 2009?
31. How do the BizTalk Administration Console cache applications?
32. How can you solve slow administration consoles
33. What should be included in a basic guideline
34. What can you use the tracking database for
35. What is a trusted / un-trusted host
35. What is MSMQ used for?
36. What is ment by dedicated hosts
37. Should the DTA Purge and Archive job be configured and running if you have global tracking turned off?
38. What has not been changed regarding hosts since BizTalk 2006?
39. How do you turn of global tracking in BizTalk 2006 – 2006 R2
40. What is the main difference between BAM and DTA?
I will come with a new blogpost with more advanced question later.. 
LOL. i am guessing the even you would`nt be able to answer correct for all of these under pressure. It should be sufficient to know where to find the answer for most of these. Also many of these are for configuring the environment, and not administer the application inside BT. It should be enough with one admin with this kind of knowledge in an operation environment.
I wrote them, and I do know the answer. I’ll tell them to you when i meet you next week Eirik! Glad you are intrested in them. I do think every BizTalk admin should know the answer to these questions or ar least have some idea of the answer, after all its the “basic” and not the advanced, I am still working on creating them!
I don’t think there are many BizTalk admins that know the answer to all of those questions. I guess you should really think what kind of BizTalk admin you need. I guess that a financial institution with a 10 node BizTalk group would require someone like that. But for a smaller organization with a just one BizTalk server this would be overrated.
…
Also you can hire someone with a little less knowledge and get a 3th line support contract with a organization like Axon Olympus
But overall a very nice list with questions you can ask during a interview. Good work!
I know that you know the answer to all these Jeroen! Its true, but most of these questions are basic knowledge when you’ve been working with BizTalk for a while, the biggest problem is that there is no school traning you to become a BizTalk Admin, and during interview these questions can be guidelines to see how much they know, and don’t. When it comes to small environments like you say, 1 server, they usually never have a “full-time” BizTalk admin, but as a fullt-time BizTalk admin you should have the general knowledge of BizTalk, at least in my opinion! But a 3rd party support contract is also highliy recommended if you’re not planning to establish a BizTalk Admin team.
Great post, it would be lovely to see an accompanying “answers” post as well btw
Ill upload it as a PDF in a while, just waiting to see if I get some good feedback here! =)
Hi Tord,
).
Thanks for reference me
I was thinking of something like that but didn’t have enough knowledge.
It would be great to add one more question list for the “BizTalk deployment”. it requires different knowledge, IMO. Operations and Deployment are different. And it is responsibility of the BizTalk Administrator, I hope (as a BizTalk Developer
Great list. Thanks! I thing you could place it to the TechNet Wiki.
Hey! Yeah you pushed the ball first! I’ll do one for deployment too! And upload both to TechNet wiki! I’ll send you some info about that later!
Tord,
I think your list is great, and it’s something that’s been missing. It’s good for those in this space to have some way to gauge where they stand. I would be very interested in the advanced questions.
Great List Tord, Request you to please include questions on Operations and Deployment and answers to these questions as well.
Hi Tord,
That is a great list.
As an administrator, I would like to add a question about whether the candidate is aware of such tools as MessageBoxViewer and BTSTerminator and what they are used for.
Although that is not a basic administrative task and any production support team should be very careful wrt these tools and its usage.
Should some one start using these tools, it could imply that there are possible design/process issues with the deployed solutions.
Regards
Bibhakar
Good point, I on the other hand recommend people to use PAL, BPA and MBV on a regular basis!
Thanks for the post. I have been fortunate to play the BizTalk Administrator role for a year after years of BizTalk and other sofware development experience and is indeed a whole different ballpark. Ideally you want someone with BizTalk developer experience combined with strong SQL Server and infrastructure background. Depending on the scale and complexity of the environment, less may do. I will be using this list to refer those to who think this role can be fullfilled with zero to little technical knowledge saying “it is just Administration I don’t think any developer or BizTalk experience is necessary…”
Admins are the key to success! Thank you for the great feedback!
Nice post Tord. Looking for the answers of these questions