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Set a security standard across environments that developers can see and run, but not change.  Read more...

Resilient T-SQL code is code that is designed to last, and to be safely reused by others. The goal of defensive database programming, the goal of this book, is to help you to produce resilient T-SQL code that robustly and gracefully handles cases of unintended use, and is resilient to common changes to the database environment.  Read more...

One option to get notified when TempDB grows is to create a SQL Alert to fire a SQL Agent Job that will automatically send an email alerting the DBA when the Tempdb reaches a specific file size. This tip explains how to set it up.  Read more...

CONNECT ANY DATABASE is one of three new permissions in SQL Server 2014 that can be granted to server logins. What is this new permission good for and why would we ever want this?  Read more...

Here are seven practical tips for any 'accidental DBA' or developer, faced with having to deploy an upgrade to a database live to production, in a development environment that is in the early stages of getting the database code “house in order".  Read more...

This article describes an easy way to handle calculation based on fiscal year and quarter  Read more...

In this article, we’ll be focusing on the different ways you can build with a Cloud Service, and what exactly happens in terms of virtual machines when you deploy your application.  Read more...

Recursive CTEs can be confusing and scary, so examining some non-standard examples may cast light upon these shadowy demons.  Read more...

Checking program code into source control is a daily ritual for most developers, but versioning database code is less well-understood. Grant Fritchey argues that getting your databases under source control is not only vital for the stability of development and deployment, but it will make your life easier when something does go wrong.  Read more...

During a transaction, data is written to the log cache so that it’s ready to be written to the log file on commit, or can be rolled back if necessary. When the log cache is being flushed to disk, the SQL Server session will wait on the WriteLog wait type. If this happens all the time, it may suggest disk bottlenecks where the transaction log is stored.  Read more...

I love SQL Prompt, and think it’s a great productivity tool. Even before I worked at Red Gate, I love...  Read more...

Packages can be scheduled to run at a time when you expect data to be in a database. Instead of...  Read more...