It seems that QA is being cut more and more as software development advances. Is that a good thing? Steve Jones has some thoughts.   Read more...

Have you ever started a database backup or a restore process that runs a long time then wanted to know when it will complete? Knowing when a database backup or restore operation will complete provides you valuable information, especially when you need to perform follow-on tasks that are waiting for the backup or restore process to complete.  Read more...

SQL Server sees the cloned database as a user database, meaning that you can treat it as one, including backup and restore - Steve Jones explains.  Read more...

This article will provide the actual implementation of the control mechanism.  Read more...

Guest author Derik Hammer dismisses the common myth that table variables perform better than temp tables because they are always in memory.  Read more...

When faced with repetitive tasks how do you go about doing them in a focused timely manner?  Read more...

Why I am now motivated to brand myself.  Read more...

In this free eBook, Kalen Delaney explains how Microsoft's new In-memory OLTP engine works. In her book, learn how to use lock- and latch-free data structures to allow non-blocking data processing, and find out how to migrate existing tables to Hekaton.  Read more...

In this article (consist from 2 parts) , I will be focusing on one of the practical solutions for management of internal SQL Server jobs in AlwaysOn Availability Groups scenarios.   Read more...

We all know how easy it is to run R, together with dependent packages, from SQL Server on order to do statistical analysis, and then turn the result into a real-time graph using Power BI; but can you actually do it? Saurabh Desai gives a step-by-step hand-holding guide to turn even the most timid into a BI guru. There is nothing difficult in using R in SQL Server 2016 once you know the steps.  Read more...

SQL Data Mask is the latest prototype to come out of Redgate Foundry. It copies your database while anonymizing personal data, and you can use it to mask your databases right now, free of charge. Here are the details.  Read more...

A common misconception for users is how tempdb, and data files in general work.   Read more...

This time we will compare different solutions to copy system folders using different SSIS tasks.  Read more...

There are many instances when dates and times don't show up at your doorstep in the format you'd like it to be, nor does the output of a query fit the needs of the people viewing it. One option is to format the data in the application itself. Another option is to use the built-in functions SQL Server provides to format the date string for you.  Read more...

Describes how to view R plots in SSMS and gives a brief introduction to R plotting  Read more...

When there are several SSIS projects with packages in a SQL Server Database or Data Warehouse development, automated deployments as part of Continuous Integration can get tricky. Nat Sundar describes how he created a Deployment script that is intended to provision a Data Warehouse for System Integrated testing (SIT).  Read more...

Steve Jones is off to Seattle for the rest of the week attending Microsoft Build 2017.  Read more...

This article describes a lightweight copy-and-generate approach for making a sanitized version of a production database available to development teams with SQL Clone and SQL Data Generator.  Read more...

This week Steve looks at the Power BI announcement of a new server product.  Read more...

In this chapter, we will show how to create a Machine Learning experiment from our Azure SQL Warehouse.  Read more...