In this tip we look at the undocumented command DBCC WRITEPAGE to corrupt a SQL Server database and then use the command to undo the corruption.  Read more...

How many times have you had a programmer come to you and say they want you (the DBA) to restore their database to sometime prior to when they accidentally corrupted it? If you are doing FULL transaction logging you can do a point in time recovery to restore the database to just prior to when the corruption occurred. But in order to do that you need to know exactly when the programmer corrupted the data, which in a lot of cases is not known down to the second.  Read more...

How to detect DB corruption ASAP...  Read more...

This script will run consistency check on database and send an email notification if it found any consistency errors.  Read more...

Having already shown how to corrupt a database, and then how nonclustered indexes can be corrupted independently, in this post Brent Ozar explains how you can detect corruption.  Read more...

This trigger will send mail notification once a row is written in the suspect pages table  Read more...

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This article details how to create a corrupt SQL Server database for testing purposes  Read more...

Problem One common task as DBA is to run DBCC CHECKDB on a regular basis to detect and correct potential corruption...  Read more...

Corrupt SQL Server databases are the worst nightmare of any SQL Server professional. In any environment, from small business to enterprise, the compromise of integrity and availability of the data can constitute a business emergency. This is especially the case in those organizations reliant on an OLTP data model, for a high-volume website. SQL Server database corruption and disruption of the transaction processing system can cause business repercussions such as large financial losses, a drop in reputation or customer retention, or contractual SLA problems with the service provider, if not managed in-house.  Read more...

How do you recover from corruption if your organization doesn't have a disaster recovery handbook? And how can you prevent the same corruption from recurring?  Read more...

The most critical task for all DBAs is to have a Backup and Recovery strategy that ensures, every day, that in the event of a disaster they can restore and recover any database, within acceptable limits for data loss and downtime. Even with all the required backups in place, it's easy to miss subtle failings in the overall plan that can, and eventually will, defeat your recovery plans.   Read more...

This article details how to create a corrupt SQL Server database for testing purposes  Read more...

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Ever restored a corrupted database from the backup, only to find that the backups are corrupted too - All the backups? Sure it can happen and it isn't nice when it does. To check that a database backup is internally consistent you have to use DBCC CheckDB. On a huge highly-loaded live system? Grant Fritchey has, as usual, a practical solution.  Read more...

Explanation of how to repair a database in SQL 2005 Enterprise which is mirrored.  Read more...

The stuff of nightmares, a corrupt database. However Gail Shaw gives you some advice about how to handle this situation.  Read more...

Returning author Wayne Sheffield recently had some database corruption - read about how it was fixed.  Read more...

At times database corruption happens and no good recovery path is available. It is possible to salvage data from indexes using query hints.  Read more...