This Friday Steve Jones talks about database design and specifically asks how you prefer to design triggers.   Read more...

I'm designing a table and I've decided to create an auto-generated primary key value as opposed to creating my own scheme or using natural keys. I see that SQL Server offers globally unique identifiers (GUIDs) as well as identities to create these values. What are the pros and cons of these approaches?  Read more...

When Nigel Rivett takes us on a tour of the apparently innocuous subject of Identity Columns in TSQL, even the seasoned programmer is due for one or two surprises.  Read more...

An IP address is something we all recognize and is a piece of data that is quite prevalent in many systems. However it is a piece of data tha presents some challenges in its storage and retrieval. SQL Server guru David Poole presents us with a look at how you can work with this strange formatting.   Read more...

Computed columns are an interesting way to cover some queries that might otherwise require a table scan. SQL Server expert Andy Warren brings us a look at this database design feature.  Read more...

SQL Server guru David Poole takes a look at the different integer data types and the impact of each of those on your database.   Read more...

An IP address is something we all recognize and is a piece of data that is quite prevalent in many systems. However it is a piece of data tha presents some challenges in its storage and retrieval. SQL Server guru David Poole presents us with a look at how you can work with this strange formatting.   Read more...

SQL Server guru David Poole takes a look at the different integer data types and the impact of each of those on your database.   Read more...

Mindy explores the metadata stored in SQL 2000 to show you how to produce a simple and useful data dictionary!   Read more...

David recently worked on a project where it turned out storing the answers to a survey using bitmapping was a good approach. He was good enough to write some of it down and share. As he notes bitmapping isn't used as often as it used to be, but it can still be a useful technique to have around.   Read more...

This article by Simon Galbraith (from Red Gate software, maker of SQL Compare) discusses migrating changes from development to staging, QA, and on to production. If you've never seen the need for a schema compare tool (Steve Jones!), this is worth reading.  Read more...

How many jobs do you have? 10? 100? 1000? Andy makes the point that what works to manage for a small number of jobs doesn't work when that number doubles or triples (well, unless you only had 1 job to start with!). In part one of two, this article looks at ideas for using categories and naming conventions to get things under control.   Read more...

For most DBAs, normalization is an understood concept, a bread and butter bit of knowledge. However, it is not at all unusual to review a database design by a development group for an OLTP (OnLine Transaction Processing) environment and find that the schema chosen is anything but properly normalized. This article by Brian Kelley will give you the core knowledge to data model.   Read more...

This article briefly discusses SQL Server's data and procedure cache and shows you the common Transact-SQL statements/command and system tables that you can use to interact with the cache through Transact-SQL.   Read more...

Binary data can be stored as integers in a table. This article explains how to query an integer field to return the bits represented by the integer.   Read more...

This article demonstrates how to store checkbox results as integers in a database...perfect for surveys!   Read more...

Version control for stored procedures isn't always popular and certainly isn't easy. Or can it be? Andy discusses a technique he used on a recent project that you might find interesting.   Read more...

Mindy explores the metadata stored in SQL 2000 to show you how to produce a simple and useful data dictionary!   Read more...

Last week Andy started a discussion of the various ways you can reduce the number of round trips to the server. This week he continues by looking at a method he used recently to do client side caching of data to eliminate the round trip altogether. Gotta read it!   Read more...

Have you ever experienced a T-SQL query, a stored procedure, view or a trigger returning unexpected results. In this article by Raj Gill, he shows you how ANSI DEFAULTS may be to blame.   Read more...