Longtime author and expert DBA David Poole examines a few T-SQL commands that he has never used. Learn how some of these little used T-SQL items function and see if they work for you.  Read more...

This article from new author Oleg Netchaev describes the cursor-less script used to generate insert statements. This allows you to efficiently and easily add data generation statements to your project deployments.  Read more...

Handling the paging of results in T-SQL has been a challenge for a long time. Robert Cary presents an interesting technique in this article.  Read more...

In Part 1, we learned how to make both Cross-Tabs and Pivots. In Part 2, we'll learn how to automate a very common type of Cross-Tab report and maybe learn some extra tricks on the way.  Read more...

In the fourth installment that looks at T-SQL changes for SQL Server 2008, Ashad Ali examines how the Filestream data type works.  Read more...

Continuing with his series on T-SQL enhancements in SQL Server 2008, Arshad Ali brings us a look at the HierarchyID and Large UDTs.  Read more...

In this new article, Yakov Shlafman shows us how he wrote a quick ad hoc report of expenses so that he could leave on time one day.  Read more...

Finding Date Ranges for Calculating StatisticsI received the following question from a fellow DBA: I need your input to derive the...  Read more...

Why does everyone use "it depends" as an answer to many T-SQL questions? Bob Hovious brings us a short example of how performance can change based on data loads for the same code.   Read more...

A book review of a new T-SQL book for SQL Server 2008, written by longtime SQLServerCentral author and MVP, Kathi Kellenburger.  Read more...

Breaking Down TempDB Contention  What is tempDB contention? From the outside looking in, tempDB contention may look like any other blocking. There...  Read more...

A lot of the time, the key to making SQL databases perform well is to take a break from the keyboard and rethink the way of approaching the problem; and rethinking in terms of a set-based declarative approach. Joe takes a simple discussion abut a problem with a UDF to illustrate the point that ingrained procedural reflexes can often prevent us from seeing simpler set-based techniques.  Read more...

SQL Server 2008 has a number of enhancements over 2005 that make it a more capable platform. New author Arshad Ali brings us an overview and some code about a few T-SQL changes.  Read more...

How to efficiently calculate moving averages with SQL Server using Stock Market data.  Read more...

This article will demonstrate an efficient way to reuse gaps in an identity column. Please note that this is something you normally shouldn't be bothered about in a well-designed database or application. However, there are circumstances where you are forced to do this.  Read more...

Seth Delconte brings us a technique to solve a common request. Using the NEWID function to return a random record from a result set.  Read more...

The Problem SQL Server is a huge product with lots of moving parts. Bugs happen. Microsoft has a place to voice...  Read more...

Rob Gravelle takes a complex SQL statement and shows you several ways to re-write it that both simplifies and shortens it, while still yielding the same results.  Read more...

Over and over again we are told that the DMV’s only hold data since your last reboot. So, how do...  Read more...

Importing Excel Spreadsheets is something that we often do with SQL Server. However it's not as easy as you would like as we move to the 64 bit platform. Peter He brings us a method that will work on all platforms.  Read more...