Today I will talk about a book  titled  ” Windows PowerShell 3.0 Step by Step” by Ed Wilson;O’Reilly Media, Inc.

When I first heard that Ed Wilson is writing a book on Windows PowerShell I was greatly excited. I am a great fan of PowerShell and by all means… Read more

by Steve Bolton

               I was drawn into the realm of SQL Server in a roundabout manner thanks to Visual Basic. Around the time I got my Microsoft Certified Solution Developer (MCSD) certification in VB 6.0 (at precisely the same time .Net hit the market, instantly leaving me a year or… Read more

As I mentioned in the introductory post, in the Introduction to SQL Server Security session for Pragmatic Work’s Training on the T’s, I received a large number of questions that there wasn’t time to answer.  Instead of just a re-cap of all of the questions, instead I’ve opted… Read more

I am fortunate enough to have been selected to give a presentation at the PASS Summit 2013 in Charlotte, NC on October 14-18.  It’s amazing to think that, although I have been in IT for 25 years, I first started to build my brand when I started this blog only… Read more

As I mentioned in my original post, Exploring Excel 2013 as Microsoft’s BI Client, I will be posting tips regularly about using Excel 2013.  Much of the content will be a result of my daily interactions with business users and other BI devs.  In order to not forget what… Read more

This is just a quick post to share a lesson learned while I was on an engagement where the client’s reporting environment was using SAP Business Objects (BO)running on Linux for reporting. We were doing a test to move the underlying data warehouse from another database platform to SQL Server… Read more

Read more

I’ve been meaning to do this, and I finally had the chance recently to start working with Azure. Red Gate is investing in cloud tools, and more development tools, so it’s something I need to work on.

I went to the Azure page, and noticed a “Member Offers” link.

When… Read more

My latest article is up at MSSQLTips.com:

Disaster Recovery Planning for Microsoft SQL Server - Getting Backups and Restores Right

For more of my articles:

• My articles here at SQLServerCentral.com
• My articles at MSSQLTips.com

  Read more

Andy Leonard (blog | twitter) and I are teaming up to do a security presentation on SSIS. It's scheduled for Wednesday, May 29th, at 11 AM EDT.

Register to attend the webinar!

We're going to look at the typical ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) pipeline and consider the weak points… Read more

I hope you were able to attend my free webinar on Ad-hoc Reporting with SharePoint on May 21, 2013.  If you weren’t you can now watch the recording here.

As usual there were many great questions that I wasn’t able to answer and I thought I’d follow up on… Read more

WOW! I was selected to present at the SQL PASS Summit 2013 in Charlotte, NC. in October! All I can do is keep repeating WOW. I’m in shock.

Even better, I was chosen for a spotlight session! I could not be more ecstatic! I received the email while I was… Read more

When Andy Warren (b | t | Li)started SQL Saturday with #1 in Orlando, we weren’t sure it would succeed. After a few events, we dreamed and wondered if we’d ever get to 50 events. Despite our success in the past, we weren’t sure if a free event,… Read more

Ever since returning from the UK for the SQLBits conference, I’ve been snowed under a mountain of action items.  I’ve got such a backlog of things to get done, emails to answer, and family to not ignore that I’m starting to feel really guilty.

So with that in mind, I… Read more

Well-designed indexes are an important part of database optimization because they are the key factor in achieving optimal query performance and response time. In the meantime, poorly designed indexes, such as missing or excessive indexes on tables, indexes placed on the wrong column or inadequate index maintenance strategies, can be… Read more

In many situations, data modification requires several steps. For example, you may need to change the values ??in two separate tables. You can use transactions to complete these two operations as a unit, or if an error occurs, does not change any of the tables. Another key consideration is that… Read more

The well-designed online analytical processing (OLAP) solution is fundamental to organizations analysis capabilities. That is why, when designing the OLAP solution for your organization, you must ensure that the components of your OLAP solution, including relational data warehouse databases and multidimensional cubes, are designed to meet the business needs of… Read more

With the release of SQL Server 2005 and later releases, Microsoft introduced set of new dynamic management view and function that helps database administrators (DBA) and developers to identify potential index candidates based on query history.

Checkout the part-3 of my three part article series on index-related dynamic management views… Read more

I’m truly honored to be chosen to speak at PASS Summit 2013. The honor is compounded as I have been chosen to deliver two sessions:

• Fast Performing SSAS Hierarchies: Tips and Tricks (3 hours)
  Track: BI Platform Architecture, Development & Administration
  Session Abstract: Depending on how they’re implemented, SQL Server…

Read more

PASS liked our “Mouth Wide Shut” interviewing session from last year so much that they’ve decided to have us back for part two: Mouth Wide Shut: Interviews from the Other Side of the Table.

This is our brand-spanking-new session for the interviewERs…those who question, vet, and rant… Read more