One of my previous posts, I covered how to create a really big database with just garbage data in it. Recently, I was given a task to blow up tempdb. I thought about using a similar script and tried it out. Of course it worked and it blew up…

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I got a request this week from an application engineer. The request was to move ALL physical database files from one physical drive to another physical drive on the same machine.

Hmmmm, I have never moved ALL .mdf files from one place to another at one time. One of my… Read more

It's been an interesting day. It was the 1 year anniversary of SQLSandwiches today. It was also my last day working in New Zealand. That's right, I decided to leave my current role as DBA at Foodstuffs. Mrs. Sandwiches and I are headed back to the States to be with closer… Read more

This weekend I went to SQL Saturday in Auckland. It was nice to interact with other DBAs again.  Kent Chenery (blog | twitter) did a nice session on powershell for n00bs and it got me thinking that I need to start posting some of my powershell stuff up… Read more

Without looking, name your most important server. Or if you have a bunch, name the top 2 or 3.

Now tell me what edition you are running. Not too hard. “SQL 2008 R2 Standard” or whatever.

Again, with out looking – what’s the build number? Hmmmm. 10.5…something or other.

Now… Read more

It was a normal Monday. I was going over some HA designs and planning the joys of setting up log shipping on a SQL 2000 instance when I got one of “those” emails.

“Hey Database Person, I’m trying to run this query but I keep getting this message:

Msg 9100,…

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I was unable to go to TechEd this year but I did get a chance to hit up Code Camp. It was a one day free event with 4 different tracks of 6 sessions each. I attended all of the SQL sessions and learned some good stuff.

The… Read more

Unfortunately my company still uses MS Access DBs. That's Access 97 folks! I've battled many challenges over the last couple months with these databases. It hasn't been fun but it's been a great learning experience.

I had a fun adventure last week with dealing with one of these DBs. We… Read more

find.....underlings.....
searching......
underlings found......

I recently was given the task to create a stored procedure to find people who are under other people from our users database.

The requester requested that they would put in the user's ID and it would return everyone under them...and everyone under those people...and so… Read more

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Good ol Maintenance plans. With 2005 and beyond we received the glorious SSIS backed Maintenance plans. I love SSIS so natually I love using these plans. Last week I was working on setting up a new server.

We had to make sure we had full, differential, and transactional log backups.… Read more

Agile! Scrum! Development methodologies! Sprint!

If you have a manager who reads any web page about being a manager, then you have probably heard about Scrum. Scrum development is very attractive from a manager or stakeholder's point of view. You get short bursts of development and can see results quickly. Read more

One thing that is enjoyable about my position is working with people who have no idea what SQL is besides “a difficult version of excel”. This gives me the chance to use what I have learned over the last couple of years and explain it the people who are using… Read more