Update: Apparently I can't write, or get a point across from the comments and a few emails, so I have edited this to hopefully make it clearer.

The pre/post conference sessions came out today for the 2010 SQL PASS Summit. And to my surprise the list of sessions wasn’t… Read more

I saw someone post recently that they wanted to run this code on their principal server in database mirroring to clean out a large transaction log and shrink it.

alter database <mydb> set recovery simple
go
checkpoint
go
alter database <mydb> set recovery full
go
backup database pubs to disk

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With the announcement of Brent Ozar (Blog | Twitter ) leaving Quest for SQL Skills, Exceptional DBA finalist Jorge Segarra (blog | twitter) taking a new job far from the Novice Chef, Kathi Kellenberger getting a new job, and more, a few people pinged… Read more

We had an unexpected switch last weekend. My boss decided that we were ready to move from the Stack Exchange (SE) to an alternative, OSQA.net, without informing any of the people that work on the site. Needless to say this wasn’t a seamless transition, but it was fairly smooth. The… Read more

I’m not a big networking person. I know that it’s good for my career, but I’ve been lucky enough to get myself fairly well known, my picture is on daily emails from SQLServerCentral, and so a lot of people know of me. As a result, I don’t have to… Read more

I’ve heard this before, it came up in the Tufte seminar I took, and it also was something that grated on my nerves at TechEd recently. I was in a presentation and saw a slide titled “Agenda” that had bullet points like this:

• History of xxx
• Problem of DIY
• Reference…

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I don’t travel a lot, but with the success of SQL Saturday, I find myself heading out on the road more than I have in the past. I’m not what you’d call an experienced traveler, and Brad McGehee, who travels a lot, constantly tells me I’m doing it wrong… Read more

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I saw Paul Kenny at the first Business of Software conference, and then had dinner with him, chatting about sales. I actually had our company bring him in for some training and he was back last year again at the Business of Software. I’m not sure he’s coming… Read more

I hope you’ve seen the note from Andy Warren (Blog | Twitter) on a PASS Spring Event, and there’s another writeup from Kendal Van Dyke. The idea of growing PASS by offering another event, in addition to the Summit, that will hopefully grow, allow more people… Read more

Someone posted a note recently asking about how to detect the changes in a sequence. Say you have a table like this:

DECLARE @t_temp table (ID INT IDENTITY(1,1), Value VARCHAR(20))
insert into @t_temp
        select 'Win32' UNION ALL
        select 'Win32' union ALL
        select 'Win32' union ALL
        select 'Win32' union

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I’ve given quite a few presentations, one keynote with another to come, and attended many more. I’ve read a few books on how to get better, and then in an Edward Tufte seminar recently, I got another one.

Dr. Tufte mentioned the idea of a supergraphic, an image with a… Read more

I saw a post recently asking if there was an easy way to find the port a client was using on a SQL Server since someone had multiple instances. I asked for some information since there are actually multiple ports in use.

The port the SQL Server listens on

The… Read more

I don’t trust ATT.

That’s saying something. AT&T, the company that built US telco, that gave us innovations from Bell Labs, including Unix. They got an exclusive deal for the coolest phone I have ever used, and I don’t trust them.

Their network, despite upgrades, still has me worried.… Read more

As the plane was landing the other day for SQL Saturday in Pensacola, I was struck by how amazing my career has gone. 19 years ago, working in a cube in a power station, programming dbase and Clipper applications. A geek at a desk.

Now I’m flying halfway around the… Read more

A short while ago someone complained that some of the headlines on SSC were deceiving in terms of what they represented. A few people noted that webcasts or other headlines weren’t technical information, and they didn’t want to click through to find that out.

Made sense to me, though I… Read more

I was excited to attend the networking session last year at the PASS Summit. Andy Warren and I had talked about it quite a bit and tried to promote it as a way to build your brand and perhaps get a better job. We were concerned that networking is a… Read more

I had been hearing about Lil’ Buck and so when I finally caught up with Buck Woody (Blog | Twitter) at TechEd, he told me to wait a minute. Unwrapped, from a separate box in his bag, in bubble wrap, out came Lil’ Buck

Apparently Marketing at Microsoft… Read more

I gave the Modern Resume: Building Your Brand presentation last week at the SQL Saturday #22 - Pensacola event and had about 30-40 people come see it. I got some good responses, but there was one interesting thing that came up.

I have talked about how it helps to prove… Read more