In about a week and a half, the SQLServerCentral opening night party takes place at the PASS Summit. And while I won’t be there, I’m in charge of the prizes that will be going out to everyone attending.

In the past I’ve usually done a couple big Best Buy trips… Read more

I actually built on in 1999 and called it a Life List. Over the years I’ve tried to work on the list each year, knocking off something, but I also learned something. I learned that as I grew, and my life was more enjoyable, some of the things on… Read more

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I was looking over the pre-conference sessions submitted for the SQL Rally event taking place next May in Orlando. I think it’s great that the community gets the chance to vote on the submissions and help decide what will be offered.

Note that you don’t have to attend the event… Read more

This continues my series on Common SQL Server mistakes, looking at more T-SQL mistakes.

What’s Wrong?

If you saw a query like this, would you see a problem?

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I had done a little work with CDC last year, experimenting with the way that it handles changes in your database. Someone had asked me the question about the retention period since the default of 3 days was not sufficient for their environment.

BOL lists the default retention period as… Read more

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It’s been quite a few years since I updated the Hawaiian shirt wardrobe. I bought a series of 5 shirts for TechEd years ago, having “SQLServerCentral.com” embroidered on each of them. I had 3 copies of each shirt, with Andy, Brian, and myself having a selection of shirts to wear. Read more

No matter whether you provide the food or have people pay for it, it seems that at every SQL Saturday I’ve attended, there is extra food left over. Sometimes it’s a very significant quantity. At one of the events I think there were over 50 boxes lunches left over.

You… Read more

The first iteration of my presentation on Common SQL Server Mistakes, based on the various things I’ve seen in the forums over the years as well as written about on this blog, was last night.

It went fairly well, though not a lot of questions from the group and I… Read more

This series looks at Common SQL Server mistakes that I see many people making in SQL Server.

Foreign Keys

It’s way too often that I see people building databases without including declared referential integrity (DRI) in their databases. Even when I see people setting a primary key on tables, it… Read more

I saw a post recently from Hugo Shebbeare that reminded me of something that I’ve seen asked often on the forums. One thing that I preach to people is that they should use their blog to show what they know, and in this case I want to do that. Also,… Read more

This is actually amazing. A talk on what YouTube does with copyright and how they view it, from TED. It’s interesting, and there are two things in there to watch. Note, that I caught this link from Jeff Atwood (@CodingHorror) on his blog.

The first thing… Read more

I don’t have either, but I ran across this comparison on the devices. It says get both, if you’re a consumer of media and culture. To some extent I do think that it’s got a perspective that makes sense, and if you can afford a $500 iPad (or more),… Read more

Recently I was at an event and a speaker wasn’t able to make a session. There was a minor scramble, and the session ended up being cancelled, which is fine, but it got me thinking about what I would do if I had an emergency.

I don’t always have the… Read more

One thing that I don’t see a lot, but it still happens with people new to SQL Server is the comparisons they’ll make with NULL values. Often those people new to T-SQL will write this:

The thought here is they… Read more

I’m not sure Google is a better company than Microsoft or some of the other extremely large companies that get caught up in dominating a market. However they are engaged in some interesting projects, and I have to think that the founders, or someone high up in management is really… Read more

It’s time for T-SQL Tuesday again, and I’m happy to participate again. This is a monthly blog party started by Adam Machanic (Blog|Twitter )that asks people to write on a particular topic all on the same day.

This month’s theme is misconceptions in SQL Server, hosted… Read more

Let’s be clear: I don’t recommend the use of xp_cmdshell as a general tool. It ought to be used when you have no alternatives, and you should carefully control access and what this can do. Opening a shell from SQL Server can be dangerous for your server.

That being said,… Read more