Performance Monitoring by Internal Fragmentation Measurement

It has not been clear to what extent fragmentation, either internal or external, truly affects the performance of your SQL Server 2000 databases. New author Koby Biller discusses some of the impacts that it could have and has a free tool for download that can help you determine how fragmented your disk truly is.

Enabling Drillthrough in Analysis Services 2005

Discover the new Analysis Services 2005 drillthrough architecture. See how to set up drillthrough in Analysis Services 2005 and get guidance on migrating drillthrough settings from Analysis Services 2000 databases.

Single Point of Administration

Whether you write TSQL code or front end VB code against your SQL Server, it pays to have some good development practices that make your life easier. Jonathan Stokes has written a good article showing some of the good practices you should use.

Using TRY/CATCH to Resolve Deadlocks in SQL Server 2005

Deadlocks are unavoidable artifacts of today's RDBMS architecture–and all too common in high-volume OLTP environments. But thanks to .NET's Common Language Runtime (CLR), SQL Server 2005 provides developers with a new way to deal with error handling. In this month's column, Ron Talmage shows you how to harness TRY/CATCH to help resolve a deadlock.

Controlling Transactions and Locks in SQL 2000 and 2005 - Part 1

A look at controlling transactions and locks with hints and snapshots in SQL Server 2000 and 2005.

SQL Server Spotlight - Thierry D'Hers

Who builds SQL Server? It's an interesting collection of individuals and we're looking to bring you some profiles of them all. This time Steve Jones interviews Thierry D'Hers, leader of the BI group.

Database Geek of the Week - Shawn Wildermuth

Shawn Wildermuth is the “go-to guy” for information on ADO.NET. He is the author of Pragmatic ADO.NET: Data Access for the Internet World and numerous articles, is a Microsoft MVP, and works as an independent consultant in Atlanta.

Shawn’s web site, The ADO Guy, is a good resource for developers looking for answers to questions about ADO and ADO.NET. The site also lists interesting blogs, books and sites that are among Shawn’s favorites.

SSC Source Code for the PASS 2005 Summit

With a month left before the 2005 PASS Summit, there is yet another great reason to attend this SQL Server conference in 2005. Read about it and be sure that you register today with our source code "SSC".

The Basics of Cryptology

After a fantastic reception to his SQL Server 2000 cryptography toolkit, Michael Coles brings us a basic look at cryptography so you can understand what you are getting into if you implement it.

Administering a Development Environment

In any well run development environment, you will have a separate SQL Server for developers to work on, completely different from your production server. However there are a few tricks that Jason Hall brings us that you might want to implement to ensure a smooth running environment.