TACKLING DATA MODELERS' TOUGHEST CHALLENGE

Recently, I began a Data Modeling “Master Class” by asking participants to nominate the toughest challenges facing them in their professional work. Virtually all the responses were about “soft” or “political” issues: persuading project teams to include a data modeling phase, negotiating territory with database technicians, gaining access to business people, and, of course, staying employed. No mention of normalization, star schemas, time-dependent data, exploiting new DBMS features, choice of language or indeed anything remotely technical

Gambling at the 2005 PASS Summit

The 2005 PASS Summit is coming up in September and this is the best place to learn about SQL Server 2005 in the US. Steve Jones gives you a few reasons and arguments for your boss to let you go.

Indexed Views With Outer Joins

SQL Server 2000 has indexed views, which can greatly improve database performance. However there are a number of restrictions on building the view, including the restriction against outer joins. So how can this work? New author Jean Charles Bulinckx brings us a technique that can help you get around this restriction.

ENTERPRISE METADATA FRAMEWORK

Over the past few years, I’ve had the opportunity to discuss enterprise metadata to a wide variety of audiences and much of this conversation is captured in this “Best Practices” implementation framework. The model has evolved over the past few years as our program continues to do the same. Of course, this summary can only be a few pages long so the depth of the content here will be a tad shallow but you should be able to get the basics from the diagram and the description that follows. Figure 1 provides the new framework and the content follows to describe each section.

Agile Development with Scrum

We've all been there: the project that never ends and no light at the end of the tunnel. Nothing is more disheartening to a developer, DBA or anyone else that may be on a project than a finish line that has no end in sight or worse yet, one that keeps moving. Agile and Scrum development methodologies aim to fix this problem and others by applying what will appear to be common sense after you engage in the methodology for a few projects. This article will get you acquainted with my now-favorite d

Processing XML Showplans Using SQLCLR in SQL Server 2005

Build an application to extract a query's estimated execution cost from its XML showplan. Users can submit only those queries costing less than a predetermined threshold to a server running SQL Server 2005, thereby ensuring it is not overloaded with costly, long-running queries.

You Want To Do What, with MY Database?

SQL Server 2000 is an extremely powerful and flexible development platform, but if the users mess up the data, there's nothing you can do. Protecting the integrity sometimes means severely limiting access to users. Roy Carlson brings us a technique using sp_makewebtask that you can easily use to provide users with some data without giving them query access.

An interview with Ken Henderson

I have never met Ken Henderson, but I have followed his career, read his books, and even reviewed one or two of them for Dr. Dobb’s Journal. When I first saw Ken’s The Guru’s Guide to Transact SQL I almost did not pick it up. As a general rule, I don’t pick up the guru’s guide to anything. I’m glad I overcame this, since the book is little short of amazing.

Ken surprised me again with his latest book, The Guru’s Guide to SQL Server Architecture and Internals . About 400 pages into it, I was impressed by the introduction to what is involved in creating a server-based application, but wondered about its inclusion in a SQL Server book. The next 400 pages made it clear that understanding how servers work on Windows is critical to understanding the implications of how SQL Server runs.

BUSINESS METADATA: HOW TO WRITE DEFINITIONS

Many errors and accidents are made/caused by misunderstandings of the meanings of terms used.

How many times have you been in a meeting when the words you heard being said did not match what you thought they were?

Many business decisions are made (and later regretted) due to a misunderstanding of the data, and what the data element used in a report is signifying. Some of these accidents and misunderstandings are large enough to be reported in the media. In prior papers I refer to the Mars Lander episode, where the unit of measure was assumed and not made explicit, miscalculations were made and the equipment was lost. Our businesses are filled with many such examples, although not as costly perhaps, are still quite impactful to the business.

Detecting and Resolving Stalled and Stuck I/O Issues in SQL Server 200

Guest columnist Robert Dorr explores how the reporting tool in SQL Server 2000 Service Pack 4 significantly reduces the time it takes to identify and determine the underlying causes of stalled and stuck I/O operations.