A Check and Foreign Key Constraint Improves Query Performance

Check and foreign key constraint do not degrade performance but actually improve it.

Registration is open for SQL Relay

SQL Relay is an annual community-run series of SQL Server training events across the UK. SQL Relay will run 8, 1-day conferences over the course of 2 weeks starting June 17th. Speakers from Microsoft, global IT companies, and a host of MVPs, are covering topics on DBA, business intelligence, and development.

Unpack an Integer with SQL Server Recursion

Starting with SQL Server 2005, developers have had recursion available as a T-SQL language feature. This article describes recursion and its SQL Server implementations, complete with examples. It also includes SQL Server functions and a stored procedure that unpacks, or parses, an integer into its multiple-of-two components.

Find the Currently Running Scheduled Job

Ever need to automatically stop a long running job? Ever need to find which named Schedule is the currently running version of your job? There's simple code that'll let you find out.

Solving Complex T-SQL Problems, Step-By-Step

What should you do if your first, most intuitive solution to a problem ends up scanning the data more than is necessary, resulting in poor performance? Have you missed a new SQL Server feature that can remove inefficiency from your technique? Alternatively, do you need a little help, and some lateral thinking, to open the path to a different approach? Sometimes, the answer is "both".

Custom Metrics for Monitoring Database Mirroring

SQL Monitor comes with plenty of metrics, but there are always going to be things that you want to measure that can't be done 'out of the box'. Taking database mirroring as an example, Grant shows that custom metrics can be used to monitor and alert whatever aspect of SQL Server or database that you need.

Using FULL JOINs to Compare Datasets

This article describes a technique of using FULL JOINs to compare two datasets within a numerical tolerance.

SQL Server Central Webinar Series #23: Safeguard your data offsite with SQL Backup Pro

You may already have a great backup and recovery plan. However, if something were to happen to your databases and you needed to restore from your backups, you’d want to be in control, with the ability to access a copy of those backups quickly, restoring them with minimal downtime and minimal fuss.

In this session Grant Fritchey, SQL Server MVP, will discuss the key reasons why you need to have offsite backups, and the advantages of hosted storage. He’ll address some of the fears surrounding cloud backups, and show how offsite backup is made quick and easy with the new ‘backup to hosted storage’ features in SQL Backup Pro 7.3.

Stay Backed Up by Monitoring Your Backup Process

Based on a linked server setup, you can check your SQL Server backups on multiple instances.

Diagnosing Common Database Ails

When a database starts showing signs of an illness, it's up to the DBA to get to the root of the problem, fast. Kat Hicks takes a look at the most common causes of database troubles, free tools that can help, and the misconceptions that get in the way.