Mala Mahadevan

My name is Malathi, a.k.a Mala - I am a DBA turned BI/Data Science person, working with SQL Server since 6.5. I am also founder of the Louisville SQL Server user group, organizer of 8 SQL Saturdays, Regional mentor for northeast, and 14-year PASS conference attendee. In my spare time I love to garden, travel, read, paint, and do yoga.

Blog Post

Thrilled to #BITS!

2021 was a strange year…mid way through a pandemic, enormously depressing on many fronts to me..and yet, it bought with it some unexpected joys. I never imagined, in the...

2022-02-09

16 reads

Blog Post

Introducing ScriptDOM

I’ve been meaning to get a series of blog posts started on this topic. A twitter conversation from yesterday finally pushed me to it. Last year, I was tasked...

2022-02-04 (first published: )

800 reads

SQLServerCentral Article

Formatting T-SQL Scripts using ScriptDOM and PowerShell

Well-formatted scripts are always easier to maintain and enhance readability to high degree. Formatting standards are an important part of coding standards anywhere and if not, they need to be. If there are a large number of scripts this can add up to a significant amount of time needed to maintain them. It is also […]

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2021-08-27

9,352 reads

Blog Post

Crocs and Naps….

I was planning a blog post for a TSQL2sday..instead would up writing an obituary blog post for a dear friend who passed on yesterday. Brian Moran was among the...

2021-07-23 (first published: )

353 reads

Blogs

Don’t Miss Out – SQL Server Query Tuning Fundamentals Starts Next Monday!

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Next Monday, February 9, 2026, my one-day live online training SQL Server Query Tuning...

Monday Monitor Tips: SQL Auditing Preview

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One of the features we advocates have been advocating for is a better way...

SQL Server 2025 CU1 Fixes the Docker Desktop AVX Issue on macOS

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Microsoft fixed the AVX instruction issue in SQL Server 2025 CU1. The container now...

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Forums

25 Years of SQL Server Central

By Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Comments posted to this topic are about the item 25 Years of SQL Server...

The Decoded Value

By Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Comments posted to this topic are about the item The Decoded Value

Deploying SQL Server Developer Edition in Kubernetes: A Cost-Effective Alternative to RDS

By Sujai Krishna

Comments posted to this topic are about the item Deploying SQL Server Developer Edition...

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Question of the Day

The Decoded Value

In SQL Server 2025, what is returned from this code:

DECLARE @message VARCHAR(50) = 'Hello SQL Server 2025!';
DECLARE @encoded VARCHAR(MAX);

SET @encoded = BASE64_ENCODE(CAST(@message AS VARBINARY(1000)));
SELECT BASE64_DECODE(@encoded) 

See possible answers