Kevin3NF

Kevin Hill is a career SQL Server DBA living in Dallas, TX. His specialities include HA/DR, Best Practice configuration, Performance tuning and teaching new and accidental DBAs
  • Interests: Cycling, family, sci-fi, DBA stuff

Blog Post

Top 10 Careers in Data

Would you re-order these? Machine Learning Engineer $$$$$ Develop and deploy AI models Optimize machine learning algorithms for efficiency Work with big data frameworks to process large datasets Data...

2025-02-28 (first published: )

331 reads

Blog Post

3rd Party Applications Have Issues

As a SQL DBA, what do you do when a vendor application has performance problems that are code related? Server settings don’t generally seem to be an issue. Queries...

2024-05-20 (first published: )

192 reads

Blog Post

Degrees and Trade Schools

Can we normalize a couple of things? 1 – Trade Schools. Back in the 80’s trade classes in high school and post high school were frowned upon, or looked...

2024-05-08

29 reads

Blog Post

Set-Based vs Row-Based Database Code

In SQL Server, the terms “set-based” and “row-based” refer to different approaches or styles of writing SQL code to manipulate data. These styles have implications for performance, readability, and...

2023-12-18 (first published: )

604 reads

Blog Post

Database Concerns – A Poll!

What are you most concerned about in your database platforms? Please pick from the list below, and expand on your choice in the comments if you like:   Thanks...

2023-11-08 (first published: )

221 reads

Blog Post

IRL #8: SQL Server Down

Problem: My PocketDBA® client called in with a non-responsive SQL Server. Application errors, timeout, alerts firing. SQL Server box is up, and the services are running. Background: This is...

2023-09-06

36 reads

Blog Post

SQL Server is not a Car

Lets compare them anyway, just for fun. Both have an engine Both have a monitoring device (Dashboard/Activity Monitor) Both need power (Gas/Electricity) Both need to be told what do...

2023-09-05

36 reads

Blogs

In-Person CISA Training – April 13-16, 2026

By

I will be leading an in-person Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA) exam prep class...

EightKB 2026

By

EightKB is back again for 2026! The biggest online SQL Server internals conference is...

The FinOps Lifecycle: From Budgeting to Reporting

By

Working in DevOps long enough teaches you two universal truths: That’s exactly why I...

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Forums

VS Code, Unresolved References.

By mjdemaris

Hi all, I just started using VS Code to work with DB projects.  I...

Fun with JSON II

By Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Comments posted to this topic are about the item Fun with JSON II

Changing Data Types

By Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Comments posted to this topic are about the item Changing Data Types

Visit the forum

Question of the Day

Fun with JSON II

I have some data in a table:

CREATE TABLE #test_data
(
    id INT PRIMARY KEY,
    name VARCHAR(100),
    birth_date DATE
);

-- Step 2: Insert rows  
INSERT INTO #test_data
VALUES
(1, 'Olivia', '2025-01-05'),
(2, 'Emma', '2025-03-02'),
(3, 'Liam', '2025-11-15'),
(4, 'Noah', '2025-12-22');
If I run this query, how many rows are returned?
SELECT t1.[key] AS row,
       t2.*
FROM OPENJSON(
     (
         SELECT t.* FROM #test_data AS t FOR JSON PATH
     )
             ) t1
    CROSS APPLY OPENJSON(t1.value) t2;

See possible answers