Listing members of a group in SQL Server.
In SQL we are used to the GROUP BY and the type of result it produces. In real life, we...
2010-10-11
1,570 reads
Phil Factor
- Interests: Motorbikes, Beer, gardening, conservation, Local history.
The One True Script
Phil Factor less-than-fond memories of the days of the One True Source Script. However, despite recent advances, he wonders just how much smoother team-based database development really is.
2010-10-04
239 reads
Cleaning up excess contiguous spaces in strings. A mystery.
/* Have you ever come across the problem where you have to remove spaces from a string that has too many?...
2010-09-30
2,985 reads
SQL Server's implementation of Window Functions
Phil factor compares SQL Server 2008's implementation of Window Functions to PostgreSQL and finds SQL Server frustratingly lacking in some of the essentials.
2010-09-27
797 reads
COMPUTE: now it is going, what else will do it?
/*I'd be very surprised if you've ever used the old COMPUTE clause in SQL Server. It is a bit mad,...
2010-09-23
1,625 reads
Getting Fired from an Unpaid Job.
Phil Factor initially brooded about being fired from a job he was just doing unpaid to help out. Then he suddenly realized that they were probably right.
2010-09-13
351 reads
Houston, we have a problem
Phil Factor takes a sideways look at Houston, a new tool for building SQL Azure applications, and is somewhat underwhelmed by what he finds.
2010-08-02
234 reads
Ambiguities and the wild object.oriented brigades
--Whilst trying to design a more effective way of detecting dependencies in a SQL Server database, I was mulling over...
2010-07-29
2,016 reads
The Killer Backslash in TSQL
--it is
quite startling to see that this, in TSQL, executes.
Select \
/*
---------------------
0.00
(1
row(s) affected)
so does
this....
*/
Select null /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
/*
---------------------
NULL
(1
row(s) affected)...
2010-07-29
5,820 reads
The Great Forum Debate
Phil discusses the pros and cons of the traditional versus stack overflow-style model for forum debate, and wonders whether there is a database model that would support all these different forms of discussion, or cooperative work, so that we can simply fit the 'visualization' to the nature of the particular discussion.
2010-06-28
101 reads
Blogs
Narrow Task Decomposition in AI Pipeline Agents
A nightly load into sales_fact fails. Ask an orchestrating agent to break down the...
Car Update: August 2026
By Steve Jones
It’s been some time since I provided a car update, so I decided to...
Microsoft Fabric OneLake Shortcuts: When to Use Them and When Not To
By James Serra
An architecture scenario Imagine separate Sales, Finance, Shared Data, and Executive Analytics workspaces. Sales...
Forums
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Question of the Day
Backing Up a DMK
In SQL Server 2025, I have a database with a Database Masker Key (DMK). I want to back up this key and keep a copy offline. When do I have to open this key before running the backup?
See possible answers