A New Word: Astrophe
astrophe n the feeling of being stuck on Earth. Us geeks are supposed to love space, right? Science Fiction? The Moon is a Harsh Mistress? Star Trek/Star Wars/Lost in...
2023-06-16
36 reads
Blog Posts
Heading to That Conference
I’ve been working with Ryan Booz a bit more and as we’ve talked over the last few weeks, he has asked me a few times if I’ve booked travel...
2023-06-16
12 reads
Masking Columns in Azure SQL and SQL Server: Safeguarding Sensitive Data
Information security and privacy are key in today’s data-driven world. Sensitive data needs to be protected from unauthorized access. With column masking in SQL Server and Azure SQL, you...
2023-06-16 (first published: 2023-06-01)
353 reads
Using Data Masker on Chinese Surnames
A customer had a question recently on masking Chinese characters. I thought that was interesting, so decided to test this out. This is a short post on using SQL...
2023-06-16 (first published: 2023-05-26)
160 reads
Avoid “Constants” in T-SQL
Here we look at a common query "anti-pattern" that can create performance problems - and how you work around it.
2023-06-14
396 reads
Introduction to SQL Server Query Store
Introduced with SQL 2016, Query Store was, probably without doubt, the most anticipated and talked out new feature. In this post we'll just take a brief look at it,...
2023-06-14 (first published: 2023-05-31)
619 reads
Microsoft Announcement: Microsoft Fabric
Yesterday at Microsoft Build, a significant announcement took place—the introduction of Microsoft Fabric, which is now available for public preview. Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, went as far...
2023-06-14 (first published: 2023-05-31)
616 reads
Why Aren’t You Monitoring SQL Server
I repeat the phrase “If you aren’t monitoring it, you can’t measure it” all the time. Through my IT career, this has been a constant. If you don’t have...
2023-06-14
2 reads
Executing Queries Using Always Encrypted
In this post we’ll look at how you interact with data that is encrypted using Always Encrypted. The examples here will show how you run queries from SSMS, in...
2023-06-13
31 reads
Across the Water Again
I’m in the UK again, for my second trip this year. This time I have no commitments for speaking or presenting anything. I’m in town for a Marketing get-together...
2023-06-12
15 reads
Blogs
Chatting with Power BI: Who Benefits from This Conversation?
By Rayis Imayev
"Dave: Open the pod bay doors, HAL.HAL: I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t...
A Quick Look at Redgate Data Modeler
By Steve Jones
Redgate acquired a data modeling tool from Vertabelo recently and I wanted to explore...
Prepping for Certification, Part 2 of ?
By Brian Kelley
The advantage of understanding the make-up of the exam: I can tailor my efforts...
Forums
SQL Server 2025 Build List
Comments posted to this topic are about the item SQL Server 2025 Build List
Filtered Indexes: The Developer’s Secret Weapon in SQL Server
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Filtered Indexes: The Developer’s Secret...
Is Data Modeling Common?
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Is Data Modeling Common?
Question of the Day
Getting The Database Name
I run this code to connect to SQL Server 2022 from the command line.
sqlcmd -S localhost -EAt the command line, I run these two commands:
SELECT ORIGINAL_DB_NAME() GOWhat is returned? See possible answers