Managed Service Account Naming Convention
A while back I had to help a customer update their naming standard for their Managed Service Accounts, so I thought I would share some of those details. The...
2022-01-18
122 reads
Everyday SQL
Get Certificate Details for SQL Encryption In-Transit Using PowerShell
In my opinion, all customers should be encrypting connections to their SQL Servers to secure data in-transit, but that’s a discussion for another day. Today, I wanted to discuss...
2022-01-04
360 reads
Finding the NTFS Allocation Unit Size for Mount Points
The 64Kb Allocation Unit size is one of the easiest SQL Server best practice items to complete during your new builds, but from time to time, I still see...
2021-12-07
783 reads
PASS is Gone
On January 15, 2021, PASS will cease to exist. https://www.pass.org/PASS-Blog/ArticleID/888/ArtMID/99177/preview/true I cannot tell you how much this disappoints me. PASS has been around for my entire database career, and...
2020-12-29
4 reads
Management Studio Find & Replace Using Regular Expressions
In my last Management Studio tip, I demonstrated how you can drag and drop column names to a query window. The only part I do not like about that...
2020-07-28
14 reads
Management Studio Drag & Drop Column Names
Continuing on my recent trend of Management Studio tips, here is another that could save you a few minutes. In today’s scenario, we need to write a select statement...
2020-07-07
12 reads
SQL Server Audit Recipe – xp_cmdshell
This article assumes you already have a basic understanding of SQL Server Audit, but if not, use this link to catch...
2018-07-17
175 reads
SQL Server Morning Health Checks
Every now and again as a Microsoft PFE, you get a chance to make a big difference for a customer....
2018-01-08 (first published: 2018-01-02)
2,660 reads
Create a Whitelist for SQL Server - UPDATED!!!
A while back, I posted an article about creating a WhiteList for access to SQL Server. Since then I have...
2017-05-16
4,573 reads
Dear McAfee, Why are you destroying my buffer pool?
For the past few months, one my customers had been trying to diagnose an issue with SQL Server paging out...
2017-05-02
1,293 reads
Blogs
Resetting on the AI hype train
By Brian Kelley
There's a great article from MIT Technology Review about resetting on the hype of...
A New Word: Etherness
By Steve Jones
etherness – n. the wistful feeling of looking around a gathering of loved ones,...
Vibe Coding a Login Tracking System
By Steve Jones
A customer was asking about tracking logins and logouts in Redgate Monitor. We don’t...
Forums
The Microsoft SQL Year in Review
Comments posted to this topic are about the item The Microsoft SQL Year in...
T-SQL in SQL Server 2025: The || Operator
Comments posted to this topic are about the item T-SQL in SQL Server 2025:...
Your Value from a Conference
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Your Value from a Conference
Question of the Day
UNISTR Basics
What does this code return in SQL Server 2025+? (assume the database has an appropriate collation)
SELECT UNISTR('Hello 4E16754C') AS 'A Classic';
A: 
B: 
See possible answers