When do Distribution Statistics Get Updated?
Statistics objects are important to us for allowing SQL to make good estimates of the row-counts involved in different parts...
2017-07-05
767 reads
Matthew McGiffen DBA
Row-count Estimates when there are no Statistics
I was discussing Cardinality Estimation with a colleague recently and the question came up, what cardinality does SQL Server use...
2019-04-26 (first published: 2017-06-28)
2,875 reads
Statistics and Cardinality Estimation
Cardinality
This is a term originally from Mathematics, generally defined as “The number of objects in a given set or grouping”....
2019-04-26 (first published: 2017-06-20)
5,799 reads
What’s an “Index” and how do they work?
What is an Index?
We often hear indexes explained using the analogy of an index in the back of a book....
2017-06-12
1,579 reads
SQL Puzzle 1: Magic Squares
This is the first in what I hope will be a semi-regular series of recreational puzzles where SQL can be...
2017-06-07
1,562 reads
Working with Data in Always Encrypted
In this post we’re going to create some encrypted columns in a table in a test database and look at...
2017-06-06
10,446 reads
Statistics Parser
In the last post we looked at using the STATISTICS IO and STATISTICS TIME commands to measure query performance.
If you’ve...
2019-04-26 (first published: 2017-05-31)
2,276 reads
Understanding Keys and Certificates with Always Encrypted
Always Encrypted on SQL 2016 is pretty easy to set up. There’s even a single wizard to guide you through...
2019-04-26 (first published: 2017-05-30)
8,428 reads
Tuning Parallelism on SQL Server
Parallelism and MAXDOP
There’s no doubt that parallelism in SQL is a great thing. It enables large queries to share the...
2017-05-26
5,288 reads
Measuring SQL Query Performance
When running workshops on the subject of SQL Query Performance the first question I always ask is how do we measure...
2019-04-26 (first published: 2017-05-24)
35,987 reads
Blogs
The Book of Redgate: Spread across the world
By Steve Jones
This was Redgate in 2010, spread across the globe. First the EU/US Here’s Asia...
Merry Christmas
By John
Today is Christmas and while I do not expect anybody to actual be reading...
Self-Hosting a Photo Server the Whole Family Can Use
By Bert Wagner
Until recently, my family's 90,000+ photos have been hidden away in the depths of...
Forums
Happy Holidays, Let's Do Nerdy Stuff
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Happy Holidays, Let's Do Nerdy...
UNISTR Escape
Comments posted to this topic are about the item UNISTR Escape
Celebrating Tomorrow
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Celebrating Tomorrow
Question of the Day
UNISTR Escape
In SQL Server 2025, I run this command:
SELECT UNISTR('*3041*308A*304C\3068 and good night', '*') as "A Classic";
What is returned? (assume the database has an appropriate collation)
A: 
B: 
C: 
See possible answers