2021-12-25
238 reads
Database Weekly
One to many SQL Server books
Back in the late 90s, I had one large book on my desk with everything I needed – or thought I needed -- to know about SQL Server. It covered T-SQL, installation, backups, security, and more. Over the years, Microsoft has added components like SQL Server Integration Services and features like windowing functions and improved […]
2021-12-11
398 reads
PASS Data Community Summit 2021 Report
The 2021 virtual PASS Data Community Summit was held from November 8th through the 12th. PASS Summit has always been the biggest yearly conference for database professionals, and this year’s virtual conference had over 18,000 individuals registered! If you signed up for the event, you may now stream the sessions on-demand. This is an exclusive […]
2021-11-20
365 reads
Do presenting and writing really matter?
I’m sure you’ve heard the adage that people are more afraid of public speaking than they are of death. On the other hand, some folks can’t get enough public speaking and look forward to opportunities to get up in front of a group and talk. Writing is not so scary since it’s a solitary activity, […]
2021-10-30
217 reads
Maybe It Is DNS
It might be DNS is the problem more often in the future. Steve notes the attacks on this system are rising.
2021-10-23
143 reads
What Do You Want to Know Before Negotiating Salary?
It's almost time for Brent Ozar's annual salary survey. Steve reminds you that you can influence the questions, but more importantly, take the survey and provide data for all of us.
2021-10-02
335 reads
All the Tools in Your Toolbox
I recently began writing an article to compare the performance of several window functions to traditional query methods. I began with my favorite function, LAG, but soon found that there were so many other ways to write the query that the article never covered the additional window functions. The article was quite fun to write, […]
2021-09-18
220 reads
What to do with more free time
Many data professionals have begun working remotely over the past year and a half which translates to less time spent commuting. In my own case, I’ve been a remote worker for almost ten years, but before that I spent two hours on the road each day. This got me wondering what folks have done with […]
2021-08-28
274 reads
What Counts for a DBA: Skill
Practice makes perfect:” right? Well, not exactly. The reality of it all is that this saying is an untrustworthy aphorism. I discovered this in my “younger” days when I was a passionate tennis player, practicing and playing 20+ hours a week. No matter what my passion level was, without some serious coaching (and perhaps a […]
2021-08-14
298 reads
Deploying SQL Server Automatically
I've had to install SQL Server many times over the years. Often it has felt that most of these installs were one-offs, a dev server, a new QA instance, a production server for a brand new application. A few times I've had to recover from disaster, including restoring master, but often, I just installed SQL […]
2021-07-31
489 reads
Blogs
The SUM of Nothing: #SQLNewBlogger
By Steve Jones
I caught this interesting item over on Pinal Dave’s blog: Eleven Interview Questions that...
How to Move the SSMS Status Bar to the Top and Color-Code SQL Server Connections
By Hemantgiri
I use color-coded connections in SSMS to distinguish Production, Pre-Production, UAT, and Development. But...
Forums
Split Large Queries in Athena with a Simple Modulo Trick
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Split Large Queries in Athena...
Finding Trailing Spaces
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Finding Trailing Spaces
Question of the Day
Finding Trailing Spaces
I have some data in a SQL Server 2025 database. It looks like this for the dbo.Customer table:
CustomerID CustomerName PreferredName 1 Steve Steve 2 Andy Andy 3 Brian Brian 4 Allan Allan 5 Devin Devin 6 Steve Steve 7 Sally SallyI want to detect which names have a single trailing space. The CustomerName is a varchar() and the PreferredName is a CHAR(). Does this query detect the problem rows?
SELECT
CustomerID,
CustomerName,
PreferredName
FROM Customer
WHERE CustomerName <> RTRIM(CustomerName)
OR PreferredName <> RTRIM(PreferredName); See possible answers