Your Security Checkup
We often find security issues come from holes in the way we've set up systems. Steve asks if you perform security checkups on your systems.
2025-12-08
122 reads
Editorials
How Important Are Real Time Decisions?
There has been a push to build real time analytics and decision support systems. Steve discusses whether this is a good idea for many organizations.
2025-12-05
108 reads
SQL Server Licensing is Simple
Over the years I've had no shortage of licensing questions for SQL Server. At times it's felt a little crazy. Look at the licensing guide. Choose EE or SE and the number of cores. Then check if you're using VMs. Oh, and consider the cloud, and which cloud you're running a workload on. It's simple […]
2025-12-03
220 reads
Don't Let Corner Cases Drive Your Design
When we design a database or system, we often do so with corner cases in mind. We don't have to do this.
2025-12-01
108 reads
FinOps - the new name for performance tuning
This year I have been speaking with an increasing number of people about FinOps and what it means. Fundamentally, it is all about getting a handle on the cost for our technology spend. When we step back and look at the bigger picture it also has ramifications on corporate Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) programs […]
2025-11-29
131 reads
2025-11-28
60 reads
Done is Better than Good
Getting something done is important, but so is the quality level. Steve has a few thoughts today.
2025-11-26
95 reads
Is Data Modeling Common?
Today Steve tasks data modeling and wonders how many people still build and maintain models.
2025-11-24
118 reads
Personal Contact Is Vital
I'm writing this while in hiding at the PASS Data Community Summit that's taking place in Seattle this week. I just had a real surprise, finding out that DocumentDB is PostgreSQL under the covers and always has been. However, as much as I enjoy talking PostgreSQL, for the moment, I'll shut up about it. Instead, […]
2025-11-22
71 reads
2025-11-21
149 reads
Blogs
Learn Better: Pause to Review More
By Brian Kelley
If you want to learn better, pause more in your learning to intentionally review.
Azure SQL Managed Instance Next-Gen: Bring on the IOPS
By John
If you’ve used Azure SQL Managed Instance General Purpose, you know the drill: to...
SQL, MDX, DAX – the languages of data
By DataOnWheels
Ramblings of a retired data architect Let me start by saying that I have...
Forums
Two foreign keys to the same table. Can't cascade deletes.
Not sure if this is really a relational theory question but it seems about...
Connecting Power BI to SSAS and effective user not working
Hi everyone, Below is a consolidated summary of what we validated Architecture & data...
High Availability setup - has anyone seen this method?
Hi all, I recently moved to a new employer who have their HA setup...
Question of the Day
Encoding URLs
I have this data in a SQL Server 2025 table:
CREATE TABLE Response ( ResponseID INT NOT NULL CONSTRAINT ResponsePK PRIMARY KEY , ResponseVal VARBINARY(5000) ) GOIf I want to get a value from this table that I can add to a URL in a browser, which of these code items produces a result I can use? See possible answers