Breaking Down Your Work
Self-assessment and self-examination can be important in many fields, especially technology in the age of AI.
SQL Art 2: St Patrick’s Day in SSMS (Shamrock + Pint + Pixel Text)
Last time we turned SQL Server into a Christmas tree. Every year around St Patrick's Day I find myself doing something I can't fully justify. This year that thing was using SQL Server's spatial viewer to draw a shamrock and a pint of Guinness. Hope you have a happy St Patrick's Day and a few […]
I’m Not Gonna Waste Time Debunking Crap on LinkedIn.
LinkedIn is full of absolute trash these days. Just flat out b****** garbage. (Oh yeah, that – this post should probably come with a language disclaimer, because this stuff makes me mad.)
How to Use sqlpackage to Detect Schema Drift Between Azure SQL Databases
This article explains how I use sqlpackage to detect schema drift and generate a delta script that shows exactly what’s different.
Multiple Deployment Processes
Many organizations haven't standardized the way they deploy code to databases, even when they do so for applications. Steve has a few thoughts on this today.
What’s New in SSMS 22
SSMS 22 has several new features. Is there a compilation list of the new features? How will these features help me as a SQL Server professional?
A Full Shutdown
Steve used to shut down systems to upgrade them, but lately he makes changes while they're running.
Going Native with Fabric Spark Pools: The Fabric Modern Data Platform
The next installment of the Fabric Modern Data Platform looks at Spark pools for executing code.
Getting Started with mssql-python for Data Developers
rogrammatic interaction with SQL Server or Azure SQL from a Python script is possible using a driver. A popular driver has been pyodbc that can be used standalone or with a SQLAlchemy wrapper. SQLAlchemy on its own is the Python SQL toolkit and Object Relational Mapper for developers. In the end of 2025 Microsoft released v1 of their own Python SQL driver called mssql-python. How do you get started using mssql-python for programmatic access to your SQL Server?
Designing Delta Tables with Liquid Clustering: Real-World Patterns for Data Engineers
Get a short introduction to Liquid Clustering in Databricks.
Blogs
How to Connect to SQL Server When Nothing Else Works – DAC
By gbargsley
It's 2 AM. Your phone is going off. Users can't connect to the application,...
Get a Range of Sequence Values: #SQLNewBlogger
By Steve Jones
I discovered a procedure recently that I wasn’t aware of: sp_sequence_get_range. This post looks...
The Agent Era: When “How do I…?” Replaces “Where do I click?”
By Arun Sirpal
After a year away getting to grips with AI and its application across the...
Forums
Are luxury packages in Andaman suitable for a honeymoon?
Yes, luxury packages in Andaman are highly popular among honeymooners due to their romantic...
Hiring: Financial SQL Systems Administrator
Fisher Phillips is looking for a Financial Systems Administrator to help support and improve our financial...
Job Opening for ERP Systems Administrator - Hybrid
Employee owned company, been around for over 50 years. Hybrid opportunity, looking folks in Pacific...
Question of the Day
Creating a JSON Document II
I want to create a JSON document that contains data from this table:
TeamID TeamNameCity YearEstablished 1 Cowboys Dallas 1960 2 Eagles Philadelphia 1933 3 Packers Green Bay 1919 4 Chiefs Kansas City 1960If I run this code, what document(s) is/are returned?
SELECT json_objectagg( n.city : n.TeamName) FROM dbo.NFLTeams;See possible answers