Specialists or Generalists: Who are best as Developers?
Should we have specialists or generalists working as developers in our companies? A guest editorial today from Mike Angelastro asks the question.
Mimicking Magnetic Tape in SQL
The sequential nature of early data storage devices such as punched card and magnetic tape once forced programmers to devise algorithms that made the best of sequential access. These ways of doing data-processing have become so entrenched that they are still used in modern relational database systems. There is now a better way, as Joe Celko explains.
Would You Rather Work for a Strong or Weak Manager?
Today we have a guest editorial from Andy Warren. Andy asks if you prefer to have a strong manager or weak one, and why.
Optimize a SQL Server Analysis Services Measure Group Partition for Performance
In this tip you will learn how to design aggregations for a partition and optimize it for performance.
Solution
Keep Data Forever
Today Steve Jones talks about some of the issues with keeping data around a long time and a new archival medium.
The OVER Clause enhancements in SQL Server code named “Denali”, CTP3
A look at how the OVER clause is changing in SQL 11, based on the CTP 3 released to the public.
XML Configuration files in SQL Server Integration Services
Package configuration files are a great way of providing the values of SSIS package properties so that packages can be used in a far more versatile way. They make the deployment of SSIS packages easier and can provide parameters that are based on the server configuration, or which change for each runtime. They're easy to understand, especially when explained by Rob Sheldon.
Filtered Indexes in SQL Server: Stairway to SQL Server Indexes Level 7
A filtered index eliminates unusable entries from the index, producing an index that is as beneficial as, but much smaller than, an unfiltered index. If a certain subset of a table's data is frequently requested, a filtered index can also be a covering index; resulting in a considerable reduction in IO.
Pop Tarts and Hurricanes
Today Steve Jones talks about the relation between hurricanes and poptarts, and why you should be working on your T-SQL skills.
Blogs
Overview of Claude AI Models: Which One to Choose?
By Arun Sirpal
For those entering the AI space whether professionally or personally I wanted to give...
Houston AI-Lytics 2026–Powerpoint Slides
By Steve Jones
Thanks to everyone for attending my session on running a Local LLM. If you...
The Book of Redgate: Do the Right Things
By Steve Jones
I do believe that Redgate has been very customer focused since it’s inception. I’ve...
Forums
SSIS package failing intermittently on last Excel Component
Good Afternoon, I have a Job which "fires" off an SSIS package (that is...
T-SQL in SQL Server 2025: JSON_ARRAYAGG
Comments posted to this topic are about the item T-SQL in SQL Server 2025:...
Spring Connections and Learning at PASS On Tour
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Spring Connections and Learning at...
Question of the Day
Multiple Sequence Values
How do I easily get the next 12 sequence values from a sequence object?
See possible answers