Did you ever wonder how and why your indexes affect the performances of joins? Once you've read Fabiano Amorim's unforgettable explanation, you'll learn to love the MERGE operator, and plan your indexes so as to allow the Query Optimiser to use it.
Talk to the Experts
In a previous post, I discussed the exist() method as part of the XQuery for the Non-Expert...
The idea of a skunk works is to build a project that works under the radar, by a small and loosely organized group of people. Used to fuel innovation, this is an idea that you might apply to SQL Server BI projects.
Multi-subnet Failover Clusters
I want to take a closer look at one of the new features in SQL Server Denali. While...
When one considers the amount of time and effort that Unit Testing consumes for the Database Developer, is surprising how few good SQL Server Test frameworks are around. tSQLt , which is open source and free to use, is one of the frameworks that provide a simple way to populate a table with test data as part of the unit test, and check the results with what should be expected. Sebastian Meine and Dennis Lloyd, who created tSQLt, explain
If you truly desire to be an effective SQL Server Database Administrator then you absolutely must have a buddy.
SQL Server...
Would you want to be a data scientist? Are you one now? Steve Jones talks about this skill that we might appreciate in our daily work.
While the system procedure sp_MSforeachdb is neither documented nor officially supported, most SQL Server professionals have used it at one time or another. This is typically for ad hoc maintenance tasks, but many people (myself included) have used this type of looping activity in permanent routines. Sadly, I have discovered instances where, under heavy load and/or with a large number of databases, the procedure can actually skip multiple catalogs with no error or warning message. Since this situation is not easily reproducible, and since Microsoft typically has no interest in fixing unsupported objects, this may be happening in your environment right now
The new SQL University Logo
Welcome back students! We’re very excited to start up a new semester and SQLU is back and...
The growth of ETL processes and secondary systems for reporting, decision support and other analysis creates an issue. Steve Jones points out that we ought to be remembering that security needs to be applied to data, not just systems.
By Steve Jones
One of the things a customer asked recently about Redgate Data Modeler was how...
By Steve Jones
For a number of years, we’ve produced the State of the Database Landscape report,...
By Steve Jones
I coach volleyball and I do a lot of stat stuff on paper. I...
Hi all, I've just had to roll back my SSMS 22 version from 22.3.0,...
Hi! I've been banging my head against the wall for 2 days now trying...
Comments posted to this topic are about the item The Power of Data and...
In SQL Server 2025, there is a new function that returns the current date without the time. What is it?
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