24 (Hours of SQL Training Delivered to Your Computer)
The Spring 24Hours of PASS: Celebrating Women in Technology will be broadcast live on the intertubez on March 15 and 16...
How to Communicate Between SSBS Applications Across Instances
Arshad Ali demonstrates how to verify the SQL Server Service Broker (SSBS) configuration when both the Initiator and Target are in different SQL Server instances, how to communicate between them and how to monitor the conversation.
Getting Up To Speed on SQL Server Denali
Now that the Denali CTP has been out for several months, Brad asks how you're planning on getting up to speed on the latest version of SQL Server
TSQL Challenge 50 - Extracting a specifical range from random data wit
The purpose of this challenge is to test your query writing skills with a limited set of TSQL keywords.
What's Your Code Quality?
Today we have an editorial reprinted from Jan 3, 2006 as Steve is on vacation. What's the quality of your code? Do you measure it? And does it matter?
Understanding SQL Server 2008 R2 Fixed Database Level Roles
To easily manage the permissions in SQL Server databases, Microsoft has provided several roles in SQL Server which are security principals that group other principals.
Deleting Large Number of Records
Often someone will try to perform a delete on a large number of records and run into a number of problems. Slow performance, log growth, and more. Lynn Pettis shows us how to better handle this situation in SQL Server 2000 and SQL Server 2005
Column-Level Encryption in SQL Server
Beginning with SQL Server 2005, column-level encryption and decryption capabilities were made available within the database, providing a solution for situations where one-off types of data need to be secured beyond your existing authorization, authentication or firewall settings. This article provides an overview and example of securing a column using native SQL Server cryptography functions.
Corporate Culture
One of the things I enjoy about work is seeing the various cultures that evolve. Some companies are rigid, some...
Blogs
Narrow Task Decomposition in AI Pipeline Agents
A nightly load into sales_fact fails. Ask an orchestrating agent to break down the...
Car Update: August 2026
By Steve Jones
It’s been some time since I provided a car update, so I decided to...
Microsoft Fabric OneLake Shortcuts: When to Use Them and When Not To
By James Serra
An architecture scenario Imagine separate Sales, Finance, Shared Data, and Executive Analytics workspaces. Sales...
Forums
Managing Incidents and Fighting Fires
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Managing Incidents and Fighting Fires
Backing Up a DMK
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Backing Up a DMK
The Quiet Part
Comments posted to this topic are about the item The Quiet Part
Question of the Day
Backing Up a DMK
In SQL Server 2025, I have a database with a Database Masker Key (DMK). I want to back up this key and keep a copy offline. When do I have to open this key before running the backup?
See possible answers