SQL Saturday #47 - Phoenix
Come learn about SQL Server in Phoenix on Feb 19, 2011. For free! Spread the word to anyone you know in the area.
Most Work is Mundane
Today we have a guest editorial from Andy Warren. Work can seem mundane and tedious at times, and today Andy asks you you remain engaged when the work isn't exciting.
Preventing usage of "SELECT *..."
Is there a way to not allow users to use SELECT * in their queries? New author AJ Raghuram has an interesting solution that can prevent this in code.
SQL Server Data Mining with Microsoft Office Excel
This article demonstrates using SQL Server's data mining capabilities with the Excel.
SQL University: SQL Server Security Architecture - 3rd Party, Some Options
Day 3 of Security Week at SQL University is now in session. You're implementing a third party solution and you...
OldSQL
Support for SQL Server 2005 expires in April. Should you care? Steve Jones thinks it might not be a big deal for many people.
February 2011 Version of SQL Server 2005 and 2008 Diagnostic Information Queries
Wow, it is already February 2011, so here are the February 2011 versions of the SQL Server 2005 Diagnostic Information...
From Zero to SSIS in 5 Days
Learn Integration Services from SSIS expert and MVP, Andy Leonard in March. This 5 day class will be held on Mar 21-25, 2011 in Farmville, Virginia.
SQL Azure - Creating backups and copies of your databases
As a DBA you always followed a practice to back up your database (or take a snapshot of your database) before making any changes so that you can revert to your old database state if something goes wrong. Also to setup a development or test environment you use a backup of your database and restore it in the respective environment. If you are moving to SQL Azure, what would you do in these cases as backup / restore and database snapshots are not supported as of now?
Calling SQL Server With A BlackBerry Phone
An interesting tutorial for linking SQL Server to a Blackberry device and viewing images.
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