Designing for Teams
When we build software, or we put together a process, we need to consider how teams use it, not just individuals.
Parameter Sniffing on SQL Server 2025: A Walkthrough with Real Numbers
This article looks at how the parameter sniffing performance problem can be helped in SQL Server 2025 with PSPO.
Why SQL Server’s default trigger execution model is a security flaw – and what Microsoft should do about it
The situation raises a question I’ve been thinking for a while: why does SQL Server allow trigger code to inherit the privileges of whichever principal happens to fire it?
Absolute and Relative References
One of the challenges in digital systems involves how we reference other resources. Steve discusses whether absolute or relative references are better.
Get Along
Steve chats with a few developers and gets some insights into how they are coping with AI.
Moving Beyond the Reboot: Finding the Culprit Behind Memory Pressure
Diagnosing memory issues can be hard. This article shows how one administrator used custom tracking to determine whether SQL Server, SSAS, or SSRS was the issue.
Migrate SQL Server Databases to Different Active Directory Domain
We want to leverage Distributed Availability Groups to migrate our databases to a different Active Directory domain. How do we go about it?
Finely Tuned Models
A company trains a custom model on their own data for $40mm. Is this something that other companies might try at smaller scales?
Optimized Locking in SQL Server 2025: Fewer Locks, Less Blocking, and the Cases It Cannot Fix
Reproduce traditional row-lock accumulation and writer blocking, then see how SQL Server 2025 uses transaction ID locking and Lock After Qualification to improve concurrency—and where hints, isolation levels, and query shapes limit the benefit.
Database Animations: The Interview Question Everybody Gets Wrong
No no, I'm not just talking about the people answering the interview question. I'm talking about the people asking the question.
Blogs
Asking for Help Isn’t a Weakness
By Brian Kelley
During COVID, I attended training on software/enterprise architecture given by Mark Richards. One of...
The Proof of the Backup Is in the Pudding
For me, the objective is straightforward: have a backup strategy that is reliable, understandable,...
T-SQL Tuesday #204 – Are blogs still relevant?
By DesertDBA
Note: This post is the invitation for T-SQL Tuesday #204 on November 3rd, 2026....
Forums
SQL Server Vector Support II
Comments posted to this topic are about the item SQL Server Vector Support II
Great Things
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Great Things
Troubleshooting Slow Queries That Already Have an Index
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Troubleshooting Slow Queries That Already...
Question of the Day
SQL Server Vector Support II
With regard to SQL Server 2025's Vector support, what is an embedding?
See possible answers