Azure SQL Database - Dynamic Data Masking
A number of security-related features are built into Azure SQL Database, including Transparent Data Encryption, Row-Level Security, and Azure SQL Database Auditing. Their availability reflects the consistent effort by Microsoft to provide functional parity between Azure SQL Database and SQL Server instances running in Azure virtual machines as well as in your on-premises environment. Another example of this trend is support for Dynamic Data Masking, covered in this article.
SQL Server Temporal Tables: How-To Recipes
Tables that return the value of the data in the table at a particular point of time have been with us since the first relational database, but have always required special queries and constraints, and can be tricky to get right. System-versioned Temporal Tables, new in SQL Server 2016, make such tables behave like any other. How do you create one, or modify an existing table? How can you get an In-Memory Optimized OLTP table to be Temporal? Alex Grinberg shows how.
Combining R and SQL Server to diagnose performance bottlenecks
Using clustering algorithms to analyse index usage data from SQL Server’s DMVs & simplify complex performance investigations.
The Rate of Change of Data
Phil Factor argues that the database should be the primary source not only of the current data values, but also of the volatility of the data, its rate of change. Surely, then, it makes sense for the database to control the caching strategy.
Generating Plots Automatically From PowerShell and SQL Server Using Gnuplot
When you are automating a number of tasks, or performing a batch of tests, you want a way of automating the production of your plots and graphs. Nothing beats a good graphical plot for giving the indications of how the process went. If you are using PowerShell and maybe also SQL Server, it pays to use a command-line plotting tool such as Gnuplot to do all the hard work. It turns out to be handy for a range of data jobs, turning PowerShell into a handy data science tool.
Using striped backups with SQL Clone
If you’re a Redgate SQL Backup customer, occasionally you’ll need to convert your SQL Backup (.sqb) files to the native SQL Server backup format (.bak), perhaps to perform native database restores on a server where SQL Backup isn’t installed. This produces a striped backup, because each thread used when making the backup will produce a separate file. Can we use a striped backup produced in this way, or indeed any striped backup, as the source for a SQL Clone image? Short answer: we can! Let’s see how that works.
Do I Need to Learn Linux and R and Python?
The SQL Server platform is growing, but Steve Jones notes that this might not really affect our jobs.
How to deploy a database plus static data using SQL Compare and SQL Data Compare
This article from Tony Davis describes how to the use the Redgate SQL Compare and SQL Data Compare GUIs to get the current version of a database schema, and its static data, into version control, and then automate database deployments from the version control system using SQL Compare's command line and PowerShell.
Blogs
Scaling PowerShell – Lessons from a Technical Interview
By gbargsley
Recently, I was in a technical interview where the topic of running PowerShell at...
Installing Old Versions of PowerShell Modules with Their Dependencies
By alevyinroc
I don’t recall where this came up (probably in SQLSlack), but I had a...
In Memory of Andrew Clarke, AKA Phil Factor
By Steve Jones
One of the parts of getting older that really sucks is I seem to...
Forums
how to get notification that my database has corssed 8gb
i have sqlexpress on rds, is there any way i can get notifacation that...
SQL Server, Heaps and Fragmentation
Comments posted to this topic are about the item SQL Server, Heaps and Fragmentation
Stairway to Azure SQL Hyperscale – Level 2: Page Server Architecture Explained
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Stairway to Azure SQL Hyperscale...
Question of the Day
SQL Server, Heaps and Fragmentation
A table without a clustered index (heap) will NOT suffer from fragmentation during frequent updates or deletes. True or False?
See possible answers