Staging Deployments

This week Steve Jones is asking if you stage your database changes ahead of application changes.

SQL Server 2016 Online ALTER COLUMN Operation

Learn about the time savings, blocking scenarios, limitations and more for the SQL Server 2016 online ALTER COLUMN operation.

Dealing with Supervision

Working with someone that micro-managers you or watches your every action can be hard. Steve Jones has a few thoughts.

SQL Server Cluster Automatic Memory Management

Don't waste memory in a cluster! Learn how to allocate memory between instances.

Byte Me: File Lost

Data Warehousing in the cloud – Azure Style

Learn about Azure SQL Data Warehouse and how to get started.

PowerShell Time Saver: Automatic Defaults

Because PowerShell needs to be usable as an immediate scripting language by IT professionals who type in commands at a console, there have to be language devices such as aliases that can make for terseness when appropriate. There are several ways of cutting down the verbiage in a script, and being able to specify default values via $PSDefaultParameterValues is one of the more generally useful ones. Michael Sorens explains how it can save you time in your daily work.

How do you go about making a big decision?

This article explores the author's way of making big decisions.

SQL Login Password Audit

Audit your SQL logins to find passwords that have never been changed or that are very weak.

Using DBCC CLONEDATABASE and Query Store for Testing

Erin Stellato demonstrates how to use the new DBCC CLONEDATABASE feature, in combination with Query Store, to test index and query changes.