Share the Interesting Work
Today we have a guest editorial from Andy Warren that looks at how we might divvy up our workload in a company.
How to Start Big Data with Apache Spark
It is worth getting familiar with Apache Spark because it a fast and general engine for large-scale data processing and you can use you existing SQL skills to get going with analysis of the type and volume of semi-structured data that would be awkward for a relational database. With an IDE such as Databricks you can very quickly get hands-on experience with an interesting technology.
How to resolve SSIS access denied error in SQL Server Management Studio
Receiving an access denied error message when trying to connect to a remote instance of SSIS from SSMS? Sadequl Hussain provides the solution.
Held Hostage by the Database
Does your database development process prevent changes in your software? You shouldn't be held hostage by your database.
Stairway to U-SQL Level 11: Stored Procedures
To finish off our look at the core database objects, we inspect how the venerable stored procedure works in U-SQL.
More Power BI to your Elbow
Power BI Desktop continues to evolve. There have been many improvements to the reporting side that together make it easier to get from the data to the visualisation as quickly as possible. You can now create line charts that let users drill down into hierarchical data. There are now ways of adding dynamic reference lines to a visualization that provide users with relevant reference points. Robert Sheldon demonstrates how to combine these features to great effect.
Exporting Data from JSON to CSV with SSIS
The following tutorial will show how to export JSON data to a CSV file using SSIS
Can I Use Statistics to Design Indexes?
"I’ve noticed that many indexes in my data warehouse aren’t used frequently. Is there a way to use the automatically generated statistics to make useful indexes?"
Kendra Little answers the question in episode 18 of Dear SQL DBA.
Blogs
Who Are You Doing It For?
By Brian Kelley
But as I've matured over the years, I came to realize that I needed...
Presenting Twice in May 2026
By alevyinroc
I will be presenting my latest session, Documenting Your Work for Worry-Free Vacations, in-person...
Finding the Next Sequence Value: #SQLNewBlogger
By Steve Jones
I saw a question asking about the next sequence value and decided to try...
Forums
DB Design Methods
I've read a few posts regarding what we use to design DB models and...
Auto Update Statistics not triggering on filtered indexes
I've got a table with 186,703,969 rows, about 300GB of data. There are several...
What is the difference between SQL Server and SQL Database?
I created a SQL Database in Azure Portal but I've just noticed it also...
Question of the Day
An Unusual Identity
What values are returned when I run this code?
CREATE TABLE dbo.IdentityTest2
(
id NUMERIC(10,0) IDENTITY(10,10) PRIMARY KEY,
somevalue VARCHAR(20)
)
GO
INSERT dbo.IdentityTest2
(
somevalue
)
VALUES
( 'Steve')
, ('Bill')
GO
SELECT top 10
id
FROM dbo.IdentityTest2 See possible answers