Virtual Chapter meeting, Mar 16, 12pm EST. Documentation is mostly overlooked and only comes up when a problem arises. What if you'd have a tool or method to generate documentation for all your database servers? In this session, Sander Stad will show you show how easy it is to use PowerShell to retrieve information from your servers. He'll detail what can be used to document your servers, how to retrieve the information and what should be documented. In the end you no longer have an excuse not to document your servers.

Sparse Columns in SQL Server : Impact on Time & Space

by Additional Articles

SQLPerformance.com

Performance

Erin Stellato (@erinstellato) looks into sparse columns in SQL Server – the changes to space requirements and the impact on the write portion of your workload.

A Sad Story about Upgrading to Windows 10

by Ben Kubicek

SQLServerCentral.com

Windows 10

This is a story about a guy that didn't do backups.

This Time

by Grant Fritchey

SQLServerCentral.com

Editorial

Finally, Grant is right about how the world of technology is changing.

Releasing Databases in VSTS with Redgate SQL CI and Octopus Deploy

by Additional Articles

SimpleTalk

Visual Studio Team Services

You can still do Database Lifecycle Management (DLM) workflows in the hosted version of Team foundation Server (TFS) in Visual Studio Team Services (VSTS) . If you are doing your database development in SSMS, you can use a mix of tools to set up the functionality in VSTS. Jason Crease demonstrates how to build and deploy a simple database into the test environment using SQL CI, SQL Source Control, Octopus Deploy, tSQLt, SQL Cop and SQL Release, all with the minimum of hassle and effort.

Open Source SQLPS

by Steve Jones

SQLServerCentral.com

Editorial

There is a request to open source SQLPS from Microsoft. Steve Jones comments.

Five Online Database Modelling Services

by Additional Articles

SimpleTalk

Database modelling

To design, or redesign, a database of any complexity, the Entity-Relationship modelling tool becomes essential. The specialized tools that have dominated the industry for a long while are expensive and are installed on a workstation. Now that browser technology has progressed so rapidly, the online database modelling tools have become viable and are starting to attract the attention of database designers. Are they good enough to use now? Robert Sheldon finds out.