Generating A Password in SQL Server with T-SQL from Random Characters
Dallas Snider explains how to use T-SQL to generate a random password that meets an organization's password requirements.
SQL Monitor Custom Metric: Plan Cache; Cache Pages Total
This metric collects the number of 8-kilobyte pages that make up the plan cache to help identify memory pressure or plan cache pollution. A sudden drop in values for this metric may indicate that the instance is under memory pressure and SQL Server had to reclaim part of the plan cache for other use.
DDL Auditing using the Default trace
This article explains how default trace can be used for auditing purposes when combined with PowerShell scripts
Time Slots - An Essential Extension to Calendar Tables
After answering many forum entries from developers asking for help with dealing with SQL that involved time intervals and ranges, Dwain dreamed of a generalized tool that sets up time slots of various sorts without the need to experiment; that could do the heavy lifting, so that developers could do aggregations and reports based on time intervals without the hard graft. Here is Dwain's dream made reality.
Complete Definitions
When we write scripts, we often assume many settings will be at some default value. When we generate scripts, that's not the case. Perhaps we should be sure that we always include the settings we expect.
How to FTP a Dynamically Named Flat File
Learn how you can dynamically name a file in SSIS and then send it using the FTP task.
MongoDB vs. Azure DocumentDB
There’s a new kid on the block in the NoSQL world – Azure DocumentDB. Released in preview back in August 2014 and going Generally Available this month, Azure DocumentDB is Microsoft’s initial foray into the increasingly competitive space of non-relational database management systems. Of course there is no better competitor in this space to measure up against than MongoDB. How close does DocumentDB stack up to MongoDB? Are they even close?
Finding Problem Code
This week Steve Jones has a poll on performance tuning code. Since many people aren't experts, the answers this week might help them learn where to focus their efforts.
The new Analytic functions in SQL Server 2012
SQL Server expert Wayne Sheffield looks into the new T-SQL analytic functions coming in SQL Server 2012.
Blogs
Advice I Like: Knots
By Steve Jones
Learn how to tie a bowline knot. Practice in the dark. With one hand....
Shifting Mindsets: Why FinOps is Essential for Cloud Efficiency
By HeyMo0sh
As a DevOps practitioner, I’ve always focused on performance, scalability, and automation. But as...
March 2026 SQL Server Security Updates
By Brian Kelley
On Patch Tuesday, in addition to OS and Office security patches, Microsoft also released...
Forums
Multiple Deployment Processes
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How to Use sqlpackage to Detect Schema Drift Between Azure SQL Databases
Comments posted to this topic are about the item How to Use sqlpackage to...
Upgrading Admin Queries
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Upgrading Admin Queries
Question of the Day
Upgrading Admin Queries
I have a query from a former DBA that we run on SQL Server 2025 to check on database metadata. This query references sys.sysaltfiles. I want to refactor this code to be more modern. Which DMV should I reference instead?
See possible answers