Capture CREATE, DROP, ALTER from the default SQL trace file
Tracks and stores changes to database objects by reading from the default SQL server trace file using ::fn_trace_gettable()
Expediency versus Best Practice!
Rumour has it that some grand old houses in the British Isles may be haunted. A SQL Server consultant spends a night in such a house musing over the use of T-SQL versus SSIS. The story is entirely fictitious and the article has been written pro bono and dedicated to the SQL Server community. For its interest, amusement and imagination.
Quintessential Or Elegant
This editorial addresses the need to write the most effective and efficient code for our solutions
Amazon's Aurora: A Distributed SQL Database Alternative For MySQL Applications
SQL-based distributed Cloud Relational databases aren't new, but Amazon's Aurora offers an alternative to SQL Azure, and, being MySQL-compatible, provides the obvious route to the cloud for hosted LAMP web applications.
Using a column name in a COUNT function
Putting a column name in a COUNT() function may not always give you what you are looking for.
How to get ETL Horribly Wrong
ETL ( Extract, transform, load) doesn't have to be like a spell on hell. To make a success of ETL systems, you need the freedom and ability to make graceful U-turns when you detect a mistake in architecture or configuration: to fix the root problem rather than to merely tackle the symptoms. Feodor lists the eight most common root causes of failure in ETL systems, and how to fix them.
Database ownership and TRUSTWORTHY
Database ownership is an old topic for SQL Server pro's. Check this simple lab to learn the risks your databases can be exposed to.
You Better Learn to Work at Scale
We are managing more and more systems and databases all the time. To Steve Jones, that means we must be able to work at scale.
Using T-SQL to Perform Z-Score Column Normalization in SQL Server
In data mining, we sometimes need to perform techniques such as Z-score normalization on numeric data type columns to prevent one column from skewing or dominating the models produced by the machine learning algorithms. Dallas Snider explains how to perform this in SQL Server with T-SQL code.
Why Developers Need to Understand Execution Plans
If you can examine and understand execution plans, you can achieve better understanding of the database system and you will write better database code. Grant Fritchey shows you how.
Blogs
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Car Update: August 2026
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Microsoft Fabric OneLake Shortcuts: When to Use Them and When Not To
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An architecture scenario Imagine separate Sales, Finance, Shared Data, and Executive Analytics workspaces. Sales...
Forums
Managing Incidents and Fighting Fires
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Backing Up a DMK
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Backing Up a DMK
The Quiet Part
Comments posted to this topic are about the item The Quiet Part
Question of the Day
Backing Up a DMK
In SQL Server 2025, I have a database with a Database Masker Key (DMK). I want to back up this key and keep a copy offline. When do I have to open this key before running the backup?
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