It Starts with Version Control
Steve Jones knows that good development practices require lots of skill and practice, but the basis for stability with your code is version control. He talks about some reasons why you might want to implement it.
Microsoft's Log Parser Utility: Swell ETL
For loading text, CSV or XML files into SQL Server, the Log Parser utility, with its amazing SQL engine, is likely to be the obvious choice. Although initially developed purely for converting IIS logs, the Log Parser can turn its hand to a range of formats including even event logs or the Windows registry.
SQL CLR Multi-Threaded File Copy
A CLR Procedure that performs multi-threaded fie copies without external command line tools.
Testing Skills
How can you measure someone's DBA skills? Steve Jones comments on a new technique that someone suggested to him.
SQL Server Index Properties in Management Studio
Understanding indexes and how they work can be complicated enough for a Jr. DBA, but throw in all the different options and properties and an index can soon be overwhelming. Brady Upton takes an introductory look at creating an index in SQL Server using SQL Server Management Studio. He explains what each index property is meant for and the various options presented.
Locking, Blocking and Deadlocking
Introduction into Locking, Blocking and Deadlocks in SQL Server, and why SQL Server uses these actions.
What Counts for a DBA: Deduction
Like Sherlock Holmes, a DBA needs the sound deductive reasoning to pinpoint the root cause of a crime, in amongst a thousand interesting but irrelevant details.
Who Inspires You?
Today we have a guest editorial from Chris Shaw. After the recent PASS Summit, Chris talks about the value of getting inspired by people he listens to talking about SQL Server.
SQL in the City Seminar Washington DC 2013 –Deployment Stairway
Join Red Gate for a free seminar on December 6 (the day before SQL Saturday Washington DC). Steve Jones and Grant Fritchey, SQL Server MVPs, will present best practices for SQL Server version control, continuous integration and deployment, in addition to showing Red Gate tools in action.
Windows Azure SQL Database (WASD) Primer
Are you a SQL Server DBA who is now being asked to migrate databases to Windows Azure SQL Database (WASD)? Are you a developer who is writing code for a cloud service that shall use SQL Database as the back-end? This blog post is based on issues encountered while supporting customers that were once in your shoes and the lessons learned in the process.
Blogs
A bespoke reporting solution doesn’t have to cost the earth
By ChrisJenkins
You could be tolerating limited reporting because there isn’t an off the shelf solution...
Presenting with Visual Studio Code
A while back I wrote a quick post on setting up key mappings in...
Advice I Like: In 100 Years
By Steve Jones
In 100 years a lot of what we take to be true now will...
Forums
AllocationType as ROW_OVERFLOW_DATA
Hello, I inherited a number of tables with like 20-30 column using nvarchar(256) in...
is it true we cant debug c# scripts in ssis anymore under vs
Hi, i'm running vs2022. I'm trying out a c# script that i'd like to...
Question of the Day
Missing the Jaro Winkler Distance
I upgraded a SQL Server 2019 instance to SQL Server 2025. I wanted to test the fuzzy string search functions. I run this code:
SELECT JARO_WINKLER_DISTANCE('tim', 'tom')
I get this error message:Msg 195, Level 15, State 10, Line 1 'JARO_WINKLER_DISTANCE' is not a recognized built-in function name.What is wrong? See possible answers