The Desktop
Steve Jones talks about laptops and desktop machines, and the potential issues that IT professionals have with one or the other.
Using DAX to retrieve tabular data
Data Analysis Expressions (DAX), originally the formula language for PowerPivot workbooks, can also be used within the MDX query window of SSMS to directly access data from a tabular SSAS database, an in-memory database that uses the xVelocity analytics engine and compression. Robert Sheldon shows how easy it is to retrieve data from a tabular database.
Sending E-Mail from SQL 2008 Express
This article provides a comprehensive solution to sending email from SQL Express 2008 and Express 2008 R2.
The Vacation Struggle
It can be hard to take all your time off each year and Steve Jones is in that situation right now. However he reminds us that life is more important than work.
Security for SQL Server User Defined Data Types
I have a group of developers that I support and they are reporting they cannot see columns within their tables. I have granted them db_datareader permissions which is a standard at my company for QA environments. Why can't they see their column definitions? Check out this tip to learn more.
Dynamically Truncate a Partitioned Table
Wouldn't be great if you could truncate any partition of a partitioned table with one T-SQL statement? This article shows you how.
SQL Server: How Important Are Index Statistics
In this article Greg Larsen will show you how to identify when your index statistics were updated last, what method was used to gather statistics, and how to update your statistics.
An Automated Process to Archive Big Tables
Many databases have large tables with hundreds of millions of rows. However, many of these tables are simply keeping a log or history data that can be archived and kept outside the user database in a special archive database.
Programming
Programming is an important skill, perhaps extremely important for the future. Steve Jones thinks that's true.
Blogs
Agentic Architect – Future IT Roles (comparison)
By Vinay Thakur
These days everything is changing to AI World, IT roles are getting changed and...
PlanTrace: Stop Reading Redshift EXPLAIN Plans. Start Seeing Them
PlanTrace: Stop Reading Redshift EXPLAIN Plans. Start Seeing Them Introducing PlanTrace — a free, browser-based...
A Cloud Dependency Failure from Amazon
By Steve Jones
I went to sleep while reading a Kindle book on my phone. I know...
Forums
SPAM Issues May 2026
We suffered a SPAM attack from May 1-6, which unfortunately corresponded with time off...
SQL Password enforcing
Hi to all We have situation at a client where someone is illegally changing...
SQL Password enforcing
Hi to all We have situation at a client where someone is illegally changing...
Question of the Day
Creating a JSON Document III
I have this data in a table called dbo.NFLTeams
TeamID TeamName City YearEstablished ------ -------- ---- --------------- 1 Cowboys Dallas 1960 2 Eagles Philadelphia 1933 3 Packers Green Bay 1919 4 Chiefs Kansas City 1960 5 49ers San Francisco 1946 6 Broncos Denver 1960 7 Seahawks Seattle 1976 8 Patriots New England 1960If I run this code, how many rows are returned?
SELECT TOP 2
json_objectagg('Team' : TeamName)
FROM dbo.NFLTeams;
See possible answers