Data Science Sanity Checks
Phil Factor on three "sanity checks" that any data scientist must perform in order to prevent businesses from interpreting data analysis errors, or fraudulent activity, as real trends.
Loginless In Seattle
Identify orphaned Database Users and differentiate them from "Loginless" Database Users.
The Ten Commandments of SQL Server Monitoring
It is easy to get database monitoring wrong. There are several common-sense rules that can make all the difference between a monitoring system that works for you and helps to avoid database problems, and one that just creates a distraction. Adam Machanic spells out the rules, based on his considerable experience with database monitoring.
Indexed Views
This article will show you the importance of Indexed Views and how they can help performance.
Visualizations
A picture can express a thousand words. That's a phrase that many of us understand well, and one we embrace when we try to present large amounts of data in reports and dashboards. This week Steve Jones asks you what visualizations you use.
Job overran Custom Metric
This SQL Monitor custom metric tells you if a specific SQL Server Agent job that runs at the same time every day has overrun. The metric is useful when a job can have negative effects on other processes if it overruns.
SQL Server Simple and Forced Parameterization
I have heard about parameterization for SQL Server queries, but what is Forced and Simple Parameterization and which one should I use for my SQL Server database?
A Broken Data Model
After a recent trip, Steve Jones noted a problem somewhere with the way airlines are handling passenger data.
Community-driven free Azure tips eBook
We’re putting together a free eBook of 50 tips for Azure Storage, if you’ve got tips that you’d like to share we’d love to hear from you.
Blogs
AI Helps Me with My Sloppiness
By Steve Jones
I type fairly well. Well, I type fast, but I do wear out a...
Automatic Index Compaction
By ReviewMyDB
Index maintenance has always meant nightly jobs and a window you have to defend....
The Goldilocks problem – Materialized Views
I’m sure you’ve all heard the tale of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, but...
Forums
SQL Art, Part 4: Happy 4th of July — A British DBA's Guide to Celebrating a War We Don't Talk About
Comments posted to this topic are about the item SQL Art, Part 4: Happy...
How We Handled a Vendor Retry That Loaded Twice in Snowflake
Comments posted to this topic are about the item How We Handled a Vendor...
Cognitive Coverage
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Cognitive Coverage
Question of the Day
Getting the Average
I have this data in the dbo.Commission table in a SQL Server 2022 database.
salesperson commission Brian 12 Brian 16 Andy 7 Andy 14 Andy 21 Steve 20 Steve NULLAll the data is a varchar, and I decide to run this query to get the totals for each salesperson.
SELECT SalesPerson
, AVG(TRY_PARSE(Commission AS int)) AS TotalCommission
FROM commission
GROUP BY SalesPerson
GO
What average commission is calculated for Steve? See possible answers