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Featured Contents

Question of the Day

What Service Tier in Managed Instance

The Voice of the DBA

Daily Coping Tip

No plans day. Be kind to yourself so you can be kind to others

I also have a thread at SQLServerCentral dealing with coping mechanisms and resources. Feel free to participate.

For many of you out there working in a new way, I'm including a thought of the day on how to cope in this challenging time from The Action for Happiness Coping Calendar. My items will be on my blog, feel free to share yours.

Are You a Tech Company?

This editorial was originally published on 20 Sep 2016. It is being republished as Steve is on vacation.

Editor Update: Has this changed for any of you? Do you think your current employer is a tech company in any sense?

Are you a tech company? That's an interesting question. I'm sure some of you might not think so, working for a commercial organization that has some physical product you sell or some service you provide. You might not consider yourself a tech company. However, your organization might be, at least according to this essay at Medium.

I certainly think software has changed, and will continue to change the world. I think data becomes is an important part of our system, but in conjunction with software and the ease with which we can gather, process, extract, and analyze the information inside of our data. In order to do that, I do believe that we need ways to better build and deploy software, whether that's database software or application software.

To do that, can we be afraid of mistakes? I think not. The opening premise of the piece is looking at rapid delivery from two points of view. Can a system be secure if you change it multiple times a day? Or perhaps it can't be secure if you don't have the ability to change things. Either view could be true, and most of us lean one way or the other. My view is towards the latter, not because I want to release multiple times a day, but because if there are issues, bugs, or security holes, I need to be able to change my software that day. I can't wait for weeks or months.

That's one of the problems I've seen with quite a few systems in the past. The time to release a new version, to patch an issue, is far, far too long when potentially hundreds, or thousands, of malicious attackers could take advantage of a flaw this week. Or our company could lose customers because a feature is broken for long periods of time. While I don't think the cost of fixing mistakes is zero, I do think that the cost of not fixing issues is also more than zero. Certainly at times the cost of not fixing something might be much, much higher than our organization would tolerate.

Mistakes will happen. However, the point the essay makes is valid. We should learn from mistakes, and not try to avoid them, but continually push forward to improve our software. Above all, we need to find ways to engage our employees and get them to believe they can produce better software and are empowered to do so.

Steve Jones - SSC Editor

Join the debate, and respond to today's editorial on the forums

Featured Contents

Formatting T-SQL Scripts using ScriptDOM and PowerShell

Diligentdba 46159 from SQLServerCentral

Well-formatted scripts are always easier to maintain and enhance readability to high degree. Formatting standards are an important part of coding standards anywhere and if not, they need to be. If there are a large number of scripts this can add up to a significant amount of time needed to maintain them. It is also […]

Executing a TSQL batch multiple times using GO

Additional Articles from MSSQLTips.com

Learn how to execute the same batch of SQL Server commands X number of times using the GO command.

Flyway with SQLite for Those of a Nervous Disposition

Additional Articles from Redgate

Get started with running Flyway migrations on SQLite databases, using PowerShell.

From the SQL Server Central Blogs - T-SQL Tuesday #141–Finding a Balance

Steve Jones - SSC Editor from The Voice of the DBA

This is a great topic, and the host is a good friend, TJay Belt. We’ve met each other’s families and a lot of our conversations revolve around non-work stuff....

From the SQL Server Central Blogs - Thoughts on a work/life balance – Spend Wisely : T-SQL Tuesday #141

Kenneth.Fisher from SQLStudies

Wow, it’s TSQL Tuesday again! Tjay Belt (blog|twitter) is our host this month and he’d like us to talk about ... Continue reading

Question of the Day

Today's question (by Steve Jones - SSC Editor):
	What Service Tier in Managed Instance
I am connected to an Azure SQL Managed Instance database. I want to know the service tier, without having to log into the portal and click around. How can I get this from T-SQL?
Think you know the answer? Click here, and find out if you are right.

Yesterday's Question of the Day (by Steve Jones - SSC Editor)

Python Mapping

I have this code:

def square(i):
    return i * i

a = a = (1,2,3,4)

x = map(square,a)

print(list(x))

What is returned by this code?

Answer: [1, 4, 9, 16]

Explanation: The map function takes a function and an interable as the parameters. The function is applied to each value in the iterable. In this case, the resulting list is each value multiplied by itself. Ref: Python Map - https://docs.python.org/3/library/functions.html#map

Discuss this question and answer on the forums

Database Pros Who Need Your Help

Here's a few of the new posts today on the forums. To see more, visit the forums.

SQL Server 2016 - Administration

Suppress Backup Messages In Logs - I'm trying to get rid of all backup messages in my SQL logs and I was able to successfully suppress completed notifications by enabling trace flag 3266. However, I'm still dealing with "backup passed" and "backup skipped" entries which quickly clutters the log when performing log backups every 10 minutes on dozens of databases. The […]

SQL Server 2016 - Development and T-SQL

Gap in dates query - Hello All, I need your help in building this query. create table #memb (ID int, eff_dt date, term_dt date, prod varchar(5)); insert into #memb select 1111 , '01/01/2016' , '12/31/2016', 'AAA' union all select 1111, '01/01/2017', '12/31/2017', 'AAA' union all select 1111, '01/01/2018', '03/31/2021', 'AAA' union all select 1112, '01/01/2017', '12/31/2017', 'AAA' union all select […]

Development - SQL Server 2014

Incorrect Syntax near End - Hi if Month(@frDate) < 4 begin SET @ytdfrDate = (SELECT CONVERT(DATE, dateadd(y,-1,@frdate + '-04-01')) end Thanks

YTD Date calculation - Hi I have @frdate parameter. In below condition i want to Set date as '01/04' and subtract 1 year from @frdate if Month(@frDate) < 4 begin SET @ytdfrDate = "01/04/" + dateadd(y,-1,@frdate) end Thanks

YTD Sale - Hi I have below Stored Procedure . I want YTd column value also. If user enters @frDate = 01/01/2021 and @toDate = 31/01/2021 then YTD value should be from 01/04/2020 to 31/01/2021 If user enters @frDate = 01/12/2020 and @toDate = 31/12/2020 then YTD value should be from 01/04/2020 to 31/12/2020 Create PROCEDURE [dbo].[SpBpGroupWiseSalePurchase] @frDate […]

SQL 2012 - General

Function for converting hh:mm:ss time to decimal equivalent - I have a user defined function that just needs a little tweaking. The first block of code used in a query returns 7 decimal places and when I wrap the code in a function it only returns 2 decimal places. Any clue would help... Thanks! ,CONVERT(DECIMAL(10,2),LEFT([LOGIN TIME],2) ) + CONVERT(DECIMAL(10,2),SUBSTRING(CONVERT(VARCHAR(8),[LOGIN TIME]),4,2))/60 + CONVERT(DECIMAL(10,2),RIGHT([LOGIN TIME],2))/3600 AS […]

SQL Server 2012 - T-SQL

How to get the detailed record and summary value at the same time - there are LineNo, itemNo and qty fields in one table, I want to the accumulative qty (totalQty) for each item and want to the totalqty shown as below picture, I just know one way to get the the result , could you please help me how many ways to get the result, it seems that […]

SQL Server 2019 - Administration

Complete permissions script - Hi Everyone Is there a script that can output a FULL audit of my SQL instance. As in script out: Logins Server roles Server securables Database Users Database Roles Database securables I have bits and pieces of this but cannot find a complete solution. Any help is appreciated Thanks

Is that a reason DBA should Install SQL Server - Hello: I got a question from upper manager and he wanted to know why DBA should install SQL Server? Should Window Server Team install SQL Server? I tried to explain and clarify to him. Would you please give me a good reason why DBA should install SQL Server? Thank you in advance. Edwin

Returning Database Properties related to "Change Tracking" - The SSMS Database Properties screen has a page "Change Tracking". How can I get those properties via regular SQL? The normal way to return database properties is to use sys.databases or DATABASEPROPERTYEX, but I could not find those properties via either approach. The SQL instance is 2019 - Microsoft SQL Server 2019 (RTM-GDR) (KB4583458) - […]

SQL Server 2019 - Development

T-SQL Unique Index - classification of unique - advice needed - I have inherited a data warehouse with Type II SCD tables. Each row has an entity_identifier (not null), StartDate (not null), EndDate (nullable) and then the entity attributes. When an attribute changes, the EndDate is completed and a new record added with the new StartDate. So far - So good Each table also has a […]

SQL Server 2008 - General

Service Broker limit in SQL - As mentioned in the link below, https://www.codemag.com/article/0605061/SQL-Server-2005-Query-Notifications-Tell-.NET-2.0-Apps-When-Critical-Data-Changes For client-side applications, query notification users should not exceed ten concurrent users , in SQL Server 2005. What is the maximum number of concurrent users allowed while using query notification in SQL 2008 and above?

General Cloud Computing Questions

Questions about Cloud Computing - I am currently a second year Information Technology student and I aspire to be a Data Analyst or be a DBA and I have currently learned SQL through MySQL Workbench and have created personal projects and I was just wondering as it pertains to cloud computing (Azure SQL or AWS SQL) is it best I […]

SSRS 2012

SSRS 2012 Email Relay question - Hi All, I am trying to figure out if it is possible to send SSRS subscriptions via email directly through our office 365 environment, and I am having issues. I can't seem to find documentation of if this is possible in SSRS 2012 (I know they added it in 2016)., and what settings I need […]

Analysis Services

SSAS Referenced Dimension - Ahoi, i have been looking at the different relationship options the Multidimensional Model offers, because i only have the Regular and the M:N ones in actual use. The one that confuses me is the Referenced Dimension type. From my understand it allows connecting a Dimension and Facts by using an intermediate Dimension which has a […]

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