The Complete Weekly Roundup of SQL Server News

Hand-picked content to sharpen your professional edge

Security is important for our software, mostly to protect the data in systems, but also for other reasons. This week I noticed a few items that were worrisome for me, though not unexpected. At this point, I assume most systems have vulnerabilities and that it's just a matter of time before they're compromised. I've gotten to the point where I just create a new password for every system and assume that a breach will occur at some point. I mostly depend on haveibeenpwned to let me know I need to check an application since I don't have a better system. Certainly I can't hope that companies will let me know they've lost data.

This week a few items concerned me. The first was a vulnerability discovered in Amazon Key. I'm sure Amazon hires good developers and has lots of evaluation for their software to avoid security issues. My guess is they do a better job than most of us because they can afford to have people try to break into systems. The problem comes when we have developers that creatively solve issues and mostly worry about the happy path for their application. Most of us that build software to solve a problem aren't anywhere near devious enough to understand how someone might attack our hardware. While I won't use Amazon Key, plenty of others will and every breach is a blight on all of us as software developers.

Perhaps more disconcerting to me is a potential issue in Boeing planes. I fly a fair amount, and the idea that someone could successfully get into a plane's network is very worriesome. I'm sure Boeing is worried (and Airbus, etc) about this. I bet they spend a lot of time not only writing and testing software, but having other companies and governments go through their efforts. Certainly there's a large effort here if a one line change really costs them $1mm. However, I'm sure there are still some vulnerable sections of software. How could there not be? Despite what Boeing says, I'd prefer their software was open, or at least available, to security researchers.

There is a rush to get software into production. DevOps helps us do that at a more rapid pace, which I like. However, what I don't like is that many companies don't increase their effort in their process (DevOps or otherwise) to improve security. They aren't finding ways to increase the stress on their systems, add additional checks, incorporate feedback to correct previously released issues. Some do, but most don't. What's worse, most aren't maing security (Rugged DevOps), a part of their development process.

Bruce Schneier has called for regulation of IoT devices. Most people resist any sort of regulatory approach, but I'm not sure this is a bad idea. Not specifics, but perhaps some good guidelines will help. GDPR in the EU takes effect next year, and this is the first legislation with real penalties that might force the average company to start to take security more seriously. I'm sure plenty of solicitors and lawyers are looking for ways to argue against penalties, but since so many of the data breaches are simple items that should never have occurred, I'm hoping some harsh penalties will get organizational management to not only press for features to get done, but require secure coding and strong infrastructure controls to be implemented.

None of this helps against phishing, which is on the rise. As we better secure systems, I expect phishing to increase in size, scale, scope, and complexity. I think some of the efforts to lock down websites, block traffic, and require better security for email and website traffic will help. They make life difficult for many small companies, but I would hope that we find ways to ease the ways in which companies can build a system to reach users in a secure fashion. We are becoming too dependent on our systems to not make more effort to secure them. Hopefully the management in our organizations will start to believe this at some point.

Steve Jones from SQLServerCentral.com

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

All the headlines and interesting SQL Server information that we've collected over the past week, and sometimes even a few repeats if we think they fit. These headlines are gathered throughout the week and are posted in real time at the website. Check there for information throughout the week or enjoy this weekly summary of the SQL Server world.

XML

JSON parsing 10x faster than XML parsing - Usually, when people talk about the performance of JSON in SQL Server, they are starting with “JSON is not actually a native type, it is just a plain text” and imply that it is probably too slow. It is true that JSON is stored as NVARCHAR and that there ......(more)

Webinars

Extending DevOps practices to SQL Server databases with ReadyRoll and VSTS - Microsoft MVP Steve Jones, and Redgate’s Tom Austin, will show you how Redgate’s Database DevOps solution works to improve your database development and deployment processes. In this demo heavy session you’ll see how Redgate’s SQL Toolbelt allows you to take a local development database, source control it, set up automated builds and automate deployments to an Azure SQL database in less than an hour using VSTS. There will also be plenty of time to ask Steve and Tom questions. ...(more)

Data protection & privacy in the world of database DevOps - Microsoft MVP and PASS President Grant Fritchey dispels the myth that database DevOps and compliance can't go hand in hand. After a brief look at how extending DevOps to the database lays solid foundations for data governance and compliance, Grant will introduce our guest speaker, James Boother, Sales and Marketing Director at Coeo....(more)

How to manage and monitor large SQL Server estates - Managing a couple of SQL Servers is a whole different ball game compared to managing 10’s or 100’s of servers. With so much available data to take in, this webinar will guide you through what’s important and what’s noise....(more)

Vendors/3rd Party Products

SQL Prompt Hidden Gem: Auto-fill the GROUP BY clause - Once you install SQL Prompt, you become aware immediately of how it enhances the native IntelliSense features of SSMS, but this can blind you to a lot of other features, hidden in various parts of the tool. In this post I share another gem of a feature that I found myself using frequently once I realize it existed! ...(more)

Generating test data in JSON files using SQL Data Generator - SQL Data Generator is adept at filling SQL Server databases with ‘spoof’ data, for use during development and testing activities. However, what if instead of a SQL Server database full of fake data, you need a JSON file?...(more)

How to deploy changes to Azure SQL Database using SQL Compare and Azure Active Directory - This quick tip shows how to connect to Azure SQL Database instances from SQL Compare, using its built-in Active Directory authentication mode, giving you an easier and more secure way to, for example, deploy schema changes from version control to an Azure SQL Database....(more)

T-SQL

The Power of Three and the Wooden Computer - The mystery of one of the almost-forgotten pioneers of the computer starts Phil Factor on a quest to explore and simulate in SQL the arithmetic operations of the lost wooden computer of Thomas Fowler. It is a homage to a little-known genius and an illustration of some curious SQL techniques....(more)

Summarizing Data Using the GROUPING SETS Operator - Maybe you have felt overwhelmed when you’re analyzing a dataset because of its size. The best way to handle this situation is by summarizing the data to get a quick review. In T-SQL, you summarize data by using the GROUP BY clause within an aggregate ......(more)

SQL Smackdown!!! Cursors VS Loops - Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the main event of the evening. The SQL Undercover Smackdown Heavy Weight Championship of the World! In the red corner, we hate him, we loath him, I’ve even heard people say he should be deprecated, it’s the Cursor!!! ......(more)

Variables in Dynamic SQL - I had someone ask me about this the other day. Specifically getting variable data out of a dynamic SQL statement. I should point out here that I really enjoy dynamic SQL. I find it fairly intuitive and always enjoy the challenge, so I’ve gotten pretty ......(more)

JSON parsing 10x faster than XML parsing - Usually, when people talk about the performance of JSON in SQL Server, they are starting with “JSON is not actually a native type, it is just a plain text” and imply that it is probably too slow. It is true that JSON is stored as NVARCHAR and that there ......(more)

Spaced-Out Strings - I came across this in a code review not long ago: Three things pop into my head when I see this sort of thing: That’s hard to read That’s a whole lot of parentheses Whoever wrote it is unfamiliar with the SQL standard about comparing strings It’s ......(more)

Tools

Building Custom Dashboard Widgets in SQL Operations Studio - Thanks to SQL Server Operations Studio, insights into your servers have never been easier to create. Here's a quick demo on how to create custom dashboard visuals. ...(more)

The Lighter Side

Tesla promises a new wicked-fast $200,000 Roadster - Tesla HAWTHORNE, CALIF.—At tonight's Tesla Semi event we got a lot more than a vague truck design. After a short presentation of the Semi's intended specs, one of the trucks backed onto the stage and a new red Roadster rolled out. "The foundation of ......(more)

Converting natural gas to hydrogen without any carbon emissions - Enlarge / Hard to believe that this stuff could cut carbon emissions. (credit: Department of Energy) The boom in natural gas production has been essential to the drop in carbon emissions in the US, as methane, the primary component of natural gas, releases ......(more)

The Dream Chaser spacecraft has completed a successful free flight - NASA On Saturday, the Dream Chaser space plane completed a milestone in its development. During an “approach and landing” test, the spacecraft was dropped from a helicopter to fly back to a landing strip at Edwards Air Force Base in California. The ......(more)

Testing Software

Write Your first Pester Test Today - I was in Glasgow this Friday enjoying the fantastic hospitality of the Glasgow SQL User Group @SQLGlasgow and presenting sessions with Andre Kamman, William Durkin and Chrissy LeMaire I presented “Green is Good Red is Bad – Turning your checklists into ......(more)

SQL Server on Linux

Top 5 Reasons Why I think SQL Server on Linux is Legit - Here are my top 5 reasons why I thing SQL Server on Linux is Legit! SQL Server on Linux is Fast – Earlier this year SQL Server on Linux posted the fasted 1TB TPC-H benchmark in the world and at the end of October posted the a 10TB result! Check out ......(more)

SQL Server News

Released: SQL Server 2017+ and Replication Management Packs (7.0.0.0) - We are happy to announce the final release of SQL Server 2017+ and Replication Management Packs! These MPs can be used to monitor SQL Server 2017 on both Windows and Linux and SQL Server 2017 Replication on Windows. Below, let’s look at some of the new ......(more)

Announcing SQL Operations Studio for preview - We are excited to announce that SQL Operations Studio is now available in preview. SQL Operations Studio is a free, light-weight tool for modern database development and operations for SQL Server on Windows, Linux and Docker, Azure SQL Database and Azure ......(more)

Spatial Data

JSON parsing is faster than Spatial equivalent - One of the most common assumption when people talk about JSON in SQL Server is that it is slow because it is placed in “plain text” and there is no native type. Instead of the assumption it is better to experiment and compare performance of JSON with ......(more)

Software Development

The wrong way of benchmarking the most efficient integer comparison function - On StackOverflow, there's a question about the most efficient way to compare two integers and produce a result suitable for a comparison function, where a negative value means that the first value is smaller than the second, a positive value means that ......(more)

Service Broker / SOA

SQL Server Service Broker – Security - This post is part of a series on this blog that will explore SQL Server Service Broker, a native messaging and queueing technology built into the SQL Server Database Engine. Previous posts: SQL Server Service Broker – Introduction SQL Server Service ......(more)

Security news and thoughts

Post-WannaCry, White House Clarifies Approach to Vulnerability Disclosure - The government is starting to open up around how it decides which security vulnerabilities to disclose. ...(more)

Oracle Issues Emergency Patch to Plug JoltandBleed Vulnerability - Patches plug five vulnerabilities plaguing Big Red's Tuxedo application server, including one offering remote server access. ...(more)

Amazon Key flaw makes entering your home undetected a possibility - Enlarge / It's watching. (credit: Amazon) Security research firm Rhino Security Labs found a vulnerability in the Amazon Key in-home delivery service's security procedures that could allow either the courier or even a savvy and malicious bystander to ......(more)

Defining a New Model for Cyber-Security Trust with Blockchain - At the SecTor security conference, an MIT futurist details an open-source effort that aims to restore trust and improve data privacy for cyber-security. ...(more)

Boeing 757 Hacked By DHS In Cybersecurity Test - DHS test proved that a Boeing 757 can be hacked remotely, but Boeing denies its planes are vulnerable to hacking. ...(more)

Google Study Finds Phishing Is Top Online Threat - Internet data breaches threaten the usernames and passwords of billions of people, but bad actors find phishing is the most effective way to hijack their victims' online identities, according to researchers at Google and the University of California-Berkeley. ...(more)

Microsoft and Adobe Patch More than 100 Bugs - On November's Patch Tuesday yesterday, Microsoft and Adobe pushed out a large number of bug fixes. They included updates to resolve serious security flaws in Microsoft Office, the Internet Explorer and Edge Web browsers, and Adobe's Acrobat, Reader, ......(more)

New Microsoft Word attacks infect PCs sans macros - Fancy Bear, the advanced hacking group researchers say is tied to the Russian government, is actively exploiting a newly revived technique that gives attackers a stealthy means of infecting computers using Microsoft Office ......(more)

USB Exploit Affects Nine Years of Intel Processors - A security firm says that a USB exploit can be used to run unsigned code on nearly all machines with Intel inside. ...(more)

R Language

The City of Chicago uses R to issue beach safety alerts - Among the many interesting talks I saw a the Domino Data Science Pop-Up in Chicago earlier this week was the presentation by Gene Lynes and Nick Lucius from the City of Chicago. The City of Chicago Tech Plan encourages smart communities and open government, ......(more)

SQL Saturday statistics – Web Scraping with R and SQL Server - I wanted to check a simple query: How many times has a particular topic been presented and from how many different presenters. Sounds interesting, tackling the problem should not be a problem, just that the end numbers may vary, since there will be some ......(more)

Product Upgrades and Releases

First Responder Kit Release: The Ides Of November - IB Rewop This is a cleanup release to get some of the pull requests in that didn’t make it in before the precon. There’s also a secret unlockable character that Brent is blogging about next week! Please clap. You can download the updated FirstResponderKit.zip ......(more)

Panoply’s Smart Data Warehouse Ready for General Use - The press release says that, “Benefitting more than 100 customers since its quiet launch earlier this year, Panoply shifts to general availability of the world’s only Smart Cloud Data Warehouse. Panoply CEO and Co-Founder Yaniv Leven details the announcement ......(more)

PowerPivot/PowerQuery/PowerBI

The Extension.Contents() M Function - Following on from my post last week about M functions that are only available in custom data extensions, here’s a quick explanation of one of those functions: Extension.Contents(). Basically, it allows you to access the contents of any file you include ......(more)

Working with images in Power BI - In this video, Patrick shows you how to work with images in Power BI. He isn't talking about adding a logo into your report. This looks at how you can integrate visuals in your visuals based on your data. The post Working with images in Power BI appeared ......(more)

Performance Tuning SQL Server

How does Query Store capture cross database queries? - When I was writing my post Capture the most expensive queries across your SQL Server using Query Store a question crossed my mind: Query Store is a configuration that is enabled per database, and the plans and stats for queries executed in that database ......(more)

In-Memory OLTP Indexes – Part 2: Performance Troubleshooting Guide. - Introduction In the previous blog post In-Memory OLTP Indexes – Part 1: Recommendations, we gave you an update on the latest features of In-Memory OLTP technology. We also summarized the key characteristics of memory-optimized indexes and shared some ......(more)

JSON vs CLR UDT – performance comparison - Ability to create custom user defined types in CLR and use them in SQL Server is introduced in SQL Server 2005. In SQL Server 2016 is added JSON support that might be alternative for storing complex objects. Since JSON is stored as NVARCHAR and CLR is ......(more)

Attempting to Force a ‘Narrow’ Plan on an Update with Query Store - When you force a plan with Query Store, you may not get what you expect. Here’s an example. My update statement has two plans recorded by Query Store I have an update statement for a user database table which is known as “Query 15” in Query Store. Query ......(more)

Finding Input Parameters in a Execution Plan - The query execution plan is a map of work which SQL Server is going to perform to execute a query. It provides a lot of useful information like operators, cost, estimated rows, actual rows, predicate details, parallelism, and much more information to ......(more)

Adaptive Query Processing and Automatic Tuning - Introduction - 1 - SQL Server 2017 and Azure SQL Database are being touted as the self learning, artificial intelligent database. One of the main reasons for the same is due to release of the following features 1) Adaptive Query Processing2) Automatic TuningAdaptive Query ......(more)

Microsoft News

Microsoft to integrate Visual Studio with AI services - Another piece of Microsoft's 'Open Mind Studio' falls into place: A new extension enabling developers to use AI services from inside Visual Studio. ...(more)

MDX/DAX

DAX Best Practices - As with any other language, you can write good DAX but you can also write bad DAX. Good DAX works fine, it is fast and reliable and can be updated easily. Bad DAX, on the other hand is… well, just bad. In this session, Marco Russo will show several DAX ......(more)

Internet of Things

Schneier: It's Time to Regulate IoT to Improve Cyber-Security - In a keynote address at the SecTor security conference, IBM Resilient Systems CTO Bruce Schneier makes a case for more regulatory oversight for software and the internet of things. ...(more)

Hardware News

MyDigitalSSD First To Retail Phison E8 NVMe SSD - MyDigitalSSD is the first with a retail Phison PS5008-E8 NVMe SSD. The controller powers the new SBX SSD that will soon replace the popular BPX. MyDigitalSSD chose Toshiba's new 3D BiCS FLASH technology to pair with the new PCIe 3.0 x2 controller. ...(more)

Intel Optane DIMMs Coming Second Half Of 2018 - Intel Optane DIMMs are finally coming, but we'll have to wait until the second half of 2018. Hopefully we'll hear more details in early 2018. ...(more)

Micron Demos 3D NAND-Based 11 TB U.2, 8 TB SATA Enterprise SSDs at SC17 - At the SC17 trade show, Micron is demonstrating several currently unavailable products for the enterprise market. Among other things, the company is showcasing its upcoming Micron 9200 ECO U.2 SSD with 11 TB capacity as well as an 8 TB drive that belongs ......(more)

HPE Unveils ProLiant DL385 Gen10: Dual Socket AMD EPYC - In a video on YouTube, which has since been hastily removed, Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) opened the can a little early on announcing a new dual socket AMD EPYC based system in a 2U form factor. As pointed out over at ServeTheHome, this is an important ......(more)

Lenovo Announces New ThinkStation P520/P520C and ThinkPad 52s: Up to 18 Core Xeon-W, Quadro Graphics - Today, Lenovo is announcing a new line of workstations under the ThinkStation P520 banner. Dubbed the ThinkStation P520 and ThinkStation P520C, the new workstations support Intel's new Xeon-W series processors from the quad-core Xeon W-2123, up to the ......(more)

Micron Announces 32GB DDR4 NVDIMM-N Modules - Micron is announcing today their next generation of NVDIMM-N modules combining DDR4 DRAM with NAND flash memory to support persistent memory usage models. The new 32GB modules double the capacity of Micron's previous NVDIMMs and boost the speed rating ......(more)

DevOps and Continuous Delivery (CI/CD)

Redgate data governance survey reveals database DevOps is the key to GDPR compliance - A major new data governance survey from Redgate demonstrates there are important GDPR compliance issues that need to be addressed – and that a DevOps approach to database development can provide the answers. A first glimpse into the results of the 2017 ......(more)

DevOps for Data Science – DevOps isn’t the Toolchain (But you still have to care about the tech) - In this series on DevOps for Data Science, I’m covering the Team Data Science Process, a definition of DevOps, and why Data Scientists need to think about DevOps. It’s interesting that most definitions of DevOps deal more with what it isn’t, than what ......(more)

You have your database in source control now what? - This post is for a specific type of person if you are: New to source control Are getting started on your path to the continuous delivery nirvana Have been able to get your database into some sort of source control system Have more than one person checking ......(more)

Database Design, Theory and Development

Postponing Our Use of In Memory OLTP - Devops, Agile and Continuous Delivery Sometimes I get asked about work and our software development practices. Often these questions use words like agile, devops, or continuous delivery as in “Are you agile?” or “Do you do continuous delivery?”. But ......(more)

Data Science

What is Data Science? - Data Science is a combination of scientific disciplines “…to build predictive models that explore data content patterns.” Data Science, formerly known as applied statistics, “…integrates methods from mathematical, statistical, computer science, signal ......(more)

Data Privacy

Microsoft Releases Preview of GDPR Compliance Dashboard - With the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation is set to go into effect in a little over six months, Microsoft's cloud customers can start evaluating their readiness now. ...(more)

Redgate data governance survey reveals database DevOps is the key to GDPR compliance - A major new data governance survey from Redgate demonstrates there are important GDPR compliance issues that need to be addressed – and that a DevOps approach to database development can provide the answers....(more)

Questions About the GDPR That You Were Too Shy to Ask - The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will affect organisations in countries around the world, not just those in Europe. The GDPR regulates how personal data is stored, moved, handled, and destroyed. Not following the regulation will lead to dire consequences for your organisation. As a data professional or developer, you may have many questions and might be wondering how it will affect the way you will do your job. William Brewer answers common questions about the GDPR that you were too shy to ask....(more)

So what is GDPR, and why should your customers care? - GDPR is introducing new rights at the same time that the threats to data are the biggest they’ve ever been. The more leaks and breaches there are, the more your customers will learn that GDPR grants them six specific rights, and the louder they’ll ask how you’re meeting those obligations....(more)

Data Mining/Data Analysis

Using Your Data Corpus to Further Digital Transformation - Every day we see freshly created data streams. From new mobile apps, to new connected appliances and automobiles, to new business applications capturing information from all corners of the ......(more)

Conferences and Events

Free Upcoming Webcasts: Query Store, R, AGs, Encryption, Security, and More - Here’s the lineup for the next free GroupBy online conference: Friday, December 1: 8:00 AM Eastern – Query Store and Query Optimization on SQL Server 2017 by Dean Savovi? 9:00 – Elegant T-SQL Solutions for Real World Problems by Matan Yungman 10:30 ......(more)

Training Day in London: Building Better SSIS Packages - I am delighted to announce that I’ll be delivering my full-day course, Building Better SSIS Packages, at the SQLBits conference in London on Thursday, February 22nd. This course is aimed at data professionals with experience in SQL Server and a general ......(more)

All Day Query Tuning Class at SQLSaturday Virginia - March 23rd, 2018, I’ll be teaching an all day class on Query Tuning Tools in Richmond Virginia. I hope to see you there. However, I have to warn you, there is very limited seating. If you want to take this class, I suggest you register for it as soon ......(more)

We’re Coming to London! Announcing Our SQL Bits Pre-Con. - Going to SQL Bits in London this year? Join me & Erik Darling on Wednesday at our all-day pre-con session, Expert Performance Tuning for SQL Server 2016 & 2017. Here’s the abstract: Your job is making SQL Server go faster, but you haven’t been to a performance ......(more)

Webinar: SQL Server Storage Testing and Validation - Wednesday, January 17, 2018, 12:00 PM Eastern Standard Time ...(more)

Computing in the Cloud (Azure, Google , AWS)

VSTS is now a Symbol Server - As far back as 2012, Visual Studio Team Services and Team Foundation Server users have been asking for a Symbol Server. Symbols are crucial to debugging Windows applications, esp. applications written in native languages like C and C++, because they ......(more)

Introducing the new CLI for VSTS - Today we are announcing a new cross-platform command line interface for Visual Studio Team Services (VSTS) and Team Foundation Server (TFS). This new CLI, currently in preview, lets you manage and work with pull requests, work items, builds, and more. ...(more)

Azure Functions: These are my new favorite squirrels. - [Note: I am actually Amazed that my old blog is still functioning, it certainly has been a long time] If you are new to the idea of Server-less Computing and Micro-services this is definitely worth some time to understand how these work and how they ......(more)

Running SQL Server in Kubernetes on Azure Container Services (AKS) II - I’ve previously blogged about running SQL Server in ACS but Microsoft has now released a new version still called Azure Container Services (AKS instead of ACS however) but now specifically tailored to building Kubernetes clusters. There are some differences ......(more)

Running any AzureRM powershell command tells you to "Run Login-AzureRmAccount to login." even though you are logged in! - Every AzureRM command I was running I would get an error message telling me to login, I then did a login, checked that I had the right subscription and I was still getting the error message - after logging in 7 times I figured that maybe there was something ......(more)

Career Growth

Google Job Search Results Now Include Salary Data or Estimates - In cases where employers don't include salary ranges with their job listings, Google Search will provide estimated salaries for similar job descriptions. ...(more)

#TSQL2sday: Brad McGehee Made a Difference in My Career. - For this month’s T-SQL Tuesday, Ewald asked who’s made a difference in our careers. When I first got started out in SQL Server, all I had was books and Books Online. Back then, neither of them were particularly well-indexed, nor were they up to date. Then ......(more)

T-SQL Tuesday: The Contributing Factor - Ewald Cress writes: Find a person or several people to pick on, and tell us a shareable story or two about how they have made a positive contribution in your life. I’ve known Ewald for 27 years, though we only met two years ago. It’s wonderful that he ......(more)

In a basement, a long, long time ago… #tsql2sday - It’s T-SQL Tuesday time and this is a good one. Read the invitation and proceed. Who Influenced Me? I’ve been working SQL Server for a long time. Since 1991, in fact, and had held 4 jobs as a DBA or developer by 1999. I was comfortable with the platform, ......(more)

T-SQL Tuesday #096: The Group Who Changed My Career Forever! - T-SQL Tuesday #96: Folks Who Have Made A Difference Today’s blog post is about T-SQL Tuesday. If you haven’t seen T-SQL Tuesday before its a great monthly call for all SQL Server bloggers to write about one topic that always changes from month to month. ......(more)

T-SQL Tuesday #096: Inspiration Abounds - Who Inspires You? Today is a bit of a divergence from the usual geekery that may abound on my blog. As prompted by Ewald Cress (blog | twitter), it is time to take a step back and put forth a bit of reflection. Ewald has requested we do this as a part ......(more)

TSQL Tuesday #96: Three People Who Made a Difference - It’s #tsql2sday today, and I’m hosting it this time around! My chosen subject is “Folks who have made a difference”, with the idea that we’ll take a moment to acknowledge people who have helped us become who we are. I have chosen three people who influenced ......(more)

TSQL2sDay – Folks Who Have Made a Difference - This months TSQL2sDay is an absolute brilliant one hosted by Ewald Cress the opportunity to give a shout-out to people (well-known or otherwise) who have made a meaningful contribution to your life in the world of data. Fabulous, fabulous idea Ewald, ......(more)

TSQL Tuesday #96: Folks Who Have Made a Difference - This month’s T-SQL Tuesday, hosted by ewald, touches on the people who have made a positive difference in our journeys in the SQL Server world. Please pardon if you’re reading this and feel left out – that’s not my intention. There are so many people ......(more)

#TSQL2SDAY 96 – Kalen Delaney’s Inspiration for Adventure - This post is part of TSQL Tuesday, a monthly blog party. You’re welcome to join in this party: if you’d like email notifications of future topics, here’s how to set them up. This month’s topic is “Folks Who Have Made a Difference”, by Ewald Cress. This ......(more)

TSQL Tuesday: Folks Who Have Made a Difference - T-SQL Tuesday is a monthly blog party for the SQL Server community. It is the brainchild of Adam Machanic (b|t) and this month’s edition is hosted by Ewald Cress (b|t), asking us to post about those who have made a difference our life in the world of ......(more)

Big Data

What is Big Data? - Big Data refers to extremely large data sets of varying types of data – structured, unstructured, and semi-structured – that can be collected, stored, and later analyzed to provide insights for organizations. Big Data’s promise depends on how the data ......(more)

Azure SQL Database

Azure SQL Database Alerting - It’s good to be proactive and one way is to setup alerts and it is no different when using Azure SQL Database. I like creating alerts for my Azure SQL Databases and I encourage you to do the same. I keep things simple and like to look at certain performance ......(more)

AI/Machine Learning/Cognitive Services

Machine Learning Services and Result Sets part 2 - In the last post, I pondered the use of WITH RESULT SETS along with sp_execute_external_script when we don't know the structure of the OutputDataSet until run time. Let's look at another example. Here I'll use the rvest package to scrape a web page: ......(more)

Machine Learning Services and Result Sets - When you run an R or Python script in-database via the sp_execute_external_script stored procedure, result sets returned by the stored procedure are output with unnamed columns by default. Here's an example using R and the [WideWorldImporters] database. ...(more)

Administration of SQL Server

Can I pause or resume an index rebuild operation? - One of the cool new features in SQL Server 2017 (and currently also in public preview in Azure SQL Database) is the option to pause and resume an online index rebuild operation. This option can be useful for several use cases. Imagine you have a very ......(more)

Geek Sync Recording: Taking Control of Your SQL Server Sprawl - Back in July, I gave a webcast for Idera’s Geek Sync. They’ve published the recording. You can find it here: Take Control of Your Organization’s SQL Server Sprawl It’s about an hour long and it focuses on automation, setting up sized templates for servers, ......(more)

SQL SERVER – Installation Error – Updating Permission Setting for File Failed - My client contacted me for a quick assistance in a setup trouble. She informed it’s a brand-new install and failing at the end. She was installing SQL Server 2016 on Windows Server 2016. Let us learn about how to fix Installation Error. Below was the ......(more)

SQL SERVER – Assembly ‘ISSERVER’ Was Not Found in the SQL Catalog of Database ‘SSISDB’ - Due to my connect with my many clients, learning never stops for me. Almost every day someone sends me email for quick 55 minute consultation. You can read more about it over here about how to fix error related to SQL Catalog. This time it was a business ......(more)

SQL SERVER – Msg 7399, Level 16 – The OLE DB Provider “ADsDSOObject” for Linked Server “AD” Reported an Error - One of my blog reader told that they are having trouble with linked server to AD. SQL SERVER – How to Query Active Directory Data Using ADSI / LDAP Linked Server. Let us learn about error related to OLE DB Provider. They said that they are trying to ......(more)

Login failed for 'NT AUTHORITY\ANONYMOUS LOGON' - the fix you probably haven't tried yet - If you're seeing this for the second time, my apologies. I wanted to update the title but had to delete the previous entry to do so, but the SSC CMS doesn't seem to have processed the delete yet. Just a quick one today. TL;DR: Remove yourself from some ......(more)

Do Not Pass GO! - What is the GO statement and why is it so important to use? When do I have to use it? When do I not use it? These are questions that have passed through my head from time to time while writing T-SQL within SQL Server. First What Is It and When Should ......(more)

How To Enlarge Your Columns With No Downtime - Let’s face it: column enlargement is a very sensitive topic. I get thousands of emails every month on this particular topic, although most of them end up in my spam folder. Go figure… The inconvenient truth is that enlarging a fixed size column is a ......(more)

Changing the Default DB for a Login–#SQLNewBlogger - Another post for me that is simple and hopefully serves as an example for people trying to get blogging as #SQLNewBloggers. Recently I got into a bit of a pickle. I was detaching some databases for a demo, which is something I do periodically to make ......(more)

Login failed for 'NTAUTHORITY\ANONYMOUS LOGON' - the fix you probably haven't tried yet - Just a quick one today. TL;DR: Remove yourself from some unnecessary AD groups. If you've ever received the message "login failed for 'nt authority\anonymous logon' while working with SQL you know how frustrating it can be. I'm going to throw a troubleshooting ......(more)

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T-SQL Tuesday #96 How did I get started? - Hi Folks, I’m the new guy that my two colleagues are still trying to convince to write my first blog post and as they like to put it I’m still scared or have stage fright. My name’s Chris and I’m the latest DBA to go undercover and investigate all ......(more)