Search Results

Search found 16060 results on 643 pages for 'tool tips'.

Page 63/643 | < Previous Page | 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70  | Next Page >

• SQLAuthority News – Social Media Series – Twitter and Myself

  - by pinaldave

  Pinal Dave on Twitter! Frequent readers of my blog might know that I am trying to get more involved in all social media sites, both professionally and personally.  Readers might also know that I have often struggled with finding the purpose of some social media sites – Twitter especially.  One of the great uses of social media is to stay connected and updated with followers.  Twitter’s 140 character limit means that Twitter is a great place to get quick updates from the world, but not a lot of deep information.  In fact, I have the feeling that Twitter’s form might actually limit its usefulness – especially for complex subjects like SQL Server. However, #sqlhelp has tag has for sure overcome that belief. You can instantly talk about SQL and get help with your SQL problems on twitter. I believe in keeping up with the changing times, and it didn’t feel right to give up on Twitter.  So I have determined a good way to use Twitter and set rules for myself.  The problem I was facing that if I followed everyone who interested me and let anyone follow me, I was completely overwhelmed by the amount of information Twitter could give me every day.  It didn’t seem like 140 characters should be able to take up so much of my time, but it took hours to sort through all the updates to find things that were of interest to me and to SQL Server. First, I was forced to unfollow anyone who made too many updates every day.  This was not an easy decision, but just for my own sake I had to limit the amount of information I could take in every day.  I still let anyone follow me who wants to, because I didn’t want to limit my readership, and I hope that they do not feel the way I did – that there are too many updates! Next, I made sure that the information I put on Twitter is useful and to the point.  I try to announce new blog posts on Twitter at least once a day, and I also try to find five posts from other people every day that are worth re-Tweeting.  This forces me to stay active in the community.  But it is not all business on Twitter.  It is also a place for me to post updates about my family and home life, for anyone who is interested. In simple words, I talk every thing and anything on twitter. If you’d like to follow me, my Twitter handle is www.twitter.com/pinaldave.  It is a good place to start if you’d like to keep updated with my blog and find out who I follow and who my influences are.  Twitter is perfect for getting little “tastes” of things you’re interested in.  If you are interested in my blog, SQL Server, or both, I hope that my Twitter updates will be interesting and helpful. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Social Media

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Index Created on View not Used Often – Observation of the View

  - by pinaldave

  I always enjoy writing about concepts on Views. Views are frequently used concepts, and so it’s not surprising that I have seen so many misconceptions about this subject. To clear such misconceptions, I have previously written the article SQL SERVER – The Limitations of the Views – Eleven and more…. I also wrote a follow up article wherein I demonstrated that without even creating index on the basic table, the query on the View will not use the View. You can read about this demonstration over here: SQL SERVER – Index Created on View not Used Often – Limitation of the View 12. I promised in that post that I would also write an article where I would demonstrate the condition where the Index will be used. I got many responses suggesting that I can do that with using NOEXPAND; I agree. I have already written about this in my original summary article. Here is a way for you to see how Index created on View can be utilized. We will do the following steps on this exercise: Create a Table Create a View Create Index On View Write SELECT with ORDER BY on View USE tempdb GO IF EXISTS (SELECT * FROM sys.views WHERE OBJECT_ID = OBJECT_ID(N'[dbo].[SampleView]')) DROP VIEW [dbo].[SampleView] GO IF EXISTS (SELECT * FROM sys.objects WHERE OBJECT_ID = OBJECT_ID(N'[dbo].[mySampleTable]') AND TYPE IN (N'U')) DROP TABLE [dbo].[mySampleTable] GO -- Create SampleTable CREATE TABLE mySampleTable (ID1 INT, ID2 INT, SomeData VARCHAR(100)) INSERT INTO mySampleTable (ID1,ID2,SomeData) SELECT TOP 100000 ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY o1.name), ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY o2.name), o2.name FROM sys.all_objects o1 CROSS JOIN sys.all_objects o2 GO -- Create View CREATE VIEW SampleView WITH SCHEMABINDING AS SELECT ID1,ID2,SomeData FROM dbo.mySampleTable GO -- Create Index on View CREATE UNIQUE CLUSTERED INDEX [IX_ViewSample] ON [dbo].[SampleView] ( ID2 ASC ) GO -- Select from view SELECT ID1,ID2,SomeData FROM SampleView ORDER BY ID2 GO When we check the execution plan for this , we find it clearly that the Index created on the View is utilized. ORDER BY clause uses the Index created on the View. I hope this makes the puzzle simpler on how the Index is used on the View. Again, I strongly recommend reading my earlier series about the limitations of the Views found here: SQL SERVER – The Limitations of the Views – Eleven and more…. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Optimization, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL View, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Challenge – Puzzle – Usage of FAST Hint

  - by pinaldave

  I was recently working with various SQL Server Hints. After working for a day on various hints, I realize that for one hint, I am not able to come up with good example. The hint is FAST. Let us look at the definition of the FAST hint from the Book On-Line. FAST number_rows Specifies that the query is optimized for fast retrieval of the first number_rows. This is a nonnegative integer. After the first number_rows are returned, the query continues execution and produces its full result set. Now the question is in what condition this hint can be useful. I have tried so many different combination, I have found this hint does not make much performance difference, infect I did not notice any change in time taken to load the resultset. I noticed that this hint does not change number of the page read to return result. Now when there is difference in performance is expected because if you read the what FAST hint does is that it only returns first few results FAST – which does not mean there will be difference in performance. I also understand that this hint gives the guidance/suggestions/hint to query optimizer that there are only 100 rows are in expected resultset. This tricking the optimizer to think there are only 100 rows and which (may) lead to render different execution plan than the one which it would have taken in normal case (without hint). Again, not necessarily, this will happen always. Now if you read above discussion, you will find that basic understanding of the hint is very clear to me but I still feel that I am missing something. Here are my questions: 1) In what condition this hint can be useful? What is the case, when someone want to see first few rows early because my experience suggests that when first few rows are rendered remaining rows are rendered as well. 2) Is there any way application can retrieve the fast fetched rows from SQL Server? 3) Do you use this hint in your application? Why? When? and How? Here are few examples I have attempted during the my experiment and found there is no difference in execution plan except its estimated number of rows are different leading optimizer think that the cost is less but in reality that is not the case. USE AdventureWorks GO SET STATISTICS IO ON SET STATISTICS TIME ON GO --------------------------------------------- -- Table Scan with Fast Hint SELECT * FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail GO SELECT * FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail OPTION (FAST 100) GO --------------------------------------------- -- Table Scan with Where on Index Key SELECT * FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail WHERE OrderQty = 14 GO SELECT * FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail WHERE OrderQty = 14 OPTION (FAST 100) GO --------------------------------------------- -- Table Scan with Where on Index Key SELECT * FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail WHERE SalesOrderDetailID < 1000 GO SELECT * FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail WHERE SalesOrderDetailID < 1000 OPTION (FAST 100) GO Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Puzzle, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQLAuthority News – Social Media Series – LinkedIn and Professional Profile

  - by pinaldave

  Pinal Dave on LinkedIn! It seems like a few year ago, there was a big “boom” in social media websites.  All of a sudden there were so many sites to choose from.  MySpace or Orkut?  Blogging websites for your business or a LinkedIn account?  The nature of the internet is to always be changing, but I believe that out of this huge growth of websites, a few have come to stay.  Facebook is obviously the leader in social media networking, especially for your personal life.  Blogging is great, but it can be more of a way to get your ideas out there, rather than a place for people to connect to you professionally.  If you want to have a professional “face” on the internet, LinkedIn is the way to go. LinkedIn is best explained as “professional Facebook.”  This is simplifying things a little bit too much, but it is certainly a website where you link up with professional contacts, so that others can see where you have worked, who you have worked with, and what projects you have done.  This is a much better place for professional contacts to find you than someplace like Facebook, where all they will see is your face and maybe picture of you at a birthday party or something like that! Because so much of my SQL Server life is conducted on the internet, especially on my blog, I felt that it would be a good idea to have a well-maintained LinkedIn web page as well, so that if anyone is curious about me and my credentials they can quickly and easily find me and see that I am for real, and not someone pretending to know a lot about SQL Server. My linked in profile is www.linkedin.com/in/pinaldave.  I keep all my professional information here, and I update it as often as possible.  Feel free to come find me, especially if you would like to “link up” and share professional information.  The technology world is becoming more and more interconnected, and more and more international.  I feel that it is very important to stay linked up virtually, because so many of us are so far apart physically. I try to keep very connected with my LinkedIn profile.  I let anyone connect with me, and I read updates from the professional world very often.  I keep this profile updated, but do not post things about my personal life or anything that I might put on Twitter, for example.  I also include my e-mail address here, if you would like to contact me professionally.  This is the best place for me to conduct business. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Social Media

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Weekend Project – Visiting Friend’s Company – Koenig Solutions

  - by pinaldave

  I have decided to do some interesting experiments every weekend and share it next week as a weekend project on the blog. Many times our business lives and personal lives are very separate, however this post will talk about one instance where my two lives connect. This weekend I visited my friend’s company. My friend owns Koenig, so of course I am very interested so see that they are doing well.  I have been very impressed this year, as they have expanded into multiple cities and are offering more and more classes about Business Intelligence, Project Management, networking, and much more. Koenig Solutions originally were a company that focused on training IT professionals – from topics like databases and even English language courses.  As the company grew more popular, Koenig began their blog to keep fans updated, and gradually have added more and more courses. I am very happy for my friend’s success, but as a technology enthusiast I am also pleased with Koenig Solutions’ success.  Whenever anyone in our field improves, the field as a whole does better.  Koenig offers high quality classes on a variety of topics at a variety of levels, so anyone can benefit from browsing this blog. I am a big fan of technology (obviously), and I feel blessed to have gotten in on the “ground floor,” even though there are some people out there who think technology has advanced as far as possible – I believe they will be proven wrong.  And that is why I think companies like Koenig Solutions are so important – they are providing training and support in a quickly growing field, and providing job skills in this tough economy. I believe this particular post really highlights how I, and Koenig, feel about the IT industry.  It is quickly expanding, and job opportunities are sure to abound – but how can the average person get started in this exciting field?  This post emphasizes that knowledge is power – know what interests you in the IT field, get an education, and continue your training even after you’ve gotten your foot in the door. Koenig Solutions provides what I feel is one of the most important services in the modern world – in person training.  They obviously offer many online courses, but you can also set up physical, face-to-face training through their website.  As I mentioned before, they offer a wide variety of classes that cater to nearly every IT skill you can think of.  If you have more specific needs, they also offer one of the best English language training courses.  English is turning into the language of technology, so these courses can ensure that you are keeping up the pace. Koenig Solutions and I agree about how important training can be, and even better – they provide some of the best training around.  We share ideals and I am very happy see the success of my friend. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Training, SQLAuthority Author Visit, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Developer Training

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Dedicated Access Control for SQL Server Express Edition – An error occurred while obtaining the dedicated administrator connection (DAC) port.

  - by pinaldave

  Recently I had faced very interesting situation. Due to some reason we were not able to login into the production server for one of client. The reason for the same was that server was very busy, we had to login into the system and bring server to normal situation. When all the attempts failed, I decided to login using Dedicated Administrator Connection (DAC). However when I attempted to connect using DAC it threw following error for me. C:\Users\pinald>sqlcmd -A -d master -S .\SQLEXPRESS Sqlcmd: Error: Microsoft SQL Server Native Client 11.0 : SQL Server Network Interfaces: An error occurred while obtaining the dedicated administrator connection (DAC) port. Make sure that SQL Browser is running, or check the error log for t he port number [xFFFFFFFF]. .Sqlcmd: Error: Microsoft SQL Server Native Client 11.0 : Login timeout expired.Sqlcmd: Error: Microsoft SQL Server Native Client 11.0 : A network-related or instance-specific error has occurred while establishing a connection to SQL Server. Server is not found or not accessible. Check if instance name is correct and if SQL Server is configured to allow remote connections. For more information see SQL Server Books Online. I was bit taken a back as I knew that my commands are correct to login and if DAC does not work, there should be some serious reason for it. When inquired further about the SQL Server version I learned that it was SQL Server Express version deployed. To conserve resources, SQL Server Express does not listen on the DAC port. There is an additional step to be done if SQL Server Express has to be used with DAC. Enable TRACEFLAG on SQL Server Express will enable the connection by DAC possible. Here is the quick methods how one can enable DAC on SQL Server Express. Go to Start >> All Program >>Microsoft SQL Server (your version) >> Configuration Tools >> SQL Server Configuration Manager. Click on SQL Server Services >> Select your SQL Server Express version >> Right Click Properties >> select Startup Parameters Once on the Startup Parameter add the Startup parameter which is TRACEFLAG -T7806. Click on OK and RESTART SQL Server Express edition. Now once again try to connect to SQL Server Express edition and it will work just fine. This is absolutely documented method on BOL and SQL Server Express needs to be restarted. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Error Messages, SQL Interview Questions and Answers, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology Tagged: SQL Server Express

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – ColumnStore Index – Batch Mode vs Row Mode

  - by pinaldave

  What do you do when you are in a hurry and hear someone say things which you do not agree or is wrong? Well, let me tell you what I do or what I recently did. I was walking by and heard someone mentioning “Columnstore Index are really great as they are using Batch Mode which makes them seriously fast.” While I was passing by and I heard this statement my first reaction was I thought Columnstore Index can use both – Batch Mode and Row Mode. I stopped by even though I was in a hurry and asked the person if he meant that Columnstore indexes are seriously fast because they use Batch Mode all the time or Batch Mode is one of the reasons for Columnstore Index to be faster. He responded that Columnstore Indexes can run only in Batch Mode. However, I do not like to confront anybody without hearing their complete story. Honestly, I like to do information sharing and avoid confronting as much as possible. There are always ways to communicate the same positively. Well, this is what I did, I quickly pull up my earlier article on Columnstore Index and copied the script to SQL Server Management Studio. I created two versions of the script. 1) Very Large Table 2) Reasonably Small Table. I a query which uses columnstore index on both of the versions. I found very interesting result of the my tests. I saved my tests and sent it to the person who mentioned about that Columnstore Indexes are using Batch Mode only. He immediately acknowledged that indeed he was incorrect in saying that Columnstore Index uses only Batch Mode. What really caught my attention is that he also thanked me for sending him detail email instead of just having argument where he and I both were standing in the corridor and neither have no way to prove any theory. Here is the screenshots of the both the scenarios. 1) Columnstore Index using Batch Mode 2) Columnstore Index using Row Mode Here is the logic behind when Columnstore Index uses Batch Mode and when it uses Row Mode. A batch typically represents about 1000 rows of data. Batch mode processing also uses algorithms that are optimized for the multicore CPUs and increased memory throughput.  Batch mode processing spreads metadata access costs and overhead over all the rows in a batch.  Batch mode processing operates on compressed data when possible leading superior performance. Here is one last point – Columnstore Index can use Batch Mode or Row Mode but Batch Mode processing is only available in Columnstore Index. I hope this statement truly sums up the whole concept. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Index, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – guest User and MSDB Database – Enable guest User on MSDB Database

  - by pinaldave

  I have written a few articles recently on the subject of guest account. Here’s a quick list of these articles: SQL SERVER – Disable Guest Account – Serious Security Issue SQL SERVER – Force Removing User from Database – Fix: Error: Could not drop login ‘test’ as the user is currently logged in. SQL SERVER – Detecting guest User Permissions – guest User Access Status One of the advices which I gave in all the three blog posts was: Disable the guest user in the user-created database. Additionally, I have mentioned that one should let the user account become enabled in MSDB database. I got many questions asking if there is any specific reason why this should be kept enabled, questions like, “What is the reason that MSDB database needs guest user?” Honestly, I did not know that the concept of the guest user will create so much interest in the readers. So now let’s turn this blog post into questions and answers format. Q: What will happen if the guest user is disabled in MSDB database? A:  Lots of bad things will happen. Error 916 - Logins can connect to this instance of SQL Server but they do not have specific permissions in a database to receive the permissions of the guest user. Q: How can I determine if the guest user is enabled or disabled for any specific database? A: There are many ways to do this. Make sure that you run each of these methods with the context of the database. For an example for msdb database, you can run the following code: USE msdb; SELECT name, permission_name, state_desc FROM sys.database_principals dp INNER JOIN sys.server_permissions sp ON dp.principal_id = sp.grantee_principal_id WHERE name = 'guest' AND permission_name = 'CONNECT' There are many other methods to detect the guest user status. Read them here: Detecting guest User Permissions – guest User Access Status Q: What is the default status of the guest user account in database? A: Enabled in master, TempDb, and MSDB. Disabled in model database. Q: Why is the default status of the guest user disabled in model database? A: It is not recommended to enable the guest in user database as it can introduce serious security threat. It can seriously damage the database if configured incorrectly. Read more here: Disable Guest Account – Serious Security Issue Q: How to disable guest user? A: REVOKE CONNECT FROM guest Q: How to enable guest user? A: GRANT CONNECT TO guest Did I miss any critical question in the list? Please leave your question as a comment and I will add it to this list. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Security, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQLAuthority News – Social Media Series – Facebook and Google+

  - by pinaldave

  Pinal on Facebook and Google+ Unless you have been living under a rock for the last few years, you know that Facebook is the first and last word in social networking.  Everyone has a Facebook account – from your local store to the 10-year old school child.  Because of this ability to be completely connected to everyone in your entire life, keeping a Facebook page for a professional business can be tricky. For the most part, I use Facebook strictly for personal matters.  I am friends only with friends I know in the “real” world (as opposed to my “virtual” online friends) and with family, of course.  I chat with friends on Facebook and upload personal photos to share with family who are far away.  I hope this doesn’t make readers from my professional life feel left out.  You can follow me on Facebook at www.facebook.com/SQLAuth, but you should know that Twitter is probably the better place to find updates about SQL Server and my blog (you can follow me on Twitter at www.twitter.com/pinaldave). There are definitely businesses who keep in touch with their clients using Facebook, but I felt the need to keep my personal and professional life separate.  That’s why I was so excited to find out Google was coming out with their own social media site, Google+.  On Google+ I post some personal things as well, and there is a lot of overlap between what I put on Facebook and what I put on Google+.  But since Google+ has become so popular amongst the “techie” crowd, I have found that it’s a good place to follow some of the stars of the Microsoft world, like Scott Hanselman and Buck Woody. If you are also a member of Google+, I am looking to expand my circle there.  You can find me at https://plus.google.com/104990425207662620918/posts.  Google+ is the newest face in the social media world, and it still hasn’t found a good footing between personal and professional yet.  That’s why I felt it would be a good idea to jump on the site early and help them determine which way to go.  Maybe someday it will be a place where business and personal can mix. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Social Media

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Validating Spatial Object as NULL using IsNULL

  - by pinaldave

  Follow up questions are the most fun part of writing a blog post. Earlier I wrote about SQL SERVER – Validating Spatial Object with IsValidDetailed Function and today I received a follow up question on the same subject. The question was mainly about how NULL is handled by spatial functions. Well, NULL is NULL. It is very easy to work with NULL. There are two different ways to validate if the passed in the value is NULL or not. 1) Using IsNULL Function IsNULL function validates if the object is null or not, if object is not null it will return you value 0 and if object is NULL it will return you the value NULL. DECLARE @p GEOMETRY = 'Polygon((2 2, 3 3, 4 4, 5 5, 6 6, 2 2))' SELECT @p.ISNULL ObjIsNull GO DECLARE @p GEOMETRY = NULL SELECT @p.ISNULL ObjIsNull GO 2) Using IsValidDetailed Function IsValidateDetails function validates if the object is valid or not. If the object is valid it will return 24400: Valid but if the object is not valid it will give message with the error number. In case object is NULL it will return the value as NULL. DECLARE @p GEOMETRY = 'Polygon((2 2, 3 3, 4 4, 5 5, 6 6, 2 2))' SELECT @p.IsValidDetailed() IsValid GO DECLARE @p GEOMETRY = NULL SELECT @p.IsValidDetailed() IsValid GO When to use what? Now you can see that there are two different ways to validate the NULL values. I personally have no preference about using one over another. However, there is one clear difference between them. In case of the IsValidDetailed Function the return value is nvarchar(max) and it is not always possible to compare the value with nvarchar(max). Whereas the ISNULL function returns the bit value of 0 when the object is null and it is easy to determine if the object is null or not in the case of ISNULL function. Additionally, ISNULL function does not check if the object is valid or not and will return the value 0 if the object is not NULL. Now you know even though either of the function can be used in place of each other both have very specific use case. Use the one which fits your business case. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Function, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Spatial Database, SQL Spatial

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Log File Growing for Model Database – model Database Log File Grew Too Big

  - by pinaldave

  After reading my earlier article SQL SERVER – master Database Log File Grew Too Big, I received an email recently from another reader asking why does the log file of model database grow every day when he is not carrying out any operation in the model database. As per the email, he is absolutely sure that he is doing nothing on his model database; he had used policy management to catch any T-SQL operation in the model database and there were none. This was indeed surprising to me. I sent a request to access to his server, which he happily agreed for and within a min, we figured out the issue. He was taking the backup of the model database every day taking the database backup every night. When I explained the same to him, he did not believe it; so I quickly wrote down the following script. The results before and after the usage of the script were very clear. What is a model database? The model database is used as the template for all databases created on an instance of SQL Server. Any object you create in the model database will be automatically created in subsequent user database created on the server. NOTE: Do not run this in production environment. During the demo, the model database was in full recovery mode and only full backup operation was performed (no log backup). Before Backup Script Backup Script in loop DECLARE @FLAG INT SET @FLAG = 1 WHILE(@FLAG < 1000) BEGIN BACKUP DATABASE [model] TO  DISK = N'D:\model.bak' SET @FLAG = @FLAG + 1 END GO After Backup Script Why did this happen? The model database was in full recovery mode and taking full backup is logged operation. As there was no log backup and only full backup was performed on the model database, the size of the log file kept growing. Resolution: Change the backup mode of model database from “Full Recovery” to “Simple Recovery.”. Take full backup of the model database “only” when you change something in the model database. Let me know if you have encountered a situation like this? If so, how did you resolve it? It will be interesting to know about your experience. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Backup and Restore, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQLAuthority News – Social Media Series – YouTube and Movies

  - by pinaldave

  Pinal Dave on Youtube! Some people might not know it, but YouTube is actually more than a place to watch funny cat videos and people singing their favorite pop songs – it’s actually a social media site.  When you are a member of YouTube you can follow people who regularly post videos, post video responses of your own, and even gain a following for your own videos.  I myself was not aware of YouTube’s potential until recently, when I started to make SQL Server in Sixty Seconds videos. YouTube is very different than other types of social media, and a big factor is that anyone can look at videos without being a member.  Unlike other social media sites, like Twitter and Facebook, you have to have an account in order to participate.  But on YouTube you are even more anonymous.  To make and post videos you need an account, but anyone who comes to the site can look at what you’ve made without signing in or leaving any trace of having seen your material.  This makes YouTube very anonymous and hard to track. However, we should not overlook the power of video on the internet.  Over the past few months I have been making SQL Server in Sixty Second videos and have come to love it.  It is very exciting to be able to talk about a subject that mostly I write about, and for many people video is far more accessible and easy to understand.   I have really enjoyed diving into something new, and would love to have more people check out these videos and give me feedback.  You can find me at www.youtube.com/user/pinaldave. I am very excited with all the possibilities on YouTube and it might just be the technology evangelist in me, but I would love for other people to discover how fun and exciting this site can be, too.  Don’t think of it as just a place to find funny videos and waste a few minutes of your time, think of it as a place to learn and interact with interesting people.  Come watch a few of my videos, while you’re there.  Remember, everything is free and there are no contracts to sign, but I hope that you get as excited as I am and join up.  We need more people creating good content on this site! Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Social Media

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Detecting Leap Year in T-SQL using SQL Server 2012 – IIF, EOMONTH and CONCAT Function

  - by pinaldave

  Note: Tomorrow is February 29th. This blog post is dedicated to coming tomorrow – a special day :) Subu: “How can I find leap year in using SQL Server 2012?“ Pinal: “Are you asking me how to year 2012 is leap year using T-SQL – search online and you will find many example of the same.” Subu: “No. I am asking – How can I find leap year in using SQL Server 2012?“ Pinal: “Oh so you are asking – How can I find leap year in using SQL Server 2012?“ Subu: “Yeah - How can I find leap year in using SQL Server 2012?“ Pinal: “Let me do that for you – How can you find leap year in using SQL Server 2012?“ Indeed a fun conversation. Honestly, only reason I pasted our conversation here is – it was fun. What he was asking is that how to do it using new functions introduced in SQL Server 2012. Here is the article I have written which introduces all the new functions in SQL Server 2012 Summary of All the Analytic Functions – MSDN and SQLAuthority and 14 New Functions – A Quick Guide. There are many functions written to figure out to figure out if any year is Leap Year or not. The same I have written using T-SQL function over here. CREATE FUNCTION dbo.IsLeapYear (@year INT) RETURNS INT AS BEGIN RETURN(IIF(DATEPART(dd,(EOMONTH(CONCAT(@year,'0201')))) = 29,1,0)) END GO What I really like is that I was able to use three newly introduced function in SQL Server 2012 in above script. You can read more about them here. IIF, EOMONTH and CONCAT. You can validate above query by running following script. SELECT dbo.IsLeapYear('2011') 'IsLeapYear'; SELECT dbo.IsLeapYear('2012') 'IsLeapYear'; GO You will get result 1 if the year is leap year and 0 if year is not leap year. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL DateTime, SQL Function, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Automation Process Good or Ugly

  - by pinaldave

  This blog post is written in response to T-SQL Tuesday hosted by SQL Server Insane Asylum. The idea of this post really caught my attention. Automation – something getting itself done after the initial programming, is my understanding of the subject. The very next thought was – is it good or evil? The reality is there is no right answer. However, what if we quickly note a few things, then I would like to request your help to complete this post. We will start with the positive parts in SQL Server where automation happens. The Good If I start thinking of SQL Server and Automation the very first thing that comes to my mind is SQL Agent, which runs various jobs. Once I configure any task or job, it runs fine (till something goes wrong!). Well, automation has its own advantages. We all have used SQL Agent for so many things – backup, various validation jobs, maintenance jobs and numerous other things. What other kinds of automation tasks do you run in your database server? The Ugly This part is very interesting, because it can get really ugly(!). During my career I have found so many bad automation agent jobs. Client had an agent job where he was dropping the clean buffers every hour Client using database mail to send regular emails instead of necessary alert related emails The best one – A client used new Missing Index and Unused Index scripts in SQL Agent Job to follow suggestions 100%. Believe me, I have never seen such a badly performing and hard to optimize database. (I ended up dropping all non-clustered indexes on the development server and ran production workload on the development server again, then configured with optimal indexes). Shrinking database is performance killer. It should never be automated. SQL SERVER – Shrinking Database is Bad – Increases Fragmentation – Reduces Performance The one I hate the most is AutoShrink Database. It has given me hard time in my career quite a few times. SQL SERVER – SHRINKDATABASE For Every Database in the SQL Server Automation is necessary but common sense is a must when creating automation. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL – Building a High Traffic, Profitable Blog – A Unique Gift on Author’s Birthday

  - by Pinal Dave

  Every July 30th, I like to do something new. It is my birthday and I like to give gifts to everyone this day. Last year, at this time I had written an article A Year Older and 3 SQL Server Books and 3 Video Courses – 33. I had written a total of 3 books by that time and had published total of  3 Pluralsight courses. When I look back the year, I feel that I gave my best to last year. Sine Last July 30th, I have written 6 more books and 5 more video courses. The total is now 9 books and 8 video courses. It seems that I have been producing one new book or course every month since last July. Building a High Traffic, Profitable Blog Out of my 8 courses my favorite course is my latest course at Pluralsight. This course is about how to build a high traffic blog and monetize it. I have been blogging for over 7 years and there have been many hurdles and roadblocks but I have never stopped blogging any single day. There have been many instances when I felt I should just hit delete and remove my entire blog from the web but fortunately I had courage to stand by on my decisions. Well at the end, I kept on fighting through the difficult time and kept on blogging. Every day there was a lesson to learn and every day there was an issue to resolve. I never gave up and kept on building new content. Today after 7 years, when I look back there are many stories to tell. It was impossible to write down the stories so I decided to build a course based on my experience. In this course, I share all the best tricks to build a high traffic, profitable blog. When we talk about profit, people often talk about money but the reality is that profit is much bigger word than money. There are many different ways one can profit from their own blog. In this course, I discuss about all different ways about how you can be profitable by building a high traffic blog. I believe this course is for everybody who aspire to build a website or blog which gives them a profit.  Here are the major topics based out of this course. Introduction Techniques to Engage Blog Readers Social Media – Social Sharing and Social Networking Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Monetizing a Blog Frequently Asked Questions Checklists Personally I believe this is the best gift I can give to all of you my friends. Build a successful high traffic blog and monetize it. Here is the list of the all of my video courses and here is the list of all of the books. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: About Me, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL Tagged: Blogging

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – PREEMPTIVE and Non-PREEMPTIVE – Wait Type – Day 19 of 28

  - by pinaldave

  In this blog post, we are going to talk about a very interesting subject. I often get questions related to SQL Server 2008 Book-Online about various Preemptive wait types. I got a few questions asking what these wait types are and how they could be interpreted. To get current wait types of the system, you can read this article and run the script: SQL SERVER – DMV – sys.dm_os_waiting_tasks and sys.dm_exec_requests – Wait Type – Day 4 of 28. Before we continue understanding them, let us study first what PREEMPTIVE and Non-PREEMPTIVE waits in SQL Server mean. PREEMPTIVE: Simply put, this wait means non-cooperative. While SQL Server is executing a task, the Operating System (OS) interrupts it. This leads to SQL Server to involuntarily give up the execution for other higher priority tasks. This is not good for SQL Server as it is a particular external process which makes SQL Server to yield. This kind of wait can reduce the performance drastically and needs to be investigated properly. Non-PREEMPTIVE: In simple terms, this wait means cooperative. SQL Server manages the scheduling of the threads. When SQL Server manages the scheduling instead of the OS, it makes sure its own priority. In this case, SQL Server decides the priority and one thread yields to another thread voluntarily. In the earlier version of SQL Server, there was no preemptive wait types mentioned and the associated task status with them was marked as suspended. In SQL Server 2005, preemptive wait types were not listed as well, but their associated task status was marked as running. In SQL Server 2008, preemptive wait types are properly listed and their associated task status is also marked as running. Now, SQL Server is in Non-Preemptive mode by default and it works fine. When CLR, extended Stored Procedures and other external components run, they run in Preemptive mode, leading to the creation of these wait types. There are a wide variety of preemptive wait types. If you see consistent high value in the Preemptive wait types, I strongly suggest that you look into the wait type and try to know the root cause. If you are still not sure, you can send me an email or leave a comment about it and I will do my best to help you reduce this wait type. Read all the post in the Wait Types and Queue series. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Wait Stats, SQL Wait Types, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – DMV – sys.dm_exec_query_optimizer_info – Statistics of Optimizer

  - by pinaldave

  Incredibly, SQL Server has so much information to share with us. Every single day, I am amazed with this SQL Server technology. Sometimes I find several interesting information by just querying few of the DMV. And when I present this info in front of my client during performance tuning consultancy, they are surprised with my findings. Today, I am going to share one of the hidden gems of DMV with you, the one which I frequently use to understand what’s going on under the hood of SQL Server. SQL Server keeps the record of most of the operations of the Query Optimizer. We can learn many interesting details about the optimizer which can be utilized to improve the performance of server. SELECT * FROM sys.dm_exec_query_optimizer_info WHERE counter IN ('optimizations', 'elapsed time','final cost', 'insert stmt','delete stmt','update stmt', 'merge stmt','contains subquery','tables', 'hints','order hint','join hint', 'view reference','remote query','maximum DOP', 'maximum recursion level','indexed views loaded', 'indexed views matched','indexed views used', 'indexed views updated','dynamic cursor request', 'fast forward cursor request') All occurrence values are cumulative and are set to 0 at system restart. All values for value fields are set to NULL at system restart. I have removed a few of the internal counters from the script above, and kept only documented details. Let us check the result of the above query. As you can see, there is so much vital information that is revealed in above query. I can easily say so many things about how many times Optimizer was triggered and what the average time taken by it to optimize my queries was. Additionally, I can also determine how many times update, insert or delete statements were optimized. I was able to quickly figure out that my client was overusing the Query Hints using this dynamic management view. If you have been reading my blog, I am sure you are aware of my series related to SQL Server Views SQL SERVER – The Limitations of the Views – Eleven and more…. With this, I can take a quick look and figure out how many times Views were used in various solutions within the query. Moreover, you can easily know what fraction of the optimizations has been involved in tuning server. For example, the following query would tell me, in total optimizations, what the fraction of time View was “reference“. As this View also includes system Views and DMVs, the number is a bit higher on my machine. SELECT (SELECT CAST (occurrence AS FLOAT) FROM sys.dm_exec_query_optimizer_info WHERE counter = 'view reference') / (SELECT CAST (occurrence AS FLOAT) FROM sys.dm_exec_query_optimizer_info WHERE counter = 'optimizations') AS ViewReferencedFraction Reference : Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL DMV, SQL Optimization, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – SQL in Sixty Seconds – Last Three Episodes – Need Your Opinion

  - by Pinal Dave

  I have been blogging for almost 7 years and building video content for around 2 years. After spending so much time on blogging and creating video, I have got the quite a good idea what people would like to read and what people like to watch. However, there is one thing, which I am constantly struggling after almost a year and I would like to get your opinion about it. Though, this may look very simple to you but it is very crucial to me and I would like to know your opinion about it. I have been building video almost every week for my SQL in Sixty Seconds series and it has been quite popular. So far on my YouTube Channel there are over 2600 subscribers and over 250K views. Here is my problem – there are about 50+ videos on SQL in Sixty Seconds Series but the not every video is popular. There are a few videos which are extremely popular and there are videos which are absolutely struggling to get even single view. I have yet not figured out what people would love to watch on this channel. I noticed lots of people watching various videos but hardly anyone leaving comments or suggestions. At the end of the blog posts associated with the SQL in Sixty Seconds, I always ask which video people would love to watch, but I get a very low response over there too. What I wonder is that why such a low engagement of viewers/readers on the video blog posts where as the channel is success and lots of people are watching the video? What do you think I should change in my video to increase the engagement? Here are my last three videos from SQL in Sixty Seconds channel and I would like to know your feedback. Remove Cached Login from SSMS Connect Dialog – SQL in Sixty Seconds #049 RESEED Identity Column in Database Table – SQL in Sixty Seconds #051 Puzzle SET ANSI_NULLS and Resultset – SQL in Sixty Seconds #052  The feedback which I will like the most will for sure get a special surprise gift for me. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL in Sixty Seconds, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology, Video

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – DMV – sys.dm_os_waiting_tasks and sys.dm_exec_requests – Wait Type – Day 4 of 28

  - by pinaldave

  Previously, we covered the DMV sys.dm_os_wait_stats, and also saw how it can be useful to identify the major resource bottleneck. However, at the same time, we discussed that this is only useful when we are looking at an instance-level picture. Quite often we want to know about the processes going in our server at the given instant. Here is the query for the same. This DMV is written taking the following into consideration: we want to analyze the queries that are currently running or which have recently ran and their plan is still in the cache. SELECT dm_ws.wait_duration_ms, dm_ws.wait_type, dm_es.status, dm_t.TEXT, dm_qp.query_plan, dm_ws.session_ID, dm_es.cpu_time, dm_es.memory_usage, dm_es.logical_reads, dm_es.total_elapsed_time, dm_es.program_name, DB_NAME(dm_r.database_id) DatabaseName, -- Optional columns dm_ws.blocking_session_id, dm_r.wait_resource, dm_es.login_name, dm_r.command, dm_r.last_wait_type FROM sys.dm_os_waiting_tasks dm_ws INNER JOIN sys.dm_exec_requests dm_r ON dm_ws.session_id = dm_r.session_id INNER JOIN sys.dm_exec_sessions dm_es ON dm_es.session_id = dm_r.session_id CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_sql_text (dm_r.sql_handle) dm_t CROSS APPLY sys.dm_exec_query_plan (dm_r.plan_handle) dm_qp WHERE dm_es.is_user_process = 1 GO You can change CROSS APPLY to OUTER APPLY if you want to see all the details which are omitted because of the plan cache. Let us analyze the result of the above query and see how it can be helpful to identify the query and the kind of wait type it creates. Click to Enlarage The above query will return various columns. There are various columns that provide very important details. e.g. wait_duration_ms – it indicates current wait for the query that executes at that point of time. wait_type – it indicates the current wait type for the query text – indicates the query text query_plan – when clicked on the same, it will display the query plans There are many other important information like CPU_time, memory_usage, and logical_reads, which can be read from the query as well. In future posts on this series, we will see how once identified wait type we can attempt to reduce the same. Read all the post in the Wait Types and Queue series. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: DMV, Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL DMV, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Wait Stats, SQL Wait Types, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Puzzle to Win Print Book – Explain Value of PERCENTILE_CONT() Using Simple Example

  - by pinaldave

  From last several days I am working on various Denali Analytical functions and it is indeed really fun to refresh the concept which I studied in the school. Earlier I wrote article where I explained how we can use PERCENTILE_CONT() to find median over here SQL SERVER – Introduction to PERCENTILE_CONT() – Analytic Functions Introduced in SQL Server 2012. Today I am going to ask question based on the same blog post. Again just like last time the intention of this puzzle is as following: Learn new concept of SQL Server 2012 Learn new concept of SQL Server 2012 even if you are on earlier version of SQL Server. On another note, SQL Server 2012 RC0 has been announced and available to download SQL SERVER – 2012 RC0 Various Resources and Downloads. Now let’s have fun following query: USE AdventureWorks GO SELECT SalesOrderID, OrderQty, ProductID, PERCENTILE_CONT(0.5) WITHIN GROUP (ORDER BY ProductID) OVER (PARTITION BY SalesOrderID) AS MedianCont FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail WHERE SalesOrderID IN (43670, 43669, 43667, 43663) ORDER BY SalesOrderID DESC GO The above query will give us the following result: The reason we get median is because we are passing value .05 to PERCENTILE_COUNT() function. Now run read the puzzle. Puzzle: Run following T-SQL code: USE AdventureWorks GO SELECT SalesOrderID, OrderQty, ProductID, PERCENTILE_CONT(0.9) WITHIN GROUP (ORDER BY ProductID) OVER (PARTITION BY SalesOrderID) AS MedianCont FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail WHERE SalesOrderID IN (43670, 43669, 43667, 43663) ORDER BY SalesOrderID DESC GO Observe the result and you will notice that MidianCont has different value than before, the reason is PERCENTILE_CONT function has 0.9 value passed. For first four value the value is 775.1. Now run following T-SQL code: USE AdventureWorks GO SELECT SalesOrderID, OrderQty, ProductID, PERCENTILE_CONT(0.1) WITHIN GROUP (ORDER BY ProductID) OVER (PARTITION BY SalesOrderID) AS MedianCont FROM Sales.SalesOrderDetail WHERE SalesOrderID IN (43670, 43669, 43667, 43663) ORDER BY SalesOrderID DESC GO Observe the result and you will notice that MidianCont has different value than before, the reason is PERCENTILE_CONT function has 0.1 value passed. For first four value the value is 709.3. Now in my example I have explained how the median is found using this function. You have to explain using mathematics and explain (in easy words) why the value in last columns are 709.3 and 775.1 Hint: SQL SERVER – Introduction to PERCENTILE_CONT() – Analytic Functions Introduced in SQL Server 2012 Rules Leave a comment with your detailed answer by Nov 25's blog post. Open world-wide (where Amazon ships books) If you blog about puzzle’s solution and if you win, you win additional surprise gift as well. Prizes Print copy of my new book SQL Server Interview Questions Amazon|Flipkart If you already have this book, you can opt for any of my other books SQL Wait Stats [Amazon|Flipkart|Kindle] and SQL Programming [Amazon|Flipkart|Kindle]. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Function, SQL Puzzle, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL Contest – Win USD 300 Worth Gift – Cartoon Contest is Back

  - by pinaldave

  There are two excellent contests and we have lots of winning to do this year end. 1) Win USD 25 Amazon Gift Cards (10 Units) This is very simple, you just have to download SQL Server DB Optimizer. That’s it! There are only two conditions: You must have a valid email address. As USD 25 Amazon Gift Card will be sent to the same address. Download DB Optimizer between today and Dec 8, 2012. Link to Download DB Optimizer. Every day one winner will be notified about their winning USD 25 Amazon Gift Cards for next 10 days. 2) Win Star Wars R2-D2 Inflatable R/C This the coolest thing to win. I personally want one but as I am running a contest, I can’t  participate. You get this cool Remote Controlled Device – you just have to answer following cartoon contest. Read the complete story and think what will be the answer provided by the smart employee. There are only two conditions: Leave your answer in the comment area of this blog post (every comment will be hidden till Dec 8, 2012). Please leave your answer in the comment area between today and Dec 8, 2012. Remember you can participate as many times as you want. Make sure that your answer is correct and creative. The most creative answer will be selected. The decision of contest owner will be final. We may have runner’s up prices but for the moment let us try to win R2-D2. Here is the cool video of R2D2. Now here is the cartoon story, please follow the story and complete the very last cartoon template. Your answer should be correct and should be creative. However, the ideal answer will not be longer than one or two sentences. Hint: (Hint) Well, Leave your answer in the comment area of this blog post. If you do not win R2D2, trust me there are chances you may win a surprise gift from me. Remember your answer should be correct and should be creative. However, the ideal answer will not be longer than one or two sentences. Last day to participate in both of the contest is Dec 8, 2012. We will announce the winner in the week of December 10. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Puzzle, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLAuthority News, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Quiz and Video – Introduction to SQL Server Security

  - by pinaldave

  This blog post is inspired from Beginning SQL Joes 2 Pros: The SQL Hands-On Guide for Beginners – SQL Exam Prep Series 70-433 – Volume 1. [Amazon] | [Flipkart] | [Kindle] | [IndiaPlaza] This is follow up blog post of my earlier blog post on the same subject - SQL SERVER – Introduction to SQL Server Security – A Primer. In the article we discussed various basics terminology of the security. The article further covers following important concepts of security. Granting Permissions Denying Permissions Revoking Permissions Above three are the most important concepts related to security and SQL Server.  There are many more things one has to learn but without beginners fundamentals one can’t learn the advanced  concepts. Let us have small quiz and check how many of you get the fundamentals right. Quiz 1) If you granted Phil control to the server, but denied his ability to create databases, what would his effective permissions be? Phil can do everything. Phil can do nothing. Phil can do everything except create databases. 2) If you granted Phil control to the server and revoked his ability to create databases, what would his effective permissions be? Phil can do everything. Phil can do nothing. Phil can do everything except create databases. 3) You have a login named James who has Control Server permission. You want to elimintate his ability to create databases without affecting any other permissions. What SQL statement would you use? ALTER LOGIN James DISABLE DROP LOGIN James DENY CREATE DATABASE To James REVOKE CREATE DATABASE To James GRANT CREATE DATABASE To James Now make sure that you write down all the answers on the piece of paper. Watch following video and read earlier article over here. If you want to change the answer you still have chance. Solution 1) 3 2) 1 3) 3 Now compare let us check the answers and compare your answers to following answers. I am very confident you will get them correct. Available at USA: Amazon India: Flipkart | IndiaPlaza Volume: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Please leave your feedback in the comment area for the quiz and video. Did you know all the answers of the quiz? Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Joes 2 Pros, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – SQL Server High Availability Options – Notes from the Field #032

  - by Pinal Dave

  [Notes from Pinal]: When it is about High Availability or Disaster Recovery, I often see people getting confused. There are so many options available that when the user has to select what is the most optimal solution for their organization they are often confused. Most of the people even know the salient features of various options, but when they have to figure out one single option to use they are often not sure which option to use. I like to give ask my dear friend time all these kinds of complicated questions. He has a skill to make a complex subject very simple and easy to understand. Linchpin People are database coaches and wellness experts for a data driven world. In this 26th episode of the Notes from the Fields series database expert Tim Radney (partner at Linchpin People) explains in a very simple words the best High Availability Option for your SQL Server.  Working with SQL Server a common challenge we are faced with is providing the maximum uptime possible.  To meet these demands we have to design a solution to provide High Availability (HA). Microsoft SQL Server depending on your edition provides you with several options.  This could be database mirroring, log shipping, failover clusters, availability groups or replication. Each possible solution comes with pro’s and con’s.  Not anyone one solution fits all scenarios so understanding which solution meets which need is important.  As with anything IT related, you need to fully understand your requirements before trying to solution the problem.  When it comes to building an HA solution, you need to understand the risk your organization needs to mitigate the most. I have found that most are concerned about hardware failure and OS failures. Other common concerns are data corruption or storage issues.  For data corruption or storage issues you can mitigate those concerns by having a second copy of the databases. That can be accomplished with database mirroring, log shipping, replication or availability groups with a secondary replica.  Failover clustering and virtualization with shared storage do not provide redundancy of the data. I recently created a chart outlining some pros and cons of each of the technologies that I posted on my blog. I like to use this chart to help illustrate how each technology provides a certain number of benefits.  Each of these solutions carries with it some level of cost and complexity.  As a database professional we should all be familiar with these technologies so we can make the best possible choice for our organization. If you want me to take a look at your server and its settings, or if your server is facing any issue we can Fix Your SQL Server. Note: Tim has also written an excellent book on SQL Backup and Recovery, a must have for everyone. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)Filed under: Notes from the Field, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL Tagged: Shrinking Database

  Read the article

• SQL SERVER – Working with FileTables in SQL Server 2012 – Part 1 – Setting Up Environment

  - by pinaldave

  Filestream is a very interesting feature, and an enhancement of FileTable with Filestream is equally exciting. Today in this post, we will learn how to set up the FileTable Environment in SQL Server. The major advantage of FileTable is it has Windows API compatibility for file data stored within an SQL Server database. In simpler words, FileTables remove a barrier so that SQL Server can be used for the storage and management of unstructured data that are currently residing as files on file servers. Another advantage is that the Windows Application Compatibility for their existing Windows applications enables to see these data as files in the file system. This way, you can use SQL Server to access the data using T-SQL enhancements, and Windows can access the file using its applications. So for the first step, you will need to enable the Filestream feature at the database level in order to use the FileTable. -- Enable Filestream EXEC sp_configure filestream_access_level, 2 RECONFIGURE GO -- Create Database CREATE DATABASE FileTableDB ON PRIMARY (Name = FileTableDB, FILENAME = 'D:\FileTable\FTDB.mdf'), FILEGROUP FTFG CONTAINS FILESTREAM (NAME = FileTableFS, FILENAME='D:\FileTable\FS') LOG ON (Name = FileTableDBLog, FILENAME = 'D:\FileTable\FTDBLog.ldf') WITH FILESTREAM (NON_TRANSACTED_ACCESS = FULL, DIRECTORY_NAME = N'FileTableDB'); GO Now, you can run the following code and figure out if FileStream options are enabled at the database level. -- Check the Filestream Options SELECT DB_NAME(database_id), non_transacted_access, non_transacted_access_desc FROM sys.database_filestream_options; GO You can see the resultset of the above query which returns resultset as the following image shows. As you can see , the file level access is set to 2 (filestream enabled). Now let us create the filetable in the newly created database. -- Create FileTable Table USE FileTableDB GO CREATE TABLE FileTableTb AS FileTable WITH (FileTable_Directory = 'FileTableTb_Dir'); GO Now you can select data using a regular select table. SELECT * FROM FileTableTb GO It will return all the important columns which are related to the file. It will provide details like filesize, archived, file types etc. You can also see the FileTable in SQL Server Management Studio. Go to Databases >> Newly Created Database (FileTableDB) >> Expand Tables Here, you will see a new folder which says “FileTables”. When expanded, it gives the name of the newly created FileTableTb. You can right click on the newly created table and click on “Explore FileTable Directory”. This will open up the folder where the FileTable data will be stored. When you click on the option, it will open up the following folder in my local machine where the FileTable data will be stored: \\127.0.0.1\mssqlserver\FileTableDB\FileTableTb_Dir In tomorrow’s blog post as Part 2, we will go over two methods of inserting the data into this FileTable. Reference : Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Filestream

  Read the article

• Big Data – Buzz Words: What is NoSQL – Day 5 of 21

  - by Pinal Dave

  In yesterday’s blog post we explored the basic architecture of Big Data . In this article we will take a quick look at one of the four most important buzz words which goes around Big Data – NoSQL. What is NoSQL? NoSQL stands for Not Relational SQL or Not Only SQL. Lots of people think that NoSQL means there is No SQL, which is not true – they both sound same but the meaning is totally different. NoSQL does use SQL but it uses more than SQL to achieve its goal. As per Wikipedia’s NoSQL Database Definition – “A NoSQL database provides a mechanism for storage and retrieval of data that uses looser consistency models than traditional relational databases.“ Why use NoSQL? A traditional relation database usually deals with predictable structured data. Whereas as the world has moved forward with unstructured data we often see the limitations of the traditional relational database in dealing with them. For example, nowadays we have data in format of SMS, wave files, photos and video format. It is a bit difficult to manage them by using a traditional relational database. I often see people using BLOB filed to store such a data. BLOB can store the data but when we have to retrieve them or even process them the same BLOB is extremely slow in processing the unstructured data. A NoSQL database is the type of database that can handle unstructured, unorganized and unpredictable data that our business needs it. Along with the support to unstructured data, the other advantage of NoSQL Database is high performance and high availability. Eventual Consistency Additionally to note that NoSQL Database may not provided 100% ACID (Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation, Durability) compliance.  Though, NoSQL Database does not support ACID they provide eventual consistency. That means over the long period of time all updates can be expected to propagate eventually through the system and data will be consistent. Taxonomy Taxonomy is the practice of classification of things or concepts and the principles. The NoSQL taxonomy supports column store, document store, key-value stores, and graph databases. We will discuss the taxonomy in detail in later blog posts. Here are few of the examples of the each of the No SQL Category. Column: Hbase, Cassandra, Accumulo Document: MongoDB, Couchbase, Raven Key-value : Dynamo, Riak, Azure, Redis, Cache, GT.m Graph: Neo4J, Allegro, Virtuoso, Bigdata As of now there are over 150 NoSQL Database and you can read everything about them in this single link. Tomorrow In tomorrow’s blog post we will discuss Buzz Word – Hadoop. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Big Data, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL

  Read the article

< Previous Page | 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70  | Next Page >