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• SQL SERVER – Wait Stats – Wait Types – Wait Queues – Day 0 of 28

  - by pinaldave

  This blog post will have running account of the all the blog post I will be doing in this month related to SQL Server Wait Types and Wait Queues. SQL SERVER – Introduction to Wait Stats and Wait Types – Wait Type – Day 1 of 28 SQL SERVER – Single Wait Time Introduction with Simple Example – Wait Type – Day 2 of 28 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

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• SQLAuthority News – SQL Server 2008 R2 System Views Map

  - by pinaldave

  SQL Server 2008 R2 System Views Map is released. I am very proud that my organization (Solid Quality Mentors) is part of making this possible. This map shows the key system views included in SQL Server 2008 and 2008 R2, and the relationships between them. SQL Server 2008 R2 System Views Map Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Documentation, SQL Download, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLAuthority News, T SQL, Technology

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• 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

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• SQL SERVER – Solution – Puzzle – Statistics are not Updated but are Created Once

  - by pinaldave

  Earlier I asked puzzle why statistics are not updated. Read the complete details over here: Statistics are not Updated but are Created Once In the question I have demonstrated even though statistics should have been updated after lots of insert in the table are not updated.(Read the details SQL SERVER – When are Statistics Updated – What triggers Statistics to Update) In this example I have created following situation: Create Table Insert 1000 Records Check the Statistics Now insert 10 times more 10,000 indexes Check the Statistics – it will be NOT updated Auto Update Statistics and Auto Create Statistics for database is TRUE Now I have requested two things in the example 1) Why this is happening? 2) How to fix this issue? I have many answers – here is the how I fixed it which has resolved the issue for me. NOTE: There are multiple answers to this problem and I will do my best to list all. Solution: Create nonclustered Index on column City Here is the working example for the same. Let us understand this script and there is added explanation at the end. -- Execution Plans Difference -- Estimated Execution Plan Vs Actual Execution Plan -- Create Sample Database CREATE DATABASE SampleDB GO USE SampleDB GO -- Create Table CREATE TABLE ExecTable (ID INT, FirstName VARCHAR(100), LastName VARCHAR(100), City VARCHAR(100)) GO CREATE NONCLUSTERED INDEX IX_ExecTable1 ON ExecTable (City); GO -- Insert One Thousand Records -- INSERT 1 INSERT INTO ExecTable (ID,FirstName,LastName,City) SELECT TOP 1000 ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name) RowID, 'Bob', CASE WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%2 = 1 THEN 'Smith' ELSE 'Brown' END, CASE WHEN ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 1 THEN 'New York' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 5 THEN 'San Marino' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 3 THEN 'Los Angeles' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 7 THEN 'La Cinega' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 13 THEN 'San Diego' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 17 THEN 'Las Vegas' ELSE 'Houston' END FROM sys.all_objects a CROSS JOIN sys.all_objects b GO -- Display statistics of the table sp_helpstats N'ExecTable', 'ALL' GO -- Select Statement SELECT FirstName, LastName, City FROM ExecTable WHERE City  = 'New York' GO -- Display statistics of the table sp_helpstats N'ExecTable', 'ALL' GO -- Replace your Statistics over here DBCC SHOW_STATISTICS('ExecTable', IX_ExecTable1); GO -------------------------------------------------------------- -- Round 2 -- Insert One Thousand Records -- INSERT 2 INSERT INTO ExecTable (ID,FirstName,LastName,City) SELECT TOP 1000 ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name) RowID, 'Bob', CASE WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%2 = 1 THEN 'Smith' ELSE 'Brown' END, CASE WHEN ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 1 THEN 'New York' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 5 THEN 'San Marino' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 3 THEN 'Los Angeles' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 7 THEN 'La Cinega' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 13 THEN 'San Diego' WHEN  ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY a.name)%20 = 17 THEN 'Las Vegas' ELSE 'Houston' END FROM sys.all_objects a CROSS JOIN sys.all_objects b GO -- Select Statement SELECT FirstName, LastName, City FROM ExecTable WHERE City  = 'New York' GO -- Display statistics of the table sp_helpstats N'ExecTable', 'ALL' GO -- Replace your Statistics over here DBCC SHOW_STATISTICS('ExecTable', IX_ExecTable1); GO -- Clean up Database DROP TABLE ExecTable GO When I created non clustered index on the column city, it also created statistics on the same column with same name as index. When we populate the data in the column the index is update – resulting execution plan to be invalided – this leads to the statistics to be updated in next execution of SELECT. This behavior does not happen on Heap or column where index is auto created. If you explicitly update the index, often you can see the statistics are updated as well. You can see this is for sure happening if you follow the tell of John Sansom. John Sansom‘s suggestion: That was fun! Although the column statistics are invalidated by the time the second select statement is executed, the query is not compiled/recompiled but instead the existing query plan is reused. It is the “next” compiled query against the column statistics that will see that they are out of date and will then in turn instantiate the action of updating statistics. You can see this in action by forcing the second statement to recompile. SELECT FirstName, LastName, City FROM ExecTable WHERE City = ‘New York’ option(RECOMPILE) GO Kevin Cross also have another suggestion: I agree with John. It is reusing the Execution Plan. Aside from OPTION(RECOMPILE), clearing the Execution Plan Cache before the subsequent tests will also work. i.e., run this before round 2: ————————————————————– – Clear execution plan cache before next test DBCC FREEPROCCACHE WITH NO_INFOMSGS; ————————————————————– Nice puzzle! Kevin As this was puzzle John and Kevin both got the correct answer, there was no condition for answer to be part of best practices. I know John and he is finest DBA around – his tremendous knowledge has always impressed me. John and Kevin both will agree that clearing cache either using DBCC FREEPROCCACHE and recompiling each query every time is for sure not good advice on production server. It is correct answer but not best practice. By the way, if you have better solution or have better suggestion please advise. I am open to change my answer and publish further improvement to this solution. On very separate note, I like to have clustered index on my Primary Key, which I have not mentioned here as it is out of the scope of this puzzle. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, Readers Contribution, Readers Question, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Index, SQL Puzzle, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Statistics

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• SQL SERVER – CXPACKET – Parallelism – Usual Solution – Wait Type – Day 6 of 28

  - by pinaldave

  CXPACKET has to be most popular one of all wait stats. I have commonly seen this wait stat as one of the top 5 wait stats in most of the systems with more than one CPU. Books On-Line: Occurs when trying to synchronize the query processor exchange iterator. You may consider lowering the degree of parallelism if contention on this wait type becomes a problem. CXPACKET Explanation: When a parallel operation is created for SQL Query, there are multiple threads for a single query. Each query deals with a different set of the data (or rows). Due to some reasons, one or more of the threads lag behind, creating the CXPACKET Wait Stat. There is an organizer/coordinator thread (thread 0), which takes waits for all the threads to complete and gathers result together to present on the client’s side. The organizer thread has to wait for the all the threads to finish before it can move ahead. The Wait by this organizer thread for slow threads to complete is called CXPACKET wait. Note that not all the CXPACKET wait types are bad. You might experience a case when it totally makes sense. There might also be cases when this is unavoidable. If you remove this particular wait type for any query, then that query may run slower because the parallel operations are disabled for the query. Reducing CXPACKET wait: We cannot discuss about reducing the CXPACKET wait without talking about the server workload type. OLTP: On Pure OLTP system, where the transactions are smaller and queries are not long but very quick usually, set the “Maximum Degree of Parallelism” to 1 (one). This way it makes sure that the query never goes for parallelism and does not incur more engine overhead. EXEC sys.sp_configure N'cost threshold for parallelism', N'1' GO RECONFIGURE WITH OVERRIDE GO Data-warehousing / Reporting server: As queries will be running for long time, it is advised to set the “Maximum Degree of Parallelism” to 0 (zero). This way most of the queries will utilize the parallel processor, and long running queries get a boost in their performance due to multiple processors. EXEC sys.sp_configure N'cost threshold for parallelism', N'0' GO RECONFIGURE WITH OVERRIDE GO Mixed System (OLTP & OLAP): Here is the challenge. The right balance has to be found. I have taken a very simple approach. I set the “Maximum Degree of Parallelism” to 2, which means the query still uses parallelism but only on 2 CPUs. However, I keep the “Cost Threshold for Parallelism” very high. This way, not all the queries will qualify for parallelism but only the query with higher cost will go for parallelism. I have found this to work best for a system that has OLTP queries and also where the reporting server is set up. Here, I am setting ‘Cost Threshold for Parallelism’ to 25 values (which is just for illustration); you can choose any value, and you can find it out by experimenting with the system only. In the following script, I am setting the ‘Max Degree of Parallelism’ to 2, which indicates that the query that will have a higher cost (here, more than 25) will qualify for parallel query to run on 2 CPUs. This implies that regardless of the number of CPUs, the query will select any two CPUs to execute itself. EXEC sys.sp_configure N'cost threshold for parallelism', N'25' GO EXEC sys.sp_configure N'max degree of parallelism', N'2' GO RECONFIGURE WITH OVERRIDE GO Read all the post in the Wait Types and Queue series. Additionally a must read comment of Jonathan Kehayias. Note: The information presented here is from my experience and I no way claim it to be accurate. I suggest you all to read the online book for further clarification. All the discussion of Wait Stats over here is generic and it varies from system to system. It is recommended that you test this on the development server before implementing on the production server. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: DMV, Pinal Dave, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Wait Stats, SQL Wait Types, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – 2012 RC0 Various Resources and Downloads

  - by pinaldave

  Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Release Candidate 0 (RC0) Microsoft SQL Server 2012 RC0 enables a cloud-ready information platform that will help organizations unlock breakthrough insights across the organization. Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Express RC Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Express RC0 is a powerful and reliable free data management system that delivers a rich set of features, data protection, and performance for embedded applications, lightweight Web Sites, applications, and local data stores. Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Semantic Language Statistics RC0 The Semantic Language Statistics Database is a required component for the Statistical Semantic Search feature in Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Semantic Language Statistics RC0. Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Release Candidate 0 (RC0) Manageability Tool Kit The Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Release Candidate 0 (RC0) Manageability Tool Kit is a collection of stand-alone packages which provide additional value for Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Release Candidate 0 (RC0). Microsoft SQL Server 2012 PowerPivot for Microsoft Excel 2010 Release Candidate 0 (RC0) Microsoft PowerPivot for Microsoft Excel 2010 provides ground-breaking technology; fast manipulation of large data sets, streamlined integration of data, and the ability to effortlessly share your analysis through Microsoft SharePoint Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Database, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Documentation, SQL Download, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – SSMS: Backup and Restore Events Report

  - by Pinal Dave

  A DBA wears multiple hats and in fact does more than what an eye can see. One of the core task of a DBA is to take backups. This looks so trivial that most developers shrug this off as the only activity a DBA might be doing. I have huge respect for DBA’s all around the world because even if they seem cool with all the scripting, automation, maintenance works round the clock to keep the business working almost 365 days 24×7, their worth is knowing that one day when the systems / HDD crashes and you have an important delivery to make. So these backup tasks / maintenance jobs that have been done come handy and are no more trivial as they might seem to be as considered by many. So the important question like: “When was the last backup taken?”, “How much time did the last backup take?”, “What type of backup was taken last?” etc are tricky questions and this report lands answers to the same in a jiffy. So the SSMS report, we are talking can be used to find backups and restore operation done for the selected database. Whenever we perform any backup or restore operation, the information is stored in the msdb database. This report can utilize that information and provide information about the size, time taken and also the file location for those operations. Here is how this report can be launched.   Once we launch this report, we can see 4 major sections shown as listed below. Average Time Taken For Backup Operations Successful Backup Operations Backup Operation Errors Successful Restore Operations Let us look at each section next. Average Time Taken For Backup Operations Information shown in “Average Time Taken For Backup Operations” section is taken from a backupset table in the msdb database. Here is the query and the expanded version of that particular section USE msdb; SELECT (ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY t1.TYPE))%2 AS l1 ,       1 AS l2 ,       1 AS l3 ,       t1.TYPE AS [type] ,       (AVG(DATEDIFF(ss,backup_start_date, backup_finish_date)))/60.0 AS AverageBackupDuration FROM backupset t1 INNER JOIN sys.databases t3 ON ( t1.database_name = t3.name) WHERE t3.name = N'AdventureWorks2014' GROUP BY t1.TYPE ORDER BY t1.TYPE On my small database the time taken for differential backup was less than a minute, hence the value of zero is displayed. This is an important piece of backup operation which might help you in planning maintenance windows. Successful Backup Operations Here is the expanded version of this section.   This information is derived from various backup tracking tables from msdb database.  Here is the simplified version of the query which can be used separately as well. SELECT * FROM sys.databases t1 INNER JOIN backupset t3 ON (t3.database_name = t1.name) LEFT OUTER JOIN backupmediaset t5 ON ( t3.media_set_id = t5.media_set_id) LEFT OUTER JOIN backupmediafamily t6 ON ( t6.media_set_id = t5.media_set_id) WHERE (t1.name = N'AdventureWorks2014') ORDER BY backup_start_date DESC,t3.backup_set_id,t6.physical_device_name; The report does some calculations to show the data in a more readable format. For example, the backup size is shown in KB, MB or GB. I have expanded first row by clicking on (+) on “Device type” column. That has shown me the path of the physical backup file. Personally looking at this section, the Backup Size, Device Type and Backup Name are critical and are worth a note. As mentioned in the previous section, this section also has the Duration embedded inside it. Backup Operation Errors This section of the report gets data from default trace. You might wonder how. One of the event which is tracked by default trace is “ErrorLog”. This means that whatever message is written to errorlog gets written to default trace file as well. Interestingly, whenever there is a backup failure, an error message is written to ERRORLOG and hence default trace. This section takes advantage of that and shows the information. We can read below message under this section, which confirms above logic. No backup operations errors occurred for (AdventureWorks2014) database in the recent past or default trace is not enabled. Successful Restore Operations This section may not be very useful in production server (do you perform a restore of database?) but might be useful in the development and log shipping secondary environment, where we might be interested to see restore operations for a particular database. Here is the expanded version of the section. To fill this section of the report, I have restored the same backups which were taken to populate earlier sections. Here is the simplified version of the query used to populate this output. USE msdb; SELECT * FROM restorehistory t1 LEFT OUTER JOIN restorefile t2 ON ( t1.restore_history_id = t2.restore_history_id) LEFT OUTER JOIN backupset t3 ON ( t1.backup_set_id = t3.backup_set_id) WHERE t1.destination_database_name = N'AdventureWorks2014' ORDER BY restore_date DESC,  t1.restore_history_id,t2.destination_phys_name Have you ever looked at the backup strategy of your key databases? Are they in sync and do we have scope for improvements? Then this is the report to analyze after a week or month of maintenance plans running in your database. Do chime in with what are the strategies you are using in your environments. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Backup and Restore, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Server Management Studio, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL Tagged: SQL Reports

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• SQLAuthority News – Storage and SQL Server Capacity Planning and configuration – SharePoint Server 2

  - by pinaldave

  Just a day ago, I was asked how do you plan SQL Server Storage Capacity. Here is the excellent article published by Microsoft regarding SQL Server capacity planning for SharePoint 2010. This article touches all the vital areas of this subject. Here are the bullet points for the same. Gather storage and SQL Server space and I/O requirements Choose SQL Server version and edition Design storage architecture based on capacity and IO requirements Determine memory requirements Understand network topology requirements Configure SQL Server Validate storage performance and reliability Read the original article published by Microsoft here: Storage and SQL Server Capacity Planning and configuration – SharePoint Server 2010. The question to all the SharePoint developers and administrator that if they use the whitepapers and articles to decide the capacity or they just start with application and as they progress they plan the storage? Please let me know your opinion. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Data Storage, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL White Papers, SQLAuthority News, T SQL, Technology Tagged: SharePoint

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• SQLAuthority News – Download Microsoft SQL Server 2012 RTM Now

  - by pinaldave

  SQL Server 2012 enables a cloud-ready information platform that will help organizations unlock breakthrough insights across the organization as well as quickly build solutions and extend data across on-premises and public cloud backed by capabilities for mission critical confidence: Deliver required uptime and data protection with AlwaysOn Gain breakthrough & predictable performance with ColumnStore Index Help enable security and compliance with new User-defined Roles and Default Schema for Groups Enable rapid data discovery for deeper insights across the organization with ColumnStore Index Ensure more credible, consistent data with SSIS improvements, a Master Data Services add-in for Excel, and new Data Quality Services Optimize IT and developer productivity across server and cloud with Data-tier Application Component (DAC) parity with SQL Azure and SQL Server Data Tools for a unified dev experience across database, BI, and cloud functions Download SQL Server 2012 RTM Download Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Feature Pack Download SQL Server Data Tools Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Documentation, SQL Download, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – History of SQL Server Database Encryption

  - by pinaldave

  I recently met Michael Coles and Rodeney Landrum the author of one of the kind book Expert SQL Server 2008 Encryption at SQLPASS in Seattle. During the conversation we ended up how Microsoft is evolving encryption technology. The same discussion lead to talking about history of encryption tools in SQL Server. Michale pointed me to page 18 of his book of encryption. He explicitly give me permission to re-produce relevant part of history from his book. Encryption in SQL Server 2000 Built-in cryptographic encryption functionality was nonexistent in SQL Server 2000 and prior versions. In order to get server-side encryption in SQL Server you had to resort to purchasing or creating your own SQL Server XPs. Creating your own cryptographic XPs could be a daunting task owing to the fact that XPs had to be compiled as native DLLs (using a language like C or C++) and the XP application programming interface (API) was poorly documented. In addition there were always concerns around creating wellbehaved XPs that “played nicely” with the SQL Server process. Encryption in SQL Server 2005 Prior to the release of SQL Server 2005 there was a flurry of regulatory activity in response to accounting scandals and attacks on repositories of confidential consumer data. Much of this regulation centered onthe need for protecting and controlling access to sensitive financial and consumer information. With the release of SQL Server 2005 Microsoft responded to the increasing demand for built-in encryption byproviding the necessary tools to encrypt data at the column level. This functionality prominently featured the following: Support for column-level encryption of data using symmetric keys or passphrases. Built-in access to a variety of symmetric and asymmetric encryption algorithms, including AES, DES, Triple DES, RC2, RC4, and RSA. Capability to create and manage symmetric keys. Key creation and management. Ability to generate asymmetric keys and self-signed certificates, or to install external asymmetric keys and certificates. Implementation of hierarchical model for encryption key management, similar to the ANSI X9.17 standard model. SQL functions to generate one-way hash codes and digital signatures, including SHA-1 and MD5 hashes. Additional SQL functions to encrypt and decrypt data. Extensions to the SQL language to support creation, use, and administration of encryption keys and certificates. SQL CLR extensions that provide access to .NET-based encryption functionality. Encryption in SQL Server 2008 Encryption demands have increased over the past few years. For instance, there has been a demand for the ability to store encryption keys “off-the-box,” physically separate from the database and the data it contains. Also there is a recognized requirement for legacy databases and applications to take advantage of encryption without changing the existing code base. To address these needs SQL Server 2008 adds the following features to its encryption arsenal: Transparent Data Encryption (TDE): Allows you to encrypt an entire database, including log files and the tempdb database, in such a way that it is transparent to client applications. Extensible Key Management (EKM): Allows you to store and manage your encryption keys on an external device known as a hardware security module (HSM). Cryptographic random number generation functionality. Additional cryptography-related catalog views and dynamic management views. SQL language extensions to support the new encryption functionality. The encryption book covers all the tools in its various chapter in one simple story. If you are interested how encryption evolved and reached to the stage where it is today, this book is must for everyone. You can read my earlier review of the book over here. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLAuthority Book Review, SQLAuthority News, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Encryption, SQL Server Encryption, SQLPASS

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• SQL SERVER – Standards Support, Protocol, Data Portability – 3 Important SQL Server Documentations for Downloads

  - by pinaldave

  I have been working with SQL Server for more than 8 years now continuously and I like to read a lot. Some time I read easy things and sometime I read stuff which are not so easy.  Here are few recently released article which I referred and read. They are not easy read but indeed very important read if you are the one who like to read things which are more advanced. SQL Server Standards Support Documentation The SQL Server standards support documentation provides detailed support information for certain standards that are implemented in Microsoft SQL Server. Microsoft SQL Server Protocol Documentation The Microsoft SQL Server protocol documentation provides technical specifications for Microsoft proprietary protocols that are implemented and used in Microsoft SQL Server 2008. Microsoft SQL Server Data Portability Documentation The SQL Server data portability documentation explains various mechanisms by which user-created data in SQL Server can be extracted for use in other software products. These mechanisms include import/export functionality, documented APIs, industry standard formats, or documented data structures/file formats. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Documentation, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• SQLAuthority News – Download SQL Server 2008 R2 Upgrade Technical Reference Guide

  - by pinaldave

  I recently come across very interesting white paper written for Microsoft by Solid Quality Mentors. A successful upgrade to SQL Server 2008 R2 should be smooth and trouble-free. To do that smooth transition, you must plan sufficiently for the upgrade and match the complexity of your database application. Otherwise, you risk costly and stressful errors and upgrade problems. SQL Server 2008 R2 Upgrade Technical Reference Guide is one of the best and comprehensive reference guide I have seen on the subject of SQL Server 2008 R2 upgrade. There are so many various subjects discussed about upgrade which one would always wanted to see. You can find the link of why one has to upgrade to SQL Server 2008 R2 over here: Why upgrade to SQL Server 2008 R2. White paper to upgrade to SQL Server 2008 R2 Upgrade Guide. Here is the quick list of content of the white paper. 1. Upgrade Planning and Deployment 2. Management and Development Tools 3. Relational Databases 4. High Availability 5. Database Security 6. Full-Text Search 7. Service Broker 8. Transact-SQL Queries 9. Notification Services 10. SQL Server Express 11. Analysis Services 12. Data Mining 13. Integration Services 14. Reporting Services 15. Other Microsoft Applications and Platforms Appendix 1: Version and Edition Upgrade Paths Appendix 2: Upgrade Planning Deployment and Tasks Checklist This white paper is indeed huge with 490 pages and 151,956 words.As I said, this is one of the most comprehensive white paper ever published on the subject. Just reading this white paper one can learn a lot about SQL Server. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Documentation, SQL Download, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQLAuthority News, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – Speed Up! – Parallel Processes and Unparalleled Performance – TechEd 2012 India

  - by pinaldave

  TechEd India 2012 is just around the corner and I will be presenting there on two different session. SQL Server Performance Tuning is a very challenging subject that requires expertise in Database Administration and Database Development. I always have enjoyed talking about SQL Server Performance tuning subject. Just like doctors I like to call my every attempt to improve the performance of SQL Server queries and database server as a practice too. I have been working with SQL Server for more than 8 years and I believe that many of the performance tuning concept I have mastered. However, performance tuning is not a simple subject. However there are occasions when I feel stumped, there are occasional when I am not sure what should be the next step. When I face situation where I cannot figure things out easily, it makes me most happy because I clearly see this as a learning opportunity. I have been presenting in TechEd India for last three years. This is my fourth time opportunity to present a technical session on SQL Server. Just like every other year, I decided to present something different, something which I have spend years of learning. This time, I am going to present about parallel processes. It is widely believed that more the CPU will improve performance of the server. It is true in many cases. However, there are cases when limiting the CPU usages have improved overall health of the server. I will be presenting on the subject of Parallel Processes and its effects. I have spent more than a year working on this subject only. After working on various queries on multi-CPU systems I have personally learned few things. In coming TechEd session, I am going to share my experience with parallel processes and performance tuning. Session Details Title: Speed Up! – Parallel Processes and Unparalleled Performance (Add to Calendar) Abstract: “More CPU More Performance” – A  very common understanding is that usage of multiple CPUs can improve the performance of the query. To get maximum performance out of any query – one has to master various aspects of the parallel processes. In this deep dive session, we will explore this complex subject with a very simple interactive demo. An attendee will walk away with proper understanding of CX_PACKET wait types, MAXDOP, parallelism threshold and various other concepts. Date and Time: March 23, 2012, 12:15 to 13:15 Location: Hotel Lalit Ashok - Kumara Krupa High Grounds, Bengaluru – 560001, Karnataka, India. Add to Calendar Please submit your questions in the comments area and I will be for sure discussing them during my session. If I pick your question to discuss during my session, here is your gift I commit right now – SQL Server Interview Questions and Answers Book. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Wait Stats, SQL Wait Types, T SQL, Technology Tagged: TechEd, TechEdIn

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• SQL SERVER – List All the DMV and DMF on Server

  - by pinaldave

  “How many DMVs and DVFs are there in SQL Server 2008?” – this question was asked to me in one of the recent SQL Server Trainings. Answer is very simple: SELECT name, type, type_desc FROM sys.system_objects WHERE name LIKE 'dm_%' ORDER BY name Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology Tagged: SQL DMV

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• SQL SERVER – Guest Posts – Feodor Georgiev – The Context of Our Database Environment – Going Beyond the Internal SQL Server Waits – Wait Type – Day 21 of 28

  - by pinaldave

  This guest post is submitted by Feodor. Feodor Georgiev is a SQL Server database specialist with extensive experience of thinking both within and outside the box. He has wide experience of different systems and solutions in the fields of architecture, scalability, performance, etc. Feodor has experience with SQL Server 2000 and later versions, and is certified in SQL Server 2008. In this article Feodor explains the server-client-server process, and concentrated on the mutual waits between client and SQL Server. This is essential in grasping the concept of waits in a ‘global’ application plan. Recently I was asked to write a blog post about the wait statistics in SQL Server and since I had been thinking about writing it for quite some time now, here it is. It is a wide-spread idea that the wait statistics in SQL Server will tell you everything about your performance. Well, almost. Or should I say – barely. The reason for this is that SQL Server is always a part of a bigger system – there are always other players in the game: whether it is a client application, web service, any other kind of data import/export process and so on. In short, the SQL Server surroundings look like this: This means that SQL Server, aside from its internal waits, also depends on external waits and settings. As we can see in the picture above, SQL Server needs to have an interface in order to communicate with the surrounding clients over the network. For this communication, SQL Server uses protocol interfaces. I will not go into detail about which protocols are best, but you can read this article. Also, review the information about the TDS (Tabular data stream). As we all know, our system is only as fast as its slowest component. This means that when we look at our environment as a whole, the SQL Server might be a victim of external pressure, no matter how well we have tuned our database server performance. Let’s dive into an example: let’s say that we have a web server, hosting a web application which is using data from our SQL Server, hosted on another server. The network card of the web server for some reason is malfunctioning (think of a hardware failure, driver failure, or just improper setup) and does not send/receive data faster than 10Mbs. On the other end, our SQL Server will not be able to send/receive data at a faster rate either. This means that the application users will notify the support team and will say: “My data is coming very slow.” Now, let’s move on to a bit more exciting example: imagine that there is a similar setup as the example above – one web server and one database server, and the application is not using any stored procedure calls, but instead for every user request the application is sending 80kb query over the network to the SQL Server. (I really thought this does not happen in real life until I saw it one day.) So, what happens in this case? To make things worse, let’s say that the 80kb query text is submitted from the application to the SQL Server at least 100 times per minute, and as often as 300 times per minute in peak times. Here is what happens: in order for this query to reach the SQL Server, it will have to be broken into a of number network packets (according to the packet size settings) – and will travel over the network. On the other side, our SQL Server network card will receive the packets, will pass them to our network layer, the packets will get assembled, and eventually SQL Server will start processing the query – parsing, allegorizing, generating the query execution plan and so on. So far, we have already had a serious network overhead by waiting for the packets to reach our Database Engine. There will certainly be some processing overhead – until the database engine deals with the 80kb query and its 20 subqueries. The waits you see in the DMVs are actually collected from the point the query reaches the SQL Server and the packets are assembled. Let’s say that our query is processed and it finally returns 15000 rows. These rows have a certain size as well, depending on the data types returned. This means that the data will have converted to packages (depending on the network size package settings) and will have to reach the application server. There will also be waits, however, this time you will be able to see a wait type in the DMVs called ASYNC_NETWORK_IO. What this wait type indicates is that the client is not consuming the data fast enough and the network buffers are filling up. Recently Pinal Dave posted a blog on Client Statistics. What Client Statistics does is captures the physical flow characteristics of the query between the client(Management Studio, in this case) and the server and back to the client. As you see in the image, there are three categories: Query Profile Statistics, Network Statistics and Time Statistics. Number of server roundtrips–a roundtrip consists of a request sent to the server and a reply from the server to the client. For example, if your query has three select statements, and they are separated by ‘GO’ command, then there will be three different roundtrips. TDS Packets sent from the client – TDS (tabular data stream) is the language which SQL Server speaks, and in order for applications to communicate with SQL Server, they need to pack the requests in TDS packets. TDS Packets sent from the client is the number of packets sent from the client; in case the request is large, then it may need more buffers, and eventually might even need more server roundtrips. TDS packets received from server –is the TDS packets sent by the server to the client during the query execution. Bytes sent from client – is the volume of the data set to our SQL Server, measured in bytes; i.e. how big of a query we have sent to the SQL Server. This is why it is best to use stored procedures, since the reusable code (which already exists as an object in the SQL Server) will only be called as a name of procedure + parameters, and this will minimize the network pressure. Bytes received from server – is the amount of data the SQL Server has sent to the client, measured in bytes. Depending on the number of rows and the datatypes involved, this number will vary. But still, think about the network load when you request data from SQL Server. Client processing time – is the amount of time spent in milliseconds between the first received response packet and the last received response packet by the client. Wait time on server replies – is the time in milliseconds between the last request packet which left the client and the first response packet which came back from the server to the client. Total execution time – is the sum of client processing time and wait time on server replies (the SQL Server internal processing time) Here is an illustration of the Client-server communication model which should help you understand the mutual waits in a client-server environment. Keep in mind that a query with a large ‘wait time on server replies’ means the server took a long time to produce the very first row. This is usual on queries that have operators that need the entire sub-query to evaluate before they proceed (for example, sort and top operators). However, a query with a very short ‘wait time on server replies’ means that the query was able to return the first row fast. However a long ‘client processing time’ does not necessarily imply the client spent a lot of time processing and the server was blocked waiting on the client. It can simply mean that the server continued to return rows from the result and this is how long it took until the very last row was returned. The bottom line is that developers and DBAs should work together and think carefully of the resource utilization in the client-server environment. From experience I can say that so far I have seen only cases when the application developers and the Database developers are on their own and do not ask questions about the other party’s world. I would recommend using the Client Statistics tool during new development to track the performance of the queries, and also to find a synchronous way of utilizing resources between the client – server – client. Here is another example: think about similar setup as above, but add another server to the game. Let’s say that we keep our media on a separate server, and together with the data from our SQL Server we need to display some images on the webpage requested by our user. No matter how simple or complicated the logic to get the images is, if the images are 500kb each our users will get the page slowly and they will still think that there is something wrong with our data. Anyway, I don’t mean to get carried away too far from SQL Server. Instead, what I would like to say is that DBAs should also be aware of ‘the big picture’. I wrote a blog post a while back on this topic, and if you are interested, you can read it here about the big picture. And finally, here are some guidelines for monitoring the network performance and improving it: Run a trace and outline all queries that return more than 1000 rows (in Profiler you can actually filter and sort the captured trace by number of returned rows). This is not a set number; it is more of a guideline. The general thought is that no application user can consume that many rows at once. Ask yourself and your fellow-developers: ‘why?’. Monitor your network counters in Perfmon: Network Interface:Output queue length, Redirector:Network errors/sec, TCPv4: Segments retransmitted/sec and so on. Make sure to establish a good friendship with your network administrator (buy them coffee, for example J ) and get into a conversation about the network settings. Have them explain to you how the network cards are setup – are they standalone, are they ‘teamed’, what are the settings – full duplex and so on. Find some time to read a bit about networking. In this short blog post I hope I have turned your attention to ‘the big picture’ and the fact that there are other factors affecting our SQL Server, aside from its internal workings. As a further reading I would still highly recommend the Wait Stats series on this blog, also I would recommend you have the coffee break conversation with your network admin as soon as possible. This guest post is written by Feodor Georgiev. Read all the post in the Wait Types and Queue series. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, PostADay, Readers Contribution, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Wait Stats, SQL Wait Types, T SQL

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• SQL SERVER – 2011 – Wait Type – Day 25 of 28

  - by pinaldave

  Since the beginning of the series, I have been getting the following question again and again: “What are the changes in SQL Server 2011 – Denali with respect to Wait Types?” SQL Server 2011 – Denali is yet to be released, and making statements on the subject will be inappropriate. Denali CTP1 has been released so I suggest that all of you download the same and experiment on it. I quickly compared the wait stats of SQL Server 2008 R2 and Denali (CTP1) and found the following changes: Wait Types Exists in SQL Server 2008 R2 and Not Exists in SQL Server 2011 “Denali” SOS_RESERVEDMEMBLOCKLIST SOS_LOCALALLOCATORLIST QUERY_WAIT_ERRHDL_SERVICE QUERY_ERRHDL_SERVICE_DONE XE_PACKAGE_LOCK_BACKOFF Wait Types Exists in SQL Server 2011 and Not Exists in SQL Server 2008 SLEEP_MASTERMDREADY SOS_MEMORY_TOPLEVELBLOCKALLOCATOR SOS_PHYS_PAGE_CACHE FILESTREAM_WORKITEM_QUEUE FILESTREAM_FILE_OBJECT FILESTREAM_FCB FILESTREAM_CACHE XE_CALLBACK_LIST PWAIT_MD_RELATION_CACHE PWAIT_MD_SERVER_CACHE PWAIT_MD_LOGIN_STATS DISPATCHER_PRIORITY_QUEUE_SEMAPHORE FT_PROPERTYLIST_CACHE SECURITY_KEYRING_RWLOCK BROKER_TRANSMISSION_WORK BROKER_TRANSMISSION_OBJECT BROKER_TRANSMISSION_TABLE BROKER_DISPATCHER BROKER_FORWARDER UCS_MANAGER UCS_TRANSPORT UCS_MEMORY_NOTIFICATION UCS_ENDPOINT_CHANGE UCS_TRANSPORT_STREAM_CHANGE QUERY_TASK_ENQUEUE_MUTEX DBCC_SCALE_OUT_EXPR_CACHE PWAIT_ALL_COMPONENTS_INITIALIZED PREEMPTIVE_SP_SERVER_DIAGNOSTICS SP_SERVER_DIAGNOSTICS_SLEEP SP_SERVER_DIAGNOSTICS_INIT_MUTEX AM_INDBUILD_ALLOCATION QRY_PARALLEL_THREAD_MUTEX FT_MASTER_MERGE_COORDINATOR PWAIT_RESOURCE_SEMAPHORE_FT_PARALLEL_QUERY_SYNC REDO_THREAD_PENDING_WORK REDO_THREAD_SYNC COUNTRECOVERYMGR HADR_DB_COMMAND HADR_TRANSPORT_SESSION HADR_CLUSAPI_CALL PWAIT_HADR_CHANGE_NOTIFIER_TERMINATION_SYNC PWAIT_HADR_ACTION_COMPLETED PWAIT_HADR_OFFLINE_COMPLETED PWAIT_HADR_ONLINE_COMPLETED PWAIT_HADR_FORCEFAILOVER_COMPLETED PWAIT_HADR_WORKITEM_COMPLETED HADR_WORK_POOL HADR_WORK_QUEUE HADR_LOGCAPTURE_SYNC LOGPOOL_CACHESIZE LOGPOOL_FREEPOOLS LOGPOOL_REPLACEMENTSET LOGPOOL_CONSUMERSET LOGPOOL_MGRSET LOGPOOL_CONSUMER LOGPOOLREFCOUNTEDOBJECT_REFDONE HADR_SYNC_COMMIT HADR_AG_MUTEX PWAIT_SECURITY_CACHE_INVALIDATION PWAIT_HADR_SERVER_READY_CONNECTIONS HADR_FILESTREAM_MANAGER HADR_FILESTREAM_BLOCK_FLUSH HADR_FILESTREAM_IOMGR XDES_HISTORY XDES_SNAPSHOT HADR_FILESTREAM_IOMGR_IOCOMPLETION UCS_SESSION_REGISTRATION ENABLE_EMPTY_VERSIONING HADR_DB_OP_START_SYNC HADR_DB_OP_COMPLETION_SYNC HADR_LOGPROGRESS_SYNC HADR_TRANSPORT_DBRLIST HADR_FAILOVER_PARTNER XDESTSVERMGR GHOSTCLEANUPSYNCMGR HADR_AR_UNLOAD_COMPLETED HADR_PARTNER_SYNC HADR_DBSTATECHANGE_SYNC We already know that Wait Types and Wait Stats are going to be the next big thing in the next version of SQL Server. So now I am eagerly waiting to dig deeper in the wait stats. Read all the post in the Wait Types and Queue series. Note: The information presented here is from my experience and there is no way that I claim it to be accurate. I suggest reading Book OnLine for further clarification. All the discussion of Wait Stats in this blog is generic and varies from system to system. It is recommended that you test this on a development server before implementing it to a production server. 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

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• SQLAuthority News – Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Service Pack 1 Released (SP1)

  - by pinaldave

  Last week, I was attending SQLPASS 2012 and I had great fun attending the event. During the event long awaited SQL Serer 2012 Service Pack 1 was released. I am pretty excited with SP1 as new service packs are cumulative updates and upgrade all editions and service levels of SQL Server 2012 to SP1. This service pack contains SQL Server 2012 Cumulative Update 1 (CU1) and Cumulative Update 2 (CU2). The latest SP1 has many new and enhanced features. Here are a few for example: Cross-Cluster Migration of AlwaysOn Availability Groups for OS Upgrade Selective XML Index DBCC SHOW_STATISTICS works with SELECT permission New function returns statistics properties – sys.dm_db_stats_properties SSMS Complete in Express SlipStream Full Installation Business Intelligence highlights with Office and SharePoint Server 2013 Management Object Support Added for Resource Governor DDL Please note that the size of the service pack is near 1 GB. Here is the link to SQL Server 2012 Service Pack 1. SQL Server Express is the free and feature rich edition of the SQL Server. It is used with lightweight website and desktop applications. Here is the link to SQL Server 2012 EXPRESS Service Pack 1. Here is the question for you – how long have you been using SQL Server 2012? Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Documentation, SQL Download, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology Tagged: Service Pack

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• SQLAuthority News – Scaling Up Your Data Warehouse with SQL Server 2008 R2

  - by pinaldave

  Data Warehouses are suppose to be containing huge amount of the data from the beginning. However, there are cases when too big is not enough. Every Data Warehouse Admin will agree that they have faced situation where they will need to scale up their data warehouse. Microsoft has released white paper discussing the same. Here is the abstract from the Microsoft Official site: SQL Server 2008 introduced many new functional and performance improvements for data warehousing, and SQL Server 2008 R2 includes all these and more. This paper discusses how to use SQL Server 2008 R2 to get great performance as your data warehouse scales up. We present lessons learned during extensive internal data warehouse testing on a 64-core HP Integrity Superdome during the development of the SQL Server 2008 release, and via production experience with large-scale SQL Server customers. Our testing indicates that many customers can expect their performance to nearly double on the same hardware they are currently using, merely by upgrading to SQL Server 2008 R2 from SQL Server 2005 or earlier, and compressing their fact tables. We cover techniques to improve manageability and performance at high-scale, encompassing data loading (extract, transform, load), query processing, partitioning, index maintenance, indexed view (aggregate) management, and backup and restore. Scaling Up Your Data Warehouse with SQL Server 2008 R2 Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com)   Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Documentation, SQL Download, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – 3 Challenges for DBA and Smart Solutions

  - by Pinal Dave

  Developer’s life is never easy. DBA’s life is even crazier. DBA’s Life When a developer wakes up in the morning, most of the time have no idea what different challenges they are going to face that day. Of course, most of the developers know the project and roadmap, which they are working on. However, developers have no clue what coding challenges which they are going face for that day. DBA’s life is even crazier. When DBA wakes up in the morning – they often thank that they were not disturbed during the night due to server issues. The very next thing they wish is that they do not want to challenge which they can’t solve for that day. The problems DBA face every single day are mostly unpredictable and they just have to solve them as they come during the day. Though the life of DBA is not always bad. There are always ways and methods how one can overcome various challenges. Let us see three of the challenges and how a DBA can use various tools to overcome them. Challenge #1 Synchronize Data Across Server A Very common challenge DBA receive is that they have to synchronize the data across the servers. If you try to manually write that up, it may take forever to accomplish the task. It is nearly impossible to do the same with the help of the T-SQL. However, thankfully there are tools like dbForge Studio which can save a day and synchronize data across servers. Read my detailed blog post about the same over here: SQL SERVER – Synchronize Data Exclusively with T-SQL. Challenge #2 SQL Report Builder DBA’s are often asked to build reports on the go. It really annoys DBA’s, but hardly people care about it. No matter how busy a DBA is, they are just called upon to build reports on things on very short notice. I personally like to avoid any task which is given to me accidently and personally building report can be boring. I rather spend time with High Availability, disaster recovery, performance tuning rather than building report. I use SQL third party tool when I have to work with SQL Report. Others have extended reporting capabilities. The latter group of products includes the SQL report builder built-in todbForge Studio for SQL Server. I have blogged about this earlier over here: SQL SERVER – SQL Report Builder in dbForge Studio for SQL Server. Challenge #3 Work with the OTHER Database The manager does not understand that MySQL is different from SQL Server and SQL Server is different from Oracle. For them everything is same. In my career hundreds of times I have faced a situation that I am given a database to manage or do some task when their regular DBA is on vacation or leave. When I try to explain I do not understand the underlying the technology, I have been usually told that my manager has trust on me and I can do anything. Honestly, I can’t but I hardly dare to argue. I fall back on the third party tool to manage database when it is not in my comfort zone. For example, I was once given MySQL performance tuning task (at that time I did not know MySQL so well). To simplify search for a problem query let us use MySQL Profiler in dbForge Studio for MySQL. It provides such commands as a Query Profiling Mode and Generate Execution Plan. Here is the blog post discussing about the same: MySQL – Profiler : A Simple and Convenient Tool for Profiling SQL Queries. Well, that’s it! There were many different such occasions when I have been saved by the tool. May be some other day I will write part 2 of this blog post. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)Filed under: MySQL, PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Utility, T SQL Tagged: Devart, SQL Tool

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• SQL SERVER – Sends backups to a Network Folder, FTP Server, Dropbox, Google Drive or Amazon S3

  - by pinaldave

  Let me tell you about one of the most useful SQL tools that every DBA should use – it is SQLBackupAndFTP. I have been using this tool since 2009 – and it is the first program I install on a SQL server. Download a free version, 1 minute configuration and your daily backups are safe in the cloud. In summary, SQLBackupAndFTP Creates SQL Server database and file backups on schedule Compresses and encrypts the backups Sends backups to a network folder, FTP Server, Dropbox, Google Drive or Amazon S3 Sends email notifications of job’s success or failure SQLBackupAndFTP comes in Free and Paid versions (starting from $29) – see version comparison. Free version is fully functional for unlimited ad hoc backups or for scheduled backups of up to two databases – it will be sufficient for many small customers. What has impressed me from the beginning – is that I understood how it works and was able to configure the job from a single form (see Image 1 – Main form above) Connect to you SQL server and select databases to be backed up Click “Add backup destination” to configure where backups should go to (network, FTP Server, Dropbox, Google Drive or Amazon S3) Enter your email to receive email confirmations Set the time to start daily full backups (or go to Settings if you need Differential or  Transaction Log backups on a flexible schedule) Press “Run Now” button to test You can get to this form if you click “Settings” buttons in the “Schedule section”. Select what types of backups and how often you want to run them and you will see the scheduled backups in the “Estimated backup plan” list A detailed tutorial is available on the developer’s website. Along with SQLBackupAndFTP setup gives you the option to install “One-Click SQL Restore” (you can install it stand-alone too) – a basic tool for restoring just Full backups. However basic, you can drag-and-drop on it the zip file created by SQLBackupAndFTP, it unzips the BAK file if necessary, connects to the SQL server on the start, selects the right database, it is smart enough to restart the server to drop open connections if necessary – very handy for developers who need to restore databases often. You may ask why is this tool is better than maintenance tasks available in SQL Server? While maintenance tasks are easy to set up, SQLBackupAndFTP is still way easier and integrates solution for compression, encryption, FTP, cloud storage and email which make it superior to maintenance tasks in every aspect. On a flip side SQLBackupAndFTP is not the fanciest tool to manage backups or check their health. It only works reliably on local SQL Server instances. In other words it has to be installed on the SQL server itself. For remote servers it uses scripting which is less reliable. This limitations is actually inherent in SQL server itself as BACKUP DATABASE command  creates backup not on the client, but on the server itself. This tool is compatible with almost all the known SQL Server versions. It works with SQL Server 2008 (all versions) and many of the previous versions. It is especially useful for SQL Server Express 2005 and SQL Server Express 2008, as they lack built in tools for backup. I strongly recommend this tool to all the DBAs. They must absolutely try it as it is free and does exactly what it promises. You can download your free copy of the tool from here. Please share your experience about using this tool. I am eager to receive your feedback regarding this article. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com)   Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Backup and Restore, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Utility, SQLServer, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – Script to Find First Day of Current Month

  - by Pinal Dave

  Earlier I wrote a blog post about SQL SERVER – Query to Find First and Last Day of Current Month and it is a very popular post. In this post, I convert the datetime to Varchar and later on use it. However, SQL Expert Michael Usov has made a good point suggesting that it is not always a good idea to convert datetime to any other date format as it is quite possible that we may need it the value in the datetime format for other operation. He has suggested a very quick solution where we can get the first day of the current month with or without time value and keep them with datatype datetime. Here is the simple script for the same. -- first day of month -- with time zeroed out SELECT CAST(DATEADD(DAY,-DAY(GETDATE())+1, CAST(GETDATE() AS DATE)) AS DATETIME) -- with time as it was SELECT DATEADD(DAY,-DAY(GETDATE())+1, CAST(GETDATE() AS DATETIME)) Here is the resultset: 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

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• SQL SERVER – What is Incremental Statistics? – Performance improvements in SQL Server 2014 – Part 1

  - by Pinal Dave

  This is the first part of the series Incremental Statistics. Here is the index of the complete series. What is Incremental Statistics? – Performance improvements in SQL Server 2014 – Part 1 Simple Example of Incremental Statistics – Performance improvements in SQL Server 2014 – Part 2 DMV to Identify Incremental Statistics – Performance improvements in SQL Server 2014 – Part 3 Statistics are considered one of the most important aspects of SQL Server Performance Tuning. You might have often heard the phrase, with related to performance tuning. “Update Statistics before you take any other steps to tune performance”. Honestly, I have said above statement many times and many times, I have personally updated statistics before I start to do any performance tuning exercise. You may agree or disagree to the point, but there is no denial that Statistics play an extremely vital role in the performance tuning. SQL Server 2014 has a new feature called Incremental Statistics. I have been playing with this feature for quite a while and I find that very interesting. After spending some time with this feature, I decided to write about this subject over here. New in SQL Server 2014 – Incremental Statistics Well, it seems like lots of people wants to start using SQL Server 2014′s new feature of Incremetnal Statistics. However, let us understand what actually this feature does and how it can help. I will try to simplify this feature first before I start working on the demo code. Code for all versions of SQL Server Here is the code which you can execute on all versions of SQL Server and it will update the statistics of your table. The keyword which you should pay attention is WITH FULLSCAN. It will scan the entire table and build brand new statistics for you which your SQL Server Performance Tuning engine can use for better estimation of your execution plan. UPDATE STATISTICS TableName(StatisticsName) WITH FULLSCAN Who should learn about this? Why? If you are using partitions in your database, you should consider about implementing this feature. Otherwise, this feature is pretty much not applicable to you. Well, if you are using single partition and your table data is in a single place, you still have to update your statistics the same way you have been doing. If you are using multiple partitions, this may be a very useful feature for you. In most cases, users have multiple partitions because they have lots of data in their table. Each partition will have data which belongs to itself. Now it is very common that each partition are populated separately in SQL Server. Real World Example For example, if your table contains data which is related to sales, you will have plenty of entries in your table. It will be a good idea to divide the partition into multiple filegroups for example, you can divide this table into 3 semesters or 4 quarters or even 12 months. Let us assume that we have divided our table into 12 different partitions. Now for the month of January, our first partition will be populated and for the month of February our second partition will be populated. Now assume, that you have plenty of the data in your first and second partition. Now the month of March has just started and your third partition has started to populate. Due to some reason, if you want to update your statistics, what will you do? In SQL Server 2012 and earlier version You will just use the code of WITH FULLSCAN and update the entire table. That means even though you have only data in third partition you will still update the entire table. This will be VERY resource intensive process as you will be updating the statistics of the partition 1 and 2 where data has not changed at all. In SQL Server 2014 You will just update the partition of Partition 3. There is a special syntax where you can now specify which partition you want to update now. The impact of this is that it is smartly merging the new data with old statistics and update the entire statistics without doing FULLSCAN of your entire table. This has a huge impact on performance. Remember that the new feature in SQL Server 2014 does not change anything besides the capability to update a single partition. However, there is one feature which is indeed attractive. Previously, when table data were changed 20% at that time, statistics update were triggered. However, now the same threshold is applicable to a single partition. That means if your partition faces 20% data, change it will also trigger partition level statistics update which, when merged to your final statistics will give you better performance. In summary If you are not using a partition, this feature is not applicable to you. If you are using a partition, this feature can be very helpful to you. Tomorrow: We will see working code of SQL Server 2014 Incremental Statistics. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com)Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Performance, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL Tagged: SQL Statistics, Statistics

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• SQL SERVER – What is AdventureWorks?

  - by pinaldave

  NOTE: If you know the answer of this question, then I request you to stop reading this post right now. Please do not leave comment about this blog post not being useful to you, if you knew the answer. Few days ago, I received DM asking What is an AdventureWorks database and why in all the examples I use that instead of any other database (e.g. Pubs or  Northwind)? As matter of fact, when I went back to my question list, which I have yet not answered, there were a few more variations of this same question. AdventureWorks is a Sample Database shipped with SQL Server and it can be downloaded from http://codeplex.com site. AdventureWorks has replaced Northwind and Pubs from the sample database in SQL Server 2005. The Microsoft team keeps updating the sample database as they release new versions. Here are some quick links: AdventureWorks SQL Server 2008 SR4 AdventureWorks 2008R2 November CTP AdventureWorks for SQL Azure (December CTP) AventureWorks for SQL Server 2005 SP2A SQL SERVER – 2008 – Download and Install Samples Database AdventureWorks 2005 – Detail Tutorial I have previously written few other articles on the same subject; you can find them easily here: [email protected] Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Documentation, SQL Download, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – Information Related to DATETIME and DATETIME2

  - by pinaldave

  I recently received interesting comment on the blog regarding workaround to overcome the precision issue while dealing with DATETIME and DATETIME2. I have written over this subject earlier over here. SQL SERVER – Difference Between GETDATE and SYSDATETIME SQL SERVER – Difference Between DATETIME and DATETIME2 – WITH GETDATE SQL SERVER – Difference Between DATETIME and DATETIME2 SQL Expert Jing Sheng Zhong has left following comment: The issue you found in SQL server new datetime type is related time source function precision. Folks have found the root reason of the problem – when data time values are converted (implicit or explicit) between different data type, which would lose some precision, so the result cannot match each other as thought. Here I would like to gave a work around solution to solve the problem which the developers met. -- Declare and loop DECLARE @Intveral INT, @CurDate DATETIMEOFFSET; CREATE TABLE #TimeTable (FirstDate DATETIME, LastDate DATETIME2, GlobalDate DATETIMEOFFSET) SET @Intveral = 10000 WHILE (@Intveral > 0) BEGIN ----SET @CurDate = SYSDATETIMEOFFSET(); -- higher precision for future use only SET @CurDate = TODATETIMEOFFSET(GETDATE(),DATEDIFF(N,GETUTCDATE(),GETDATE())); -- lower precision to match exited date process INSERT #TimeTable (FirstDate, LastDate, GlobalDate) VALUES (@CurDate, @CurDate, @CurDate) SET @Intveral = @Intveral - 1 END GO -- Distinct Values SELECT COUNT(DISTINCT FirstDate) D_DATETIME, COUNT(DISTINCT LastDate) D_DATETIME2, COUNT(DISTINCT GlobalDate) D_SYSGETDATE FROM #TimeTable GO -- Join SELECT DISTINCT a.FirstDate,b.LastDate, b.GlobalDate, CAST(b.GlobalDate AS DATETIME) GlobalDateASDateTime FROM #TimeTable a INNER JOIN #TimeTable b ON a.FirstDate = CAST(b.GlobalDate AS DATETIME) GO -- Select SELECT * FROM #TimeTable GO -- Clean up DROP TABLE #TimeTable GO If you read my blog SQL SERVER – Difference Between DATETIME and DATETIME2 you will notice that I have achieved the same using GETDATE(). Are you using DATETIME2 in your production environment? If yes, I am interested to know the use case. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://www.SQLAuthority.com) Filed under: Pinal Dave, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL DateTime, SQL Query, SQL Scripts, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, T SQL, Technology

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• SQL SERVER – Four Tutorial for SQL Server 2012 New Features

  - by pinaldave

  One of the very common question I receive on my facebook is that if there is any tutorial for SQL Server 2012 new enhanced features and solutions. I see this demand a bit increasing as the SQL Server 2012 is more and more being adopted. Here is the list of four tutorial which is specifically created for SQL Server 2012 by Microsoft. Multidimensional Modeling (Adventure Works Tutorial) This tutorial teaches you how to develop and deploy an Analysis Services project that enables the employees of Adventure Works Cycles to analyze various aspects of their business. Tabular Modeling (Adventure Works Tutorial) This tutorial teaches you how to create a SQL Server 2012 Analysis Services tabular model that enable sales and marketing teams to easily analyze internet sales data in the AdventureWorksDW2012 data warehouse. You will build the tabular model in SQL Server Data Tools. Tutorials and Demos for Power View Create Power View reports and explore Power View features. View demos, videos, and tutorials that help you get started quickly with Power View and successfully build reports with interactive filters and visualizations such as bubble charts, tiles, and cards. Tutorial: Using the hierarchyid Data Type This tutorial is intended for users who are experienced with Transact-SQL, but are new to the hierarchyid data type. In this tutorial, you convert an existing table to a hierarchical structure, and you also create a new table to store and manage hierarchical data efficiently. Note: The description of the course is taken from original course description. You will need to install SQL Server 2012 AdventureWorks for all this tutorial. Reference: Pinal Dave (http://blog.sqlauthority.com) Filed under: PostADay, SQL, SQL Authority, SQL Query, SQL Server, SQL Tips and Tricks, SQL Training, T SQL, Technology

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