SQL Server and Cloud Links for the Week

SQL Server Links

How to do a rolling upgrade with SQL 2008 slipstreams – it’s as easy as 1-2-3-4-5-6! What could go wrong?

Managing your transaction logs – Mike Walsh gives tips on how to keep your transaction logs at a manageable size.

What is the DBA role? – a short overview of what DBAs do in their daily work.

Risks of EXECUTE AS – SQLBatman finds yet more crappy vendor code.  The fun never ends.  (Fun when you’re not involved, anyway.)

Fastest way to count rows – Gail gives yet another wonderful start-to-finish explanation with sample code.

PASS Update from Andy Warren – the latest news on the Professional Association of SQL Server.

Cloud and Virtualization Links

Iomega StorCenter IX4-200R

Iomega released a new “low-end” iSCSI SAN – and it’s on the VMware ESX hardware compatibility list, which is a really big deal. You can preorder the StorCenter Pro ix4-200r with 2TB for $1800, but that’s not exactly low-end, and you can’t get an empty version with no hard drives.  I’m heartbroken because I’ve been hoping to pick up one of their older 2-drive StorCenter ix2’s for $270, which is also on the VMware hardware compatibility list, but it doesn’t include iSCSI.  If you want to build a cheap home VMware ESX lab and you can live without iSCSI support, the StorCenter ix2 is a great way to do it.  Rumors have circled for months about the ix2 supporting iSCSI “soon”, but Stephen Foskett says it’s not coming.

Next week, VMware’s doing a big announcement of their next version of ESX.

The Junk Drawer

New Laptop Hunters ad – something about this one is a little different than the last three.  Can’t quite put my finger on it.  Speaking of which, Google is losing $1.65m per day on YouTube.

7 Deadly Sins of Networking – including things like “Making introductions on behalf of people you can’t vouch for.”  Amen.  I’ve learned some of these the hard way.

Apple, Your Mighty Mouse Sucks – yes, yes it does.  I’ve got one of these.  Don’t fall for the sexy shell – they burn batteries like crazy, and the awesome scroll nub on the top gets clogged up with, uh, stuff.  Yeah.  Stuff.

Free songs at Amazon – Amazon sells MP3s, and at any given time they’ve got a bunch available for free. I would have guessed they’d all be people I’d never heard of, but they had Los Fabulosos Cadillacs, Death Cab for Cutie, Robyn Hitchcock and Ra Ra Riot on the very first page. Nice.

InformationWeek says 83% of business aren’t going for Windows 7 – for the first year.  That’s a shame – 7 is so much better than Vista that I’m quite excited to pick up a netbook with it.  No April Fool’s joke there.