SQL Server Links
Kick Your Assumptions – Jimmy May explains why sys.dm_db_index_operational_stats doesn’t include information about every index, despite what Books Online says (and what I thought.)
The Importance of Regular Consistency Checks – Paul Randal reveals survey results about how often people are running DBCCs, and explain why they should be run more often.
Complimenting Your Skills and DBA Compliments – Colin Stasiuk and Jason Massie talk about the kinds of skills you should consider learning to augment your database administration abilities.
PASS is Relaunching Their Magazine – Grant Fritchey will be editing the new SQL Server Standard Magazine, and they’re looking for writers.
Is That Table Being Used? – Denis Gobo uses the DMVs to find out which tables are being queried.
Rome Wasn’t Built in 15 Minutes – Allan Hirt goes off about why good things take time and planning.
SQL Server Memory Models Part 1 – in which the Microsoft Premier Field Engineers take you to school.
Do Small Tables Need Indexes? – Simon Sabin answers with demo scripts.
New Training Videos
How to Audit Your SQL Server – Colin steps through all of the pre-2008 options, and then demos SQL Server 2008 auditing.
Troubleshooting the SQL Server Service – Denny Cherry and Trent Mera show how to troubleshoot the service when it won’t start.
Backing Up Big SharePoint & Encrypted Databases with Differentials – Backing up databases with a lot of binary data (images, documents, files) like SharePoint or fax software can be painful. Same with encrypted data, too. Brent Ozar and David Swanson explain how you can use differential backups to achieve compression in these normally incompressible environments.
Cloud and Virtualization Links
The Biggest Cloud Computing Pitfall – Jason Massie believes the problem isn’t security, but more like vendor lock-in. If you code your application for proprietary cloud tools like Amazon SimpleDB, you can face lock-in, making it much tougher to change vendors.
Real World Azure with Microsoft IT – Microsoft’s doing a tour and they’re coming to a town near you! Two sessions per day – a morning one for IT people, and an afternoon one for developers. I’ll be at the Grand Rapids ones on 9/16.
The Junk Drawer
XKCD Says Linux is Finally Ready for the Desktop
Seth Godin Webcast You Must Watch – Seth is a genius and a hell of a presenter, and this particular one is about why marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department. Bonus points for working in Jimmy Buffett and Parrotheads. Funny quote: “Do you remember when tofu only came in two flavors, Plain and Extra Plain?”
How To Know if a Company Is First-Rate or Second-Rate – Jay Grieves has an awesome article here with the line, “When you find a second-rate system that the company won’t fix, you know that you’re not dealing with a first-rate company and you need to stop treating them as such.” Brilliant.
StackOverflow Birthday – StackOverflow is one year old this week.
DFS Replication Tips – Windows Distributed File System is a really cool way to synchronize your SQL Server backups across multiple locations without lifting a finger. Kendal Van Dyke writes about things I wish I’d have known when I started using DFS. (I still have a borked share on my domain controller from this.)
Facebook Now 4th Largest Site in World – they surpassed Wikipedia, and now they’re only behind Google, Microsoft and Yahoo.
Get Into the Top Ten Percent – Steve Jones tells you how to get your resume onto the top of the stack.
Your Robot Tripod is Trying to Get You Fired – Sony’s new tripod moves the camera around, recognizes faces, composes images and takes pictures automatically. If only these took SD cards, you could hook it up to an EyeFi card that automatically uploads your photos whenever you’re within WiFi range. Leave one of these bad boys running during your next drunken shindig, and capture the moment that you’ll always regret.
