Month: January 2012

Brent, Kendra and Jeremiah with Amit Bansal at #SQLBaremetal

SQL Server 2012 BareMetal Workshop

Last Updated January 27, 2012

Last week Brent, Jeremiah and Kendra attended the SQL Server 2012 BareMetal workshop at Microsoft Headquarters. This was a special train-the-trainer style event where Microsoft Program Manager Dandy Weyn (blog | twitter) brought MVPs, Microsoft employees, and MCMs together. We talked about implementing SQL Server, training the community to use new features, and helping people…

Understanding Database Choice

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Jeremiah Peschka

Architecture

Everyone needs a distributed database right? Wrong. It’s easy to get so excited about trying out a new technology that you close your eyes to the problem you’re trying to solve. I came across a question on Stack Overflow where the poster was asking what kind of distributed database they needed. Rather than jump right…

I'll pull in close to the island so they can see me fail.

DBA Darwin Awards: Log File Edition

Last Updated January 25, 2012

Brent Ozar

Right after the DBA says “Uh oh,” they call in the consultants. We get to see some really amazing acts of career suicide. DBSEASEA SINK You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff we’ve seen, and some of these things are probably happening in your environment right now. In this session, we’ll talk about some of…

Availability, Data Locality, and Peer-to-Peer Replication

Last Updated February 9, 2017

Jeremiah Peschka

Architecture, Replication

I want to make something clear: high availability is not load balancing. The two options don’t have to be mutually exclusive, but they aren’t the same thing. Several months ago, I wrote about resolving write conflicts. Some of the approaches I mentioned for resolving write conflicts (such as taking a “last write wins” approach) involved…

SQL Server Interview Questions and Answers – Book Review

Last Updated December 9, 2018

Brent Ozar

Book Reviews, Professional Development

I read a lot of technical books – stuff on SQL Server, VMware, storage – and they all start to blend together. Within the first few pages of reading SQL Server Interview Questions and Answers by Pinal Dave and Vinod Kumar, though, it jumped out and grabbed me because it’s really different. This is gonna…

SQL Server Can Run Databases from Network Shares & NAS

Last Updated January 16, 2021

Brent Ozar

SQL Server, Storage

Geeks love duct tape. Sure, we pride ourselves on building a rock-solid solution the right way, but when the brown stuff hits the moving metal stuff, we love to show off our ingenuity. We carry our money in duct tape wallets, wear duct tape shirts, practice ductigami, and hang our duct tape from custom metal…

The Art of the Execution Plan

Last Updated June 18, 2020

Brent Ozar

Execution Plans

There’s beauty everywhere – even in SQL Server. I was just staring at this plan when I was struck by its beauty: Stored Procedure Part 1 Oh, sure, it’s ugly, and I recoiled in horror at first, but when you get over that reaction, there’s an amazing amount of stuff there. Someone – probably many…

Notes on Scalability

Last Updated December 12, 2011

Jeremiah Peschka

We all hope that we’re going to succeed beyond our wildest expectations. Startups long for multi-billion dollar IPOs or scaling to hundreds, or even thousands, of servers. Every hosting provider is touting how their new cloud offering will help us scale up to unheard of heights. I’ve built things up and torn them down a…

What 2012 Work Scares You?

Last Updated February 14, 2017

Brent Ozar

Professional Development

Right now, this very moment, there’s an ugly piece of work tapping on your shoulder – and I don’t mean your boss. Or bacon. Bacon works too. You agreed to do it months ago during the 2012 planning sessions, but you never really expected January 2012 to arrive. Now that it’s here, you’re starting to…