Updated First Responder Kit and Consultant Toolkit for April 2019

This month, lots of improvements and bug fixes, including checking for paused resumable index operations, Evaluation Edition expiration dates, sp_BlitzCache shows the number of duplicated plans for each query, sp_BlitzIndex will skip a list of databases for you, and more.

To get the new version:

• Download the updated FirstResponderKit.zip
• Azure Data Studio users with the First Responder Kit extension:
  ctrl/command+shift+p, First Responder Kit: Import.
• Download the updated Consultant Toolkit in your account
• EU customers: check your email for the updated version from Gumroad

sp_Blitz Changes

• Improvement: check for First Responder Kit stored procs that are out of date (in case you’re updating sp_Blitz, but not its relatives.) (#1994, thanks JeffChulg!)
• Improvement: check for resumable index operations that have been paused. (#2010)
• Improvement: warn on Evaluation Edition expiration dates. (#2017)

sp_BlitzCache Changes

• Improvement: shows the new air_quote_actual plans from sys.dm_exec_query_plan_stats on SQL Server 2019 and Azure SQL DB. (#2019)
• Improvement: show the number of multiple plans for a query in the Warnings column, like “Multiple Plans (105)”. (#2026)
• Fix: arithmetic overflow when calculating terribly bad total reads for a plan. (#2018, thanks IanManton for the bug report.)
• Fix: Azure SQL DB wasn’t allowed to sort by memory grants or spills because we were checking version numbers rather than sys.all_columns to check if the necessary columns exist. (#2015)
• Fix: the output table wouldn’t get created when called with @SortOrder = ‘all.’ The table would get populated if it already existed, it just wouldn’t get created for the first time. (#2009)

sp_BlitzFirst Changes

• Improvement: when we call sp_BlitzCache in the 15-minute Agent job for the Power BI Dashboard, we now run it with @SkipAnalysis = 1, @SortOrder = ‘all’. This runs faster (because it doesn’t analyze the plan XML looking for anti-patterns), and simultaneously gets you more query plans because we sort by all methods, every time. (#2009)

sp_BlitzIndex Changes

• Improvement: new @IgnoreDatabases parameter lets you skip a comma-delimited list of database names. We use that same logic to populate databases with over 100 partitions, which means @GetAllDatabases = 1 works normally, but skips databases with over 100 partitions (and shows them in the output list as to why they were skipped.) To examine those, use @BringThePain = 1. (#1944, thanks Richard Hughes for the idea and Rich Benner for the starting point for the code.)

sp_BlitzLock Changes

• Fix: remove a collation error. (#2014, thanks Gerald-Abacus!)
• Fix: now works (slowly) on Amazon RDS, which doesn’t support some tricky hints. (#2037)

sp_BlitzQueryStore Changes

• Fix: fixed error “The multi-part identifier “s.is_cursor” could not be bound.” (#2024)

sp_ineachdb Changes

• Fix: now it actually does stuff even if you don’t specify @Help = 1. I tell you what, people, this is how I can tell you’re not using this proc yet, hahaha. (Pull #2035, thanks Aaron Bertrand.)

For Support

When you have questions about how the tools work, talk with the community in the #FirstResponderKit Slack channel. If you need a free invite, hit SQLslack.com. Be patient – it’s staffed with volunteers who have day jobs.

When you find a bug or want something changed, read the contributing.md file.

When you have a question about what the scripts found, first make sure you read the “More Details” URL for any warning you find. We put a lot of work into documentation, and we wouldn’t want someone to yell at you to go read the fine manual. After that, when you’ve still got questions about how something works in SQL Server, post a question at DBA.StackExchange.com and the community (that includes us!) will help. Include exact errors and any applicable screenshots, your SQL Server version number (including the build #), and the version of the tool you’re working with.