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Posts by Brent Ozar

Brent Ozar
2453 posts
https://www.brentozar.com
I make Microsoft SQL Server go faster. I love teaching, travel, cars, and laughing. I'm based out of Las Vegas. He/him.

Change of travel plans

Brent Ozar
1 Comment
This weekend, we changed our travel plans and headed back home to Houston instead of driving on out to California.  We probably should have checked the maps a little more carefully – particularly this map: Tropical Storm Edaeiou(and sometimes y)rdo is heading right for Houston tomorrow.  Both Ed and I have conflicting reservations at the…
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Long live the DBA

Brent Ozar
2 Comments
Jason Massie (aka StatisticsIO.com) wrote a blog post this week called The Death of the DBA.  He talks about why the coming cloud computing craze creates career chaos. I have the exact opposite opinion: I can’t wait for databases to move toward the cloud because it makes database administrators even more vital. Reason #1: Cloud…
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8 DBAs talk about their jobs

Brent Ozar
Professional Development
3 Comments
OdinJobs.com interviewed eight different DBAs from completely different backgrounds and careers.  The one thing we’ve got in common is that we blog, but outside of that, we’ve got wildly different points of view about the career and what we like about SQL Server. I shall now copy/paste Jason Massie’s hard work at listing each person’s…
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SQL Server support on virtual servers

Brent Ozar
Virtualization
1 Comment
The Microsoft knowledge base article on SQL Server virtualization support just got an update.  Here’s the interesting part: “Versions of SQL Server after SQL Server 2005 will incorporate full support for running on a supported guest operating system that is installed on a Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V virtual machine.” That means SQL Server 2008 will…
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Taking a cross-country road trip

Brent Ozar
2 Comments
We’ve packed up the Honda and we’re heading out this morning on a road trip of epic proportions: Just over 5,000 miles. Erika, Ernie (our miniature Schnauzer) and I are driving from Houston to Memphis today, overnighting there. On Sunday we’re continuing up to Muskegon, Michigan to spend some time with Dad and Caryl, my…
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Speaking at PASS Camp 2008 in Germany

Brent Ozar
#SQLPass
2 Comments
I love my job! When a new version of SQL Server comes out, database administrators want to know what features will make an immediate difference in their lives.  They want a very fast recap of what they need to do first, what they need to plan for, and what to tell the rest of their…
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Important SQL Server Data Services warning

Brent Ozar
0
An important email just came out from the Microsoft SSDS team about this week’s upgrade.  The second bullet point in the impact alert is especially important, and everybody needs to take note.  Here’s a screenshot: Got that?  Good.  To be a good DBA, it’s important to be able to read Wingdings.
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Tracking the Chicago-Mac race with GPS

Brent Ozar
2 Comments
A friend of mine is competing in the 100th annual Chicago-Mac race, a sailboat race up Lake Michigan from Chicago to Mackinac Island.  This year they gave out GPS tracking devices so you could follow your favorite boat’s progress during the race. Now I’m not saying anybody cheated, but the route of the Hannah Frances…
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The Wine Trials: a wine book for donut lovers

Brent Ozar
0
Last night, the author & editor of The Wine Trials held a release party at the Caroline Collective, the Houston coworking office where I lay my weary laptop.  Robin Goldstein and Alexis Herschkowitsch talked vino, signed books and raised glasses.  I liked them, and I liked the book, and I’ll tell ya why. I’m just…
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Storage virtualization for SQL Server: friend or foe?

Brent Ozar
Storage
0
Storage virtualization is a really slick SAN technology that does for SANs what VMware did for servers: it abstracts away the underlying hardware to make management easier.  Multiple SANs can be swapped around back and forth behind the scenes without affecting any servers that store data on those SANs. It’s nowhere near common yet –…
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Coding Horror post about normalization

Brent Ozar
2 Comments
I’m a DBA, not a programmer, but I subscribe to Jeff Atwood’s excellent Coding Horror blog because it’s well-written, funny and teaches good lessons.  In his latest post, he talks about database normalization – when to do it and when to avoid it. Pay particular attention to the links to HighScalability.com – they have great…
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Software Development Meme

Brent Ozar
0
Jason Massie tagged me, so it’s my turn to answer the questionnaire…. How old were you when you first started programming? Dad and Mom upgraded us from an Atari 2600 to a Commodore 64 when those came out, so I must have been around 9-10.  I don’t remember much from those early attempts at programming,…
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AMD triple-core servers and SQL Server 2005

Brent Ozar
9 Comments
If you’re using AMD Phenom 3-core processors, SQL Server 2005 won’t install without going through some hoops first.  Microsoft just published a knowledge base article on SQL 2005 errors on 3 and 6 core servers. I don’t usually blog about knowledge base articles, but I got such a laugh out of that one that I…
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Russia as seen from my hotel bathroom

Brent Ozar
5 Comments
I’m spending a few days in St. Petersburg, Russia to visit Quest’s office.  Sure, I have the regular touristy photos, like myself in front of old buildings: But what I really like about overseas travel is that everything looks and feels different, and it forces me to look at the design and user interface for…
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Quickly replying to recruiter emails

Brent Ozar
1 Comment
In today’s hiring market, DBAs get a lot of emails from recruiters that say things like: “I am curious to know if you would be interested in (or know someone who is interested in) relocating to Big Falls East for the position discussed below….” The job description never includes the salary range, and it rarely…
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Quest LiteSpeed isn’t right for everybody

Brent Ozar
2 Comments
Sean McCown at Infoworld wrote a blog post today that said some negative things about Quest and LiteSpeed, and I had to respond. He’s switched away from using LiteSpeed, and he had an interesting set of reasons. “I just don’t need the centralized repository in my lab, and I do enough demos that having native…
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Free SQL Server tools and utilities

Brent Ozar
0
Mark Garner came across a great list of free SQL Server tools & utilities.  I took one look at that page, bookmarked it, and realized it’s going to take me a week to go through that list!  Good stuff.
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Developers: sometimes you just gotta trust the DBA

Brent Ozar
0
At this week’s Customer Advisory Board at Quest, I’ve had a great time sharing war stories with other database administrators.  One theme keeps popping up again and again: developers don’t trust DBAs and seem to refuse to take the DBA’s word for anything.  It seems that developers just want to keep learning things the hard…
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