Posts by Brent Ozar

Brent Ozar

2775 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.

Interview Tip: Don’t Stress Out

Last Updated February 12, 2017

Brent Ozar

Professional Development

I was just talking to a fellow blogger who’s going through an interview process, and we touched on something that bears repeating here. Interviewers don’t always expect you to know the answers. Sometimes they ask you a string of ugly, nasty technical questions that you can’t possibly have seen before. They might not be testing…

Why back up? Ask JournalSpace.

Last Updated April 19, 2009

Brent Ozar

When your managers ask you that question, point them to the sad story of JournalSpace.com. The company evaporated on December 30, 2008 because they didn’t have a backup. They were relying on their RAID drive mirrors to keep their data safe, but that only protects you from hard drive failures – not from application errors…

Ozar Family Portraits

Last Updated January 1, 2009

Brent Ozar

The Ozars We had a photographer come to Dad & Caryl’s house over the holidays while we were there with my sister and her stepson, and you can check out our family portraits on Flickr. The amazing part: this is the first actual picture of Erika (my better half) that I’ve been allowed to post…

Tom LaRock and Pat Wright now on PASS Board of Directors!

Last Updated February 12, 2017

Brent Ozar

#SQLPass

Yes We Can! Congratulations to Tom LaRock, aka SQLBatman, and Pat Wright, aka SQLAsylum, who just got into the PASS Board of Directors! Two board members had resigned, and Pat & Tom was appointed to one of those two positions. I’m excited because I believe these guys will make great board members, and I’m even…

About those blogging rules…

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Brent Ozar

Blogging

A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about some guidelines for getting started with technical blogging. I’ve now gone and broke one of them – not editing your WordPress template. When CSS sharpie Jeremiah Peschka read of my desire to make my site span the full width of the page, he offered to give me…

New Year’s Resolutions

Last Updated September 5, 2009

Brent Ozar

David Stein of Made2Mentor.com posted about his professional New Year’s resolutions (as opposed to personal ones), and Denis Gobo tagged me too, so here goes. I updated my GTD priority lists on RememberTheMilk during my vacation a couple of weeks ago and I’ve already forgotten them, hahaha, but that’s what RTM is for. Learn SQL…

Meet my coauthors on Pro SQL Server Internals and Troubleshooting

Last Updated March 10, 2021

Brent Ozar

SQL Server

Meet my partners in crime, the people who are going to coauthor the book on SQL Server internals: Christian Bolton – he’s the Director and Database Architect at COEO and SQL Server MVP. He’s ChristianBolton on Twitter. Justin Langford – another SQL guru at COEO, a Principal Consultant, formerly a Microsoft Premier Field Engineer. Christian…

New SQL Server exploit in the wild

Last Updated December 23, 2008

Brent Ozar

There’s a new SQL Server exploit running around, and Denis Gobo’s done a fantastic job of covering it: sp_replwritetovarbin Heap Overflow Code Exploit Code In The Wild, Works By Using Our Good Friend SQL Injection

Spot the Differences

Last Updated December 22, 2008

Brent Ozar

Last week, I was cruising in the Virgin Islands. This week, I’m back home in Michigan. See if you can spot which photo was taken where: I know, it’s a tough one. They have so much in common: 18 degrees Fahrenheit with 4-6′ snowdrifts. 18 degrees North latitude with 4-6′ waves.

It was a dark and stormy night…

Last Updated March 10, 2021

Brent Ozar

SQL Server

and I was hunched over my trusty, battered Macbook Pro, sipping whiskey by the backlit keys when the email came in. I got worried as soon I saw the sender, because Big Jimmy May is what they call a “Performance Consultant”. Before I even opened the email, I called my bookie to make sure my…

New internal solid state drives are “world’s fastest storage”

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Brent Ozar

Storage

Fastest Storage in the World? I don’t talk about hardware much here, but an SSD review hit Engadget this morning and made me take notice. Fusion-io gave their new 80gb ioDrive to TweakTown for a review, and – Wait, hang on. Don’t close the browser yet. I know, everything about this post reeks of some…

SQL Quiz: Toughest challenges

Last Updated December 9, 2008

Brent Ozar

Chris Shaw posted a new SQL Quiz where he asks: “What are the largest challenges that you have faced in your career and how did you overcome those?” 1: Managing a SAN I was just sitting there, minding my own business, happily administering databases, when my manager said that our SAN administrator was resigning. I…

How to Start a Technical Blog, Part 5: Blog Etiquette

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Brent Ozar

Blogging, Professional Development

Enough with the technical details – let’s talk manners. Give People Credit and Links If you hear about something from somebody else, credit ’em. The internet is huge, SQL Server is huge, and we all get help to find the stuff we need to do our jobs every day. We find stuff through other people,…

How to Start a Technical Blog, Part 4: WordPress Themes

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Brent Ozar

Blogging

In my series this week on how to get started blogging, I’ve touched on the business of blogging for yourself, why you should use WordPress and how to configure it, and the best WordPress plugins. Today I’m going to focus on look and feel. WordPress uses a “theme” system to bundle images, CSS files and…

Are blades right for small businesses?

Last Updated September 5, 2009

Brent Ozar

After reading my HP c7000 Blade Chassis review, a reader contacted me with a question: “I do computer consulting and web hosting, and I recently bought a blade chassis. I was going to use it for web hosting at a colo datacenter, but I’m debating whether to use it or keep using 1u pizza box…

How to Start a Technical Blog, Part 3: WordPress Plugins

Last Updated July 1, 2011

Brent Ozar

Part 1 explained the reasoning and decisionmaking process, part 2 recommended using WordPress, and in this entry I’ll talk about what WordPress plugins I use here on BrentOzar.com and what they do. FeedBurner FeedPress Gets You RSS Stats Some of your readers will subscribe to your blog using RSS feeds. I won’t explain RSS here,…

How to Start a Blog, Part 2: Configuring WordPress

Last Updated July 1, 2011

Brent Ozar

In part 1, I talked about the basics of why you might want to blog for yourself (instead of a third party) and how to pick your domain name. In today’s installment, I’ll cover what blog software you want to use and how to configure it. Use Self-Hosted WordPress to Run Your Blog There’s a…

Big News: Windows Home Server and Ford Pinto Finally Ready!

Last Updated December 2, 2008

Brent Ozar

Andrew Brust blogged today that Windows Home Server now deserves a serious second look because Microsoft fixed the bug. When I say “the” bug, I mean the bug to end all bugs: it’s a file server, but if you saved certain kinds of files to it, they got corrupted. What kinds of files, you ask?…

When BI is missing the I…

Last Updated December 2, 2008

Brent Ozar

From Failblog: Business Intelligence without the Intelligence

How to Start a Blog

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Brent Ozar

Blogging, Professional Development, Writing and Presenting

So you’ve been reading blogs for a while, and you want to know how to start a blog. It’s really easy, it pays off long term in your career, and it’s a great way to meet awesome people. I’m going to tell you all the things I wish somebody would have told me way back…