Posts by Jes Schultz

Jes Schultz

48 posts

Signing off

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Dear Brent Ozar Unlimited readers: thanks for following me for three great years. I’m off on a new adventure, but I hope to see you at a user group, a SQL Saturday, or a conference in the future! I’m leaving with a lot of great memories – and here are a few of my favorites…

“It’s Slow” Is Not A Metric

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Jes Schultz

Wait Stats

When I start a SQL Server Critical Care with a client, the first thing I ask is, “What is your #1 pain point? Where does it hurt?” The answer I hear most often is, “The server is too slow”. I’m a runner. If I was able to run a 5K race at an 8:30 per…

Three reasons to use Extended Events

Last Updated January 22, 2015

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

I have a new mission: to convince you, the long-time Profiler user, to switch to Extended Events. I realize I have a long, difficult task ahead of me. Profiler has been around for a long time. You’re comfortable with it. You know it’s not perfect, but you have learned to live with its imperfections. Now I want…

How to Query Extended Events Target XML

Last Updated January 15, 2015

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

When Extended Events (XE) were released with SQL Server 2008, I was excited – something new to learn! I read Microsoft articles about them, read blog posts about them, and tried to use them. At that time, there was no GUI for XE. I had to create the sessions with T-SQL. That wasn’t awful – I…

How to Restore a Page in SQL Server Standard and Enterprise Edition

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Jes Schultz

Backup and Recovery, SQL Server

One of the many restore features in SQL Server is the ability to restore one or more pages of data. This can be very convenient in some narrow situations – for example, corruption occurs on one page or an oops update is made to one record. The page restore process is not straightforward, however, and,…

Are SQL Server Functions Dragging Your Query Down?

Last Updated February 14, 2017

Jes Schultz

Execution Plans, SQL Server, T-SQL

In most coding languages, functions are often-used blocks of code that can be reused from multiple locations, leading to less code – and cleaner code. SQL Server also lets us create functions that can be used the same way. They are reusable blocks of code that can be called from multiple locations. So, if you…

Email Query Results Using a SQL Server Agent Job

Last Updated January 29, 2015

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

SQL Server Agent is one of my favorite tools – it allows you to automatically schedule jobs, alert you if things are going badly, and capture information into database tables. One common request is to execute a query and send the results via email on a regular basis. This task is a great match for SQL Server…

Comparing Estimated and Actual Execution Plans in SQL Server

Last Updated May 12, 2019

Jes Schultz

Execution Plans, SQL Server

Let’s say you want to have an addition built on your house. You contact a contractor, who comes to your house, looks at your lot, looks at what exists, and asks you questions about exactly what you want. He then gives you an estimate of the work – approximately how long he thinks it will…

Capturing Deadlocks in SQL Server

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Jes Schultz

Locking, Blocking, and Isolation Levels, SQL Server

What’s a deadlock? Well, let’s say there’s a fight going on between Wonder Woman and Cheetah, and, in the same room, a fight between Batman and Mr. Freeze. Wonder Woman decides to help Batman by also attempting to throw her lasso around Mr. Freeze; Batman tries to help Wonder Woman by unleashing a rope from…

Backups, Restores, Corruption, and You: How Strong are You?

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Jes Schultz

Backup and Recovery, CHECKDB and Corruption, SQL Server

You and your databases have a strong relationship. You back them up, and check them for corruption. They provide the business with information day after day. Don’t let your relationship come to this! Then, one day, your relationship is rocked. The backups are too slow. The restores are too slow. There is…gasp…corruption. Are you prepared…

Advice to an IT newcomer

Last Updated April 15, 2014

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

Women in Technology (yes, Clippy is a woman, too) We recently got the following question for Kendra and Jes in the Brent Ozar Unlimited® mailbox: Six months ago I stumbled into the IT world. Do you have any advice for someone (a woman) starting off in the IT industry, specially someone without a computer science…

Five Reasons a Production DBA Should Learn to Read Execution Plans

Last Updated August 7, 2019

Jes Schultz

Execution Plans

While chatting with attendees before my Don’t Fear the Execution Plan webcast, a question was posed: “As a DBA who mainly worries about backups, index fragmentation and checkdb, should I also be looking at execution plans?” YES! Here’s why. Performance is important. A production DBA’s main focus should be the safety and security of the…

What happens to in-flight data compression in an emergency?

Last Updated January 29, 2015

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

Data compression can have many uses and advantages, but it also has its drawbacks. It’s definitely not a one-size-fits-all strategy. One of the things to be aware of is that initial compression of a table or index can take quite some time, and will be resource-intensive. It also is an offline operation, so the object…

Rollback: What happens when you KILL a session?

Last Updated March 13, 2014

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

It’s Friday afternoon. You, the DBA, are looking forward to a long weekend. You’re going to walk out the door in 30 minutes and enjoy some family time. The phone rings and you pick it up. On the other end, Joe Developer says, “There’s a query that’s been running for a long time. Can you…

How to count the number of rows in a table in SQL Server

Last Updated January 28, 2021

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

“How many rows exist in a table?” It seems like such an innocent request. It isn’t too hard to get this information out of SQL Server. But before you open SSMS and whip out a quick query, understand that there are multiple methods to get this information out of SQL Server – and none of…

Improving the Performance of Backups

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Jes Schultz

Backup and Recovery, SQL Server

There will come a time when your database backups will not be as fast as you would like them to be. Over time, the volume of data you’re storing will grow, and backups will take longer – but your weekly or daily maintenance windows don’t grow as well. Backups can be resource-intensive, using I/O and…

Why Are You Still Using SQL Server 2005?

Last Updated May 13, 2014

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

The year: 2005. What was happening with the Brent Ozar Unlimited® crew? I was working on the help desk for a small company while attending Fox Valley Tech College to earn my associate degree. I think I still wanted to go into programming at that point in time! I’d never been to a user group…

Filtered Indexes vs. Table Partitioning

Last Updated February 13, 2017

Jes Schultz

Indexing, Partitioning, SQL Server

It was a dark and stormy… Oh, wrong story. It was actually a warm, sunny afternoon in Charlotte, NC. I was presenting “Index Methods You’re Not Using” at PASS Summit. In this talk, I discussed how indexed views, filtered indexes, and compressed indexes can improve your query performance by reducing I/O. From stage right, an…

What You Can (and Can’t) Do With Indexed Views

Last Updated May 9, 2019

Jes Schultz

Indexing, SQL Server

Views are logical objects in SQL Server databases that present you with a “virtual table”. Views are typically created for one of three reasons: security, simplification, or aggregation. Security: we create views so that a user can read specific columns out of certain tables, but not all the data. Simplification: sometimes, it’s easier to write…

Building a Report to View Memory Usage

Last Updated June 27, 2021

Jes Schultz

SQL Server

Memory is one of the most-used resources in SQL Server. Generally, the more you have, the better query performance you’ll get. This blog isn’t about the magic of the buffer pool or the plan cache, but you should understand how important they are to your server’s performance. Since memory is such an important resource, you…