tl;dr - run a copy-only full backup of the Hekaton filegroup to nul. If the backup fails, you have corruption, and you need to immediately make plans to either export all your data, or do a restore from your last good full backup, plus all your transaction log backups since. Yeah, that one's gonna need a…
There's an old DBA saying...
May you already have a backup restored
A half hour before your boss knows there's corruption
What? There's no such thing as old DBA sayings? Well, maybe if you all said something other than "no" once in a while, you'd be more quotable. Hmpf.
Anyway, this is a serious question! And there are a lot of things to consider
It's easy to get caught up in daily incidents, tickets, and special projects. Like a good scout, though, a core task in a DBA's job is to be prepared. You have to set time aside in your schedule to: 1. Practice responding to corruption. Gail Shaw's "Help, my database is corrupt, now what?" post should…
You can download the next preview of SQL Server 2016 today, and the announcement blog post touted a few improvements to maintenance plans. Oddly, the screenshots in the announcement were apparently done with Microsoft Paint, so I fired up a VM to see how things really look.
The DBCC CHECKDB step in the wizard now has checkboxes for physical only and tablock:
Most companies come to us saying, "The SQL Server isn't fast enough. Help us make it go faster."
They're kinda surprised when one of the first things we fill out together is a variation of our High Availability and Disaster Recovery Planning Worksheet:
whether it's a new job or a new (old) server
If you're reading this, you've at some point in your career stared at a server, for the first time, with great trepidation.
If you've got indexed views, or are thinking of using them, this is important.
First, go read the blog post, "An Indexed View Bug with Scalar Aggregates" by Paul White. It will take a minute, but it's important to understand.
Every time someone tells me, "This database is mission critical - we can't have data loss or downtime," I just smile and shake my head. Technology is seriously difficult.
To illustrate, here's a collection of client stories from the last few years:
DBCC CheckDB: Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Do I really need to run DBCC CheckDB? Yes. If you're even partially in charge of a SQL Server and you'd like to keep your job, you should make sure CheckDB is being run regularly. (Seriously!)
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.
Then, one day, your relationship is rocked. The backups are too slow. The restores are too slow. There is...gasp...corruption. Are you prepared to handle this? Will your working relationship continue? Take this quiz to find out!
Sometimes you see someone with toilet paper sticking to their shoe, their shirt tucked into their underwear, or badly in need of a tissue to get rid of whatever that is hanging out of their nose. It's only right to find a discreet way to let them know they should do some quick cleanup before they get completely embarrassed.
In Michigan where I grew up, we pull the boats out of the water at the beginning of the fall. It's a bit of a sad time, realizing we're done having fun on the water, and the seasons are about to change.
To prepare a boat for a few months of storage, we drain some fluids, replace others, give it a good cleaning, do some basic maintenance, and put on a tight waterproof cover.
Taking care of your health is incredibly important (says the marathon runner). Eating right, exercising, and getting plenty of rest help you stay healthy and perform optimally. Your database server’s health is important to your company’s health. You need to take regular backups, check for consistency, and keep indexes tuned for optimal performance. Here are…
I recently posed the question, “Who’s taking your backups?” This is of utmost importance, because your business’s data is the business. Protecting it and backing it up need to be priorities for DBAs.
Now, for my next question: who is responsible for restoring those backups?
