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Why You Shouldn’t Use SQL Server’s Activity Monitor

October 21, 2014

I love free tools. I also love analyzing SQL Server’s wait statistics. But I’m not a fan of Activity Monitor, a free tool in SQL Server Management studio, which helps you look at wait stats. Activity Monitor just doesn’t give you the whole truth. I fired up a workload with HammerDB against a test SQL Server 2014 instance.…

New sp_Blitz® v35 Checks for Unsupported and Dangerous SQL Server Builds

July 3, 2014

Brent Ozar

First Responder Kit, SQL Server

News broke recently of a dangerous data loss bug in SQL Server 2012 and 2014, and Aaron Bertrand explained which patch levels are affected. It’s kinda tricky, and I’m afraid most people aren’t even going to know about the bug – let alone whether or not they’re on a bad version. I added build number checking into…

Introducing sp_BlitzCache®

May 6, 2014

Jeremiah Peschka

First Responder Kit, SQL Server

Finding the worst queries in SQL Server is easy, right? You just query one of the dm_exec_* DMVs, bring in the SQL text and the execution plan, and then you spend hours looking at execution plans trying to figure out what’s wrong in the query, much less how to fix it. All that’s changing – we’re introducing sp_BlitzCache®.…

Celebrating Two Years of sp_Blitz® (And a New Version)

October 12, 2013

Brent Ozar

#SQLPass, First Responder Kit, SQL Server

Two years ago this week, I took to the stage at the PASS Summit 2011 and unveiled sp_Blitz®, my free health check stored procedure that helps you rapidly take over SQL Servers you’ve never seen before. Some historical highlights include: 117,125 downloads 117 checks (technically much more than that, because we look for variations of…

How to Find ‘Secret Columns’ in Nonclustered Indexes

July 25, 2013

Kendra Little

Indexing, sp_BlitzIndex

sp_BlitzIndex® just can’t keep a secret. That’s a feature, not a bug. I wrote sp_BlitzIndex® specifically so that it would rat out some things that SQL Server is doing behind the scenes to secretly help you out– because it’s really better if you know about it. What are secret columns? SQL Server needs a unique…

sp_BlitzIndex® Holiday Week Edition

December 24, 2012

Kendra Little

First Responder Kit, SQL Server

sp_blitzindex

Only one thing could have dragged me away from the soft glow of the electric leg lamp glowing in the window… sp_BlitzIndex® It’s one of those weeks when things get nice and slow. Your business users and managers are all out of the office due to holidays. Your inbox is blissfully quiet. You get a…

Instant Index Insight: How to Use sp_BlitzIndex® (video)

December 14, 2012

Kendra Little

First Responder Kit, Videos

sp_blitzindex

You probably don’t have enough time to dig through DMVs trying to figure out which indexes you should add or drop. Whether you’re a DBA or developer, junior or senior, you’re probably too busy doing your real job to master all the index best practices – and now you don’t have to. In this 30…