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SQL Server

Breaking News: SQL Server 2022 Keeps Getting Worse.

Last Updated May 26, 2023

<sigh> Okay, so, the last few Cumulative Updates have had known issues around broken remote queries using the generic ODBC connector and errors with contained availability groups, but I couldn’t really care less about those. If you use those features, I give you bombastic side eye anyway. However, in the last few days, two more…

It’s Been 6 Months. SQL Server 2022 Still Isn’t Ready Yet. (Updated)

Last Updated May 17, 2023

SQL Server 2022

Six months ago today, Microsoft announced that SQL Server 2022 was ready. Except it wasn’t. And it still isn’t ready. See, look at the very first hero in their list of 2022’s new features: The very first one is “Business continuity through Azure – Bidirectional DR to Azure SQL.” However, buried way down in the footnotes, Microsoft admitted:…

Free Webcast Next Week! What’s New (and Actually Good) in SQL Server 2022

Last Updated May 4, 2023

SQL Server 2022

It’s May 2023, and believe it or not, some of the flagship features in Microsoft’s latest version still aren’t ready for prime time yet. Good news, though: there are a few things that genuinely make your life easier with minimal work required on your part. Forget rewriting code, though – in this session, I’ll show…

How to Go Live on SQL Server 2022

Last Updated April 25, 2023

SQL Server 2022

You’re planning to migrate to SQL Server 2022, and you want your databases to be faster after the migration. This is NOT a blog post about how to migrate – that’s the same as it’s been for a long time. Go build the new 2022 servers, and use log shipping or database mirroring to sync…

Is SQL Server 2019 More CPU-Intensive Than SQL Server 2016?

Last Updated March 28, 2023

SQL Server 2019

I’m running into something that I’m having a hard time believing. A client was hitting CPU issues during load testing, and they swore all things were equal between their SQL Server 2016 and 2019 environments. The 2019 box was having CPU pressure issues that didn’t show up on the 2016 box. I’ve played this game before,…

The 20th Anniversary of the SQL Slammer Worm

Last Updated January 10, 2023

Twenty years ago this month (next Wednesday to be exact), sysadmins and database administrators started noticing extremely high network traffic related to problems with their SQL Servers. The SQL Slammer worm was infecting Microsoft SQL Servers. Microsoft had known about it and patched the problem 6 months earlier, but people just weren’t patching SQL Server. There…

And it looks bad even in shades.

How to Install SQL Server and the Stack Overflow Database on a Mac

Last Updated January 16, 2023

SQL Server 2022

To follow along, you’ll need: An Apple Mac with an Apple Silicon processor (M1, M2, etc – not an Intel or AMD CPU) Azure Data Studio Docker Desktop 4.16.1 or newer An Internet connection In Docker Desktop, go into Settings, Features in Development, and check the box for “Use Rosetta.” That’s the new 4.16 feature that…

Should You Use SQL Server 2022’s GREATEST and LEAST?

Last Updated December 15, 2022

If you’ve been following along with this week’s posts on DATETRUNC and STRING_SPLIT, you’re probably going to think the answer is no, but bear with me. It’s Christmas week, right? The news can’t all be bad. GREATEST and LEAST are kinda like MAX and MIN, but instead of taking multiple rows as input, they take multiple columns.…

Contest: Guess the Next SQL Server Release Date

Last Updated November 19, 2022

SQL Server 2023

When will Microsoft officially release SQL Server 2023 (or 2024, or whatever it’ll be) for download? The dust is just barely starting to settle on the 2022 box, so it’s time to guess the next one. Leave one – and only one – comment here in YYYY/MM/DD format with your release date guess. If you…

#PASSdataCommunitySummit Keynote Day 3 Live Blog

Last Updated November 18, 2022

Today at the PASS Data Community Summit in Seattle, Kimberly Tripp is doing the first-ever in-person community keynote. Here’s the abstract: Over the 30+ years I’ve been working with SQL Server, I’ve seen an incredible amount of innovation and change. How do we keep up with so many changes and how do we know how…

SQL Server 2022 Paid Editions Require a Licensing Key.

Last Updated November 17, 2022

SQL Server 2022

For the final release of SQL Server 2022, Microsoft popped a surprise that wasn’t in the release candidates: Your choices are: Install a free edition: Evaluation (which times out after 180 days), Developer (which isn’t allowed to be used for production purposes), or Express (which is limited to small databases & hardware resources) Use pay-as-you-go-billing,…

SQL Server 2022 Release Date: November 16, 2022

Last Updated November 16, 2022

SQL Server 2022

Microsoft released SQL Server 2022 today, November 16, 2022. The footnotes indicate: SQL Server 2022 free editions (Developer edition, Express edition) are available to download starting today. SQL Server 2022 paid editions (Enterprise edition, Standard edition) will be available in Volume Licensing (Enterprise Agreement, Enterprise Agreement Subscriptions) customers starting today, which represents the majority of…

Office Hours: Read This, Watch This Edition

Last Updated November 10, 2022

This week, a lot of the questions you posted at https://pollgab.com/room/brento just need pointers to resources at other places. Welcome to the Read This, Watch This series of answers. Don’t Blame Anthony: Our developers prefer writing TSQL queries directly in their .NET code rather than writing sprocs and calling them. What are the pros /…

Free Live Webcast: Why is One Query Sometimes Slow and Sometimes Fast?

Last Updated September 28, 2022

Sometimes the exact same query goes slow out of nowhere. Your current fix is to update statistics, rebuild indexes, or restart the SQL Server. It works, but you don’t know why. The single most common reason is parameter sniffing. SQL Server “sniffs” the first set of parameters for a query, builds an execution plan for…

And it looks bad even in shades.

PSPO: How SQL Server 2022 Tries to Fix Parameter Sniffing

Last Updated August 24, 2022

Parameter Sniffing, SQL Server 2022

Parameter sniffing is a notorious problem for Microsoft SQL Server because it tries to reuse execution plans, which doesn’t work out well for widely varying parameters. Here’s a primer for the basics about how it happens. SQL Server 2022 introduces a new feature called Parameter Sensitive Plan optimization. I’m not really sure why Microsoft capitalized…

Brent Ozar

What’s New in SQL Server 2022 Release Candidate 0: Undocumented Stuff

Last Updated August 25, 2022

SQL Server 2022

Microsoft has an official list of what’s new in 2022 overall, but here I’m specifically focusing on system objects that might be interesting to script developers like you and I, dear reader. New stored procedure sp_get_table_card_est_and_avg_col_len – I assume the “card” refers to statistics and cardinality, not Hallmark. SQL Server has historically struggled with memory…

How to Install SQL Server 2022 Release Candidate 0

Last Updated August 24, 2022

SQL Server 2022

SQL Server 2014’s end of support date is coming in less than two years: July 9, 2024. I know that sounds far-off right now, but consider the work you have to do between now and then: Pick a new version to migrate to Set up development SQL Servers for that new version Start developing &…

Pour One Out for Distributed Replay. It’s Deprecated in SQL Server 2022.

Last Updated October 19, 2022

SQL Server 2022

I love how Microsoft treats deprecated and discontinued features in SQL Server. No, seriously. I give Microsoft a lot of sarcasm and lip around here, but Microsoft takes serious care to make it easy to upgrade versions without worrying about your application breaking. If you disagree, hear me out for a minute. “Discontinued” means it’s…

SQL Server 2022 Tells You Why A Query Can’t Go Parallel.

Last Updated June 7, 2022

Execution Plans, SQL Server 2022

Until 2022, when a query couldn’t go parallel, all we got was a really cryptic note in the execution plan properties saying NonParallelPlanReason = CouldNotGenerateValidParallelPlan. But starting with SQL Server 2022, even when I’m running under older compatibility levels: ALTER DATABASE CURRENT SET COMPATIBILITY_LEVEL = 140; /* 2017 */ GO DECLARE @TableVariable TABLE(Total BIGINT); INSERT…

The Top Feature Requests for SQL Server

Last Updated May 5, 2022

If you want to get a look at where Microsoft SQL Server is heading in the future, it helps to get an idea of what users are repeatedly asking for. Here’s a quick rundown of the top requests from feedback.azure.com as voted by the people who cared enough to log in and upvote ’em: 10:…