Selecting versions and editions, understanding licensing, and modernizing platforms.
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It's the perfect time of year in Las Vegas when we can chill outside by the fire, enjoy a glass of wine, and go through your top-voted questions from https://pollgab.com/room/brento.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=esMYx_mbfqo
Let's hang out in the backyard - as recently seen on Zillow Gone Wild - and take your top-voted questions from https://PollGab.com/room/brento.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKd30ILb7ys
The first few questions from this week's crop at https://pollgab.com/room/brento are very much about what-problem-are-you-trying-to-solve, but they get more complex from there.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWDUgd_8ZNo
I strapped on my Apple Vision Pro, updated its OS, and recaptured my persona with the latest updates, and... it's still pretty weird. Let's go through your top-voted questions from https://pollgab.com/room/brento and have a laugh at my hot dog fingers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLAEqItBnuI
This entire blog post is driven by the #1 feature in this list. I think about the #1 feature a lot, like at least once a week. I think about it so much that I had to stop and think about what other similar great things Microsoft has done over the years, and be thankful for what a nice platform this is to work with. Let's go through 6 of my favorite Microsoft decisions.
I originally took these questions from https://pollgab.com/room/brento poolside at the Trixie Motel (really), but I forgot to use the good microphone, so I re-recorded 'em from my home studio when I got back:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8booXqUYY-Y
Today's questions from https://pollgab.com/room/brento require a little bit longer answers:
https://youtu.be/W-HKNMh8JQE
I went to LA for the opening week of Somni, a gorgeous restaurant in LA, and took your questions from the rooftop deck of the adorable Petit Ermitage hotel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MtdQkAw9a8
Your app is happily humming along on SQL Server Standard Edition. Things are quiet - too quiet. You're wondering what you're missing, and whether you should be on SQL Server Enterprise Edition. Here are 3 warning signs to watch out for.
Developers say, "Any downtime is unacceptable."
About 10 years ago, Microsoft made changes to the Cardinality Estimator (CE) which caused some problems for SQL Server upgrades. When folks upgraded to SQL Server 2014, they also casually switched their databases' compatibility level to the latest version, because for years that hadn't really affected query plans. They just figured they wanted the "latest and greatest" compat level, without regard to the effects. That backfired badly when they suddenly got 2014's Cardinality Estimation changes.
I was honored to speak at the Present to Succeed conference in Sofia, Bulgaria, run by a former SQL Server MCM. Sofia is a beautiful city, and the gorgeous Patriarchal Cathedral of St. Alexander Nevsky (Wikipedia) was close to my hotel, so I dragged my tripod over there for an Office Hours session.
https://youtu.be/xn2afGkPcmo
As a consultant, I sometimes see SQL Servers with high CPU core counts relative to their workload. For example, the situation that inspired this post was seeing half a dozen SQL Servers with ~50 cores each, hundreds of cores total - yet they consistently had just 1-5% CPU usage. Here's what I said to management:…
Brent says: It's really funny how the world works. I wrote what you see below in December 2023 and scheduled it for publication on January 16th (today), hoping to get help from the community to get this process started. On January 9, before the post went live, David Wiseman submitted a pull request with the first steps! More on that at the end of the post. I'm leaving the post as-written in Dec 2023 because it's still useful.
I woke up on the wrong side of the bed after a nap. How does that even happen?!? To take the edge off, I poured myself a gin & tonic and went through your top-voted questions from https://pollgab.com/room/brento.
https://youtu.be/5lF0RtdBPP8
At least once a month, a client has The Postgres Conversation™ with me.
It happens at the end of a consulting engagement, after we've talked about the work that the team needs to do in order to meet their performance objectives.
I have a special guest star on today's episode: Pinal Dave dropped by the house! We went through a few of the top-voted questions from https://pollgab.com/room/brento.
https://youtu.be/vXuzpa41BW8
I went through the top-voted questions from https://pollgab.com/room/brento and discussed 'em live on my Twitch channel.
https://youtu.be/tyu0JN7H_hQ
A lot of today's questions from https://pollgab.com/room/brento have a common theme, but it's just a coincidence:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2Tm_BHXT68
You're planning to migrate to a new version of SQL Server, 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 2025 servers, and use log shipping or database…
If you right-click on a database in SQL Server Management Studio, you get an option to set Compatibility Level at the database level:
When you upgrade SQL Server or you want to improve performance, which option should you choose? Should you always go with the newest compatibility level? If you have an old application, can you upgrade SQL Server but still keep the old compat level without the vendor knowing? Let's hit the common questions.
