Last month marked the 2 year point for my blog. At times like this I like to reflect on the past so I don’t forget it – even better to learn something from it.
Read on to hear about my last year in blogging!
T-SQL Tuesday #107 Invitation: Death March
There is a famous book in our field written in the 2000’s by Ed Yourdon called “Death March“. In it he details the phenomenon in project management of death march software projects. He observed a trend in organizations who plan software projects to estimate so poorly that completion becomes overwhelming and unlikely.
More companies than ever before could be considered “software companies”. Project planning hasn’t gotten much better over time and we still have terribly managed projects. The best reason to explain this I found on Quora – Why are software development task estimations regularly off by a factor of 2-3? In particular, read the answer by Michael Wolfe midway through the page. It is both a humorous and scary analogy.
On this month of Halloween we are going to discuss our death march project horrors!
Stop and Think Before You Shrink – Shrinking a SQL Server Database
I like Halloween so I find myself getting mentally ready each year about a couple of months prior. My mind turns to horrors and I must warn wary travelers in DBA-land about an evil I see all too often – shrinking a database.
I know this has been done to death but I still see it. Gather around the fire as I tell you the ills of shrinking database files.
I’m Speaking – SQL Saturday San Diego 2018!
On Saturday September 22nd I will be speaking at SQL Saturday San Diego presenting on 2 fun topics:
- Database Corruption! Preventing Disaster to your Database
- Environmental SQL Server Troubleshooting
Read on about my presentations…
SQL Memes
SQL Memes! I have put together a bunch of SQL Server, database related, general technology, and office memes. Some you may find funny and others perhaps not. That’s cool. You can post your own or comment here and I can evolve this over time.
Working With Different Languages in SQL Server
Today I want to talk about some of the language settings in SQL Server and the impact they have. Read on to see about setting up a default language in SQL Server, setting language for a scoped session, and differences between SQL Server and Windows Server settings.
The Prisoners Dilemma of Defect Disclosure
Cory Doctorow wrote an excellent piece about the disclosure of software security defects. The post “Telling the Truth About Defects in Technology Should Never, Ever, Ever Be Illegal. EVER.” spells out the current predicament and suggests a way forward.
This topic is contemporary, impactful, and fascinating. It spans various domains such as InfoSec, free speech, censorship, and private corporate rights
Read on as I analyze the article and offer my thoughts about security vulnerability disclosures.
Feature Image Attribution and License.
T-SQL Tuesday #105 – Brick Wall
How to Move and Configure tempdb Files
Every SQL Server instance relies heavily on tempdb to function. Because of this it is important to properly setup and configure tempdb. If you work on a system with a sub optimal tempdb setup then you may have to move files. Read on to see a technique for getting this job done.
How to Insert Into a Table Using Excel to Write SQL
Today I want to show off a quick trick I learned many years ago that is useful to this day.
The Scenario: you have a spreadsheet, CSV file, or some other delimited flat file and need to load that into a database. There are many options to load data into SQL Server; however, a quick method I am fond of is to use Microsoft Excel and manipulate the data to craft insert statements then paste into SSMS and execute.
Read on to see how to parse and load a CSV flat file, character delimited flat file, and columnar text.