28May 2010 by Grant Fritchey 6 Comments

Buy vs. Build

PowerShell, Tools
It's the classic question faced by everyone in Information Services. I know how to do this and I could build software to do it, but I'm a lazy b_____d so I'd rather just pick up a piece of software that does it for me. I love working for large companies because I can usually get them to purchase stuff so that I can loll around stuffing my face all day instead of doing actual work. Unfortunately, not everyone can afford to pick up Microsoft's Operations Manager or Idera's Diagnostic Manager. But you still need to monitor your servers. With buy eliminated, that leaves build. Which, is where this excellent blog post by Laerte Junior comes in. He lays out how to build a wrapper around calls to get Performan Counter…
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23Dec 2009 by Grant Fritchey 1 Comment

A Lack of Excitement

PASS, PowerShell, SQL Server, T-SQL, Tools
I usually use all the problems, crashes, and issues that I run into at work as grist for my mill, aka, material to blog about. But lately, we haven't been crashing & burning much <knock wood, turn three times, throw salt over my left shoulder, spit>. But it was suggested that may be I should mention why that is. The fact of the matter is that I've been spending a lot more time working on methods for monitoring our systems so that we avoid more of the stupid stuff, full disks, failed backups, long running agent jobs, etc.. I've blogged before about our use of Microsoft's Operations Manager for monitoring our servers and how we've built custom rules and monitors to keep an eye on things. I've also mentioned how…
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