11Sep 2009 by Grant Fritchey No Comments

LaRock on Monitoring

SQL Server, T-SQL
Since I just spent a bit more than half of my 24 Hours of PASS presentation on tuning queries talking about monitoring performance, you could probably tell that I think that the two are inextricably linked. I'm not alone. Tom LaRock has put a post on why it's important to understand the extent of your problem prior to attempting to fix it. It's absolutely spot-on and a must read. Remember, if someone says performance on a system you manage is slow, you have to ask, as compared to what? You need to understand what "normal" performance is on your system in order to arrive at the ability to identify a particular process as performing in an abnormal manner. That's not to say that you couldn't tune a query in complete…
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09Sep 2009 by Grant Fritchey 8 Comments

Spools in Execution Plans

SQL Server, T-SQL
I got the question the other day, when are you likely to see a spool in an execution plan? Easy, whenever SQL Server needs to walk through the data multiple times, usually in JOIN operations... Yeah, well, once again, my flip answers are not quite the entire story. Spool operations are temporary storage of the data for later reuse in a query plan. There are two types of spool operations, eager spool and lazy spool. A spool is basically a temporary table created within the execution of the query that is used when it's likely that data will be needed again, and again during the execution of the query. This is not an explicit #temp temporary table, but a work table for operations within the processing necessary for a given query's…
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03Sep 2009 by Grant Fritchey 1 Comment

Debuting: Beginning SQL Server 2008 Administration

Uncategorized
The new book is up on Amazon. I only worked on three chapters of Rob Walter's new book and that was after begging to only work on two, so I can't take much credit for the effort that went into this book. However, thanks to our editor Jonathan Gennick, I was privileged to work with Rob & Carmen, if pretty indirectly. I know I mentioned the book before when it was put up on the Apress web site, but this is Amazon. Once it's up on Amazon, it's real.
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02Sep 2009 by Grant Fritchey 3 Comments

24 Hours of PASS

PASS, SQL Server, T-SQL
This was a pretty cool event. The advertising leading up to it seemed to really cover the community very well. There was even a link to 24 Hours of PASS in my team's local web site. Unfortunately, I'm not an iron man like Tom LaRock, watching all 24 hours. I only hit a few sessions. The first session I hit was Allen White's PowerShell for SQL Server. I have attended a couple of  his presentations at the PASS Summit. I think he's done a great job of gleaning better and better examples out of his presentations. This one was good. I loved the way he put together the backup processes for automating backups. It looked good, took into account common issues, it just worked. I was really happy I got…
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31Aug 2009 by Grant Fritchey No Comments

24 Hours of PASS

PASS
Or, as you should tell your boss, 24 hours of free training by many of the leaders of the industry presenting original sessions that will teach you about topics from SSIS to Spatial Data to Index Selection to CLR performance to... well, you get the idea. This shouldn't be a hard sell for anyone to their boss. "Hey, remember that problem we had the other day with the database that was in simple recovery mode? Yeah, well, Kalen Delaney is presenting for an hour on just that topic." Your follow-up question to the boss, should then be, not, can I, but "Do you want me to get a meeting room and project this for everyone?" Developers, designers, architects, administrators, and managers are going to be able to find something interesting…
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29Aug 2009 by Grant Fritchey No Comments

SQL Server Standard Update

Misc
We've received wonderful support from the community. Brad McGehee has a list with great people on it who have volunteered to be technical editors. A bunch of people have inquired about writing for the reincarnation of SQL Server Standard (SSS). I've accepted, to date, eight different abstracts. I've started learning what it means to be an editor. I've gone through first drafts on four articles from some great people. They're smart and you're going to love the information they're putting together for you. But, we need more. A lot more. Please look over the requirements and if you meet them, consider sending us an abstract (send it to grant.fritchey -at- sqlpass dot org). A few suggestions to help you out. Right now, we're looking for technical articles. But that doesn't…
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29Aug 2009 by Grant Fritchey 2 Comments

#ActiveAugust Final Post

Misc
I haven't done well with this. I missed a post. I missed a bunch of workouts. I put on weight. Basically #ActiveAugust for me was one giant bag of FAIL. Anyway, I finished up the week with a couple of days teaching karate. I did workouts before class, including a tabata on the heavy bag and just general calisthenics, shadow boxing and practicing techniques. I got my chainsaw back from repairs today. I cut & split wood for about 2 1/2 hours. Final weight 201 from a start of 194. That's +7 in four weeks. Not good. Is the next month going to be #StarvationSeptember? That's what I need.
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25Aug 2009 by Grant Fritchey 6 Comments

PASS Board Nominations

PASS
I think the Professional Association of SQL Server users (PASS) is an extremely important organization for SQL Server DBA's. Even if you're not a member, you've never attended the Summit, gone to a local chapter meeting, read the magazine (while it was in print), took part in the special interest groups, or even read the technical articles available on the web site, you know, or work with, someone who has. What's more, the people who get involved with PASS are the ones that are growing and expanding. PASS members are the ones that are becoming leaders in the industry. PASS members influence the direction Microsoft takes with its products. PASS, it's members and volunteers, foster and grow the speakers, teachers, writers and MVP's that are showing you how to perform your craft as a…
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24Aug 2009 by Grant Fritchey No Comments

New Book

Uncategorized
Well, three chapters. The latest book I worked on is up at Apress. I only have three chapters in this one, backup, restore & performance monitoring & tuning. It's written as an introductory book, targeted to help get people started as a DBA. I haven't read the chapters from the other authors, but Rob Walters is a terrific writer & a great guy and Carmen Taglienti has a wonderful reputation, so I suspect their work will be everything you could ask for. Of course, it's not real until you can get it on Amazon.
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21Aug 2009 by Grant Fritchey 15 Comments

What happens when you use WITH RECOMPILE

SQL Server, T-SQL
I saw this question and my immediate thought was "Well, duh, the execution plan is recreated by a recompile." But, someone a bit smarter than myself suggested that, in fact, no plan was stored in cache, forcing a new plan to be created each time the query was run. So, which is it? Does a plan get added to cache and then removed every time the procedure is called, or do you get nothing in cache and the "recompile" is actually a compile every time? As Mr. Owl says, let's find out. I have a small script that looks like this: CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Test]( [col] [varchar] (10) NULL ); CREATE TABLE [dbo].[Test2] ( [col] VARCHAR(10) NULL ); INSERT INTO dbo.Test (col) VALUES ('Val1'), ('Val2'),   ('Val3') ; INSERT INTO dbo.Test2…
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