23Jan 2012 by Grant Fritchey 6 Comments

Deadlock Monitoring

T-SQL
There are four different ways you can get information about deadlocks in your system. These are: traceflag 1204 traceflag 1222 trace events extended events For years I’ve been pushing traceflag 1222 as the best of the lot. Well, that’s over. I’ve been learning more and more about extended events and I’m currently in love with xml_deadlock_report event. Why? Simple, it has everything that traceflag 1222 has, but there are two glorious things about it. First, it’s not going to be filling up my error log with, for the error log, noise. Seriously. As much as I liked the information displayed from traceflag 1222, I didn’t like what it did to the log, but I saw it as a necessary evil. Second, it’s XML baby! That means you can set up…
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18Jan 2012 by Grant Fritchey 7 Comments

Stop PIPA & SOPA

Misc
I’m not going to black out my blog, because, let’s face it, who’s going to notice? But for all six of you who read this (and, of course, you Mom), I do want to point out that these are horrific bad bills. They are sponsored by Democrats and Republicans, so party affiliation shouldn’t enter into this. In this case, they’re all bad guys. And why? Greed, pure & simple. Hollywood donates millions & millions to politicians and they expect these people to stay bought and deliver on their “anit-piracy” legislation. Don’t know anything about this? Here’s an article. Just don’t focus on SOPA. It’s the bill sponsored by the Republicans (which for some reason is the only one called out as evil…grrr). There’s also PIPA, which is the Senate equivalent…
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13Jan 2012 by Grant Fritchey 2 Comments

Friday SQL Nugget #1

Professional Development
Gee thanks Jes (blog|twitter). Just what I wanted, a little extra work on a Friday afternoon. I used to like you. We have a tagging theme started by Ted Krueger (blog|twitter) who I also used to like. The theme is: Deciding that I need to delete and start all over Lordy I hate this one. See, I find it easy to decide that I need to delete and start all over. My challenging task is persevering. But… here’s the rub. Because my challenge is persevering, I have a tendency to try to persevere when I really should be throwing in the towel. I don’t have a technical example of this ready at hand (I did mention it was the afternoon on a Friday, right?), but I do have a presentation…
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11Jan 2012 by Grant Fritchey 10 Comments

Database Backups: Things You Need To Do Now

SQL Server, T-SQL
I want to say a few things about database backups that you need to know. Wait a minute, haven’t you written about backups before? Why, yes. Yes I have. Aaand… you’re doing it again because? Have you noticed the shocking number of questions that come up on SQL Server Central and #sqlhelp regarding backups? Have you noticed the incredibly huge number of people who don’t have backups at all? That’s why. To get the word out. Oh, good point. Carry on. Because backups are so easy, people tend to discount them. That is, until they need them. Then, suddenly, they become extremely important. Here’s a suggestion: Make databases important now. Learn how SQL Server backup works. Make sure you have backups on your systems. Make sure you have the appropriate…
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19Dec 2011 by Grant Fritchey 2 Comments

PASS Summit 2012 Evaluation Results

PASS, Professional Development
I say it all the time because it’s worth repeating, feedback is a gift. Good, bad or indifferent (well, not indifferent), feedback is a wonderful gift. Any time you appreciate a speaker, give them feedback. Any time you think a speaker could improve, give them feedback. Any time you hate a speaker, give them feedback. It’s really the best thing you can do. With that in mind, I have a huge stack of gifts in front of me here, the evaluations from the PASS Summit.Thank you very much to each and every one of the 160 different evaluations I received. I presented three times at the summit, once on a pre-con with Gail Shaw called “All About Execution Plans,” one time in a spotlight session called “DMOs as a Shortcut…
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14Dec 2011 by Grant Fritchey No Comments

SQL Saturday #104: Colorado Springs

Professional Development
I’ll be presenting at the Colorado Springs SQL Saturday on January 7th of 2012. The session is called Seven Ways to Fix Bad Parameter Sniffing. Please, if you’re in the area, register and come to the event. There are going to be some truly excellent speakers there. There is also evidently skiing on Sunday, although I won’t be taking part in that.
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12Dec 2011 by Grant Fritchey 11 Comments

Changes to SQL Server 2012 Execution Plans

Uncategorized
I’ve been working with execution plans quite a lot in SQL Server 2012. There are a number of changes, most of them associated with new or different functionality. I had not noticed anything really fundamental until recently. I’ve become a huge proponent of always checking the properties of the SELECT statement. There’s so much useful information in there about what’s happened with the plan generation in the optimizer (not low level stuff, but the big picture items) that you should always be checking it first as a fundamental part of your plan examinations. Here’s an example from SQL Server 2008R2: You can see cool stuff like the size of the plan, the time it took to compile, the optimization level, the reason for early termination. Many of the properties on…
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09Dec 2011 by Grant Fritchey 3 Comments

#sqlfamily

Professional Development
Microsoft is supporting an effort by PragmaticWorks targeted at supporting technical training for returning veterans. I can’t think of a single better cause to throw some support behind. Not one. They’re going to donate money based on posts about #sqlfamily. Well done to Brian Knight (blog|twitter) and all the team at PragmaticWorks. I knew you were great people, I just didn’t know how great. Thanks to Microsoft and the SQL Server Team for their support of Brian. Oh, and for all the work you guys do with SQL Server. I may bitch about you guys more than you’d like, but it’s only because I live inside your software, constantly. I wouldn’t be there all the time if you didn’t do great work. Keep it up. We can talk about this…
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06Dec 2011 by Grant Fritchey 1 Comment

SQL Connections Fall 2011 Speaker Evaluations

Misc
In keeping with the past, I’m going to go ahead and post my evals for the two sessions I did at Connections in Vegas back in November. It was a mixed conference for me. The first session I had ~80 people. The second session I had 9. Yeah, weird. But there were great speakers there (as usual) so I’m hardly shocked that I had low attendance, but the funny thing is I expected the sessions to be reversed. The low one was the session I lavished love & attention on. The high one wasn’t given as much of my focus. Figures. Here are the evals. I love how Connections shows the high, mean and low so you get a sense of how you fit. SQL Server Optimization Checklist (36 responses)…
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05Dec 2011 by Grant Fritchey 1 Comment

Resolutions: Outcome

Professional Development
Earlier this year, I wrote a post about my upcoming plans for the year in response to a question asked by Jen McCown (flat out, one of my favorite people, blog|twitter). It was supposed to be about resolutions, but I just don’t make those. I make plans. Here we are, close to a year later (11 months). How did the plans work out? The first one, hinted at the time, was to start a new job. Well, that’s done and it’s going swimmingly, thank you very much. The job has turned out to be harder than I thought it was going to be. I travel more than I thought I was going to travel (although we’re keeping it within the limits we agreed to, I love my new company). Frankly,…
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