Connecting to the SQL Server Community Online: Uplifting Folks

We’ve got a session coming up in the free Redgate Streamed virtual conference on, “How database DevOps levels up remote work.” When thinking about that session I began thinking about other ways to improve remote work.

While I worked remotely for nearly ten years until recently and have established practices which work well for me , moving to another country and the general chaos and uncertainty right now as the world tries to cope with a global pandemic have increased my feelings of worry and loneliness.

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Altering an Indexed View in SQL Server Drops All Indexes

I learned an interesting thing about ALTER VIEW behavior in SQL Server when applied to indexed views. This is covered in the product documentation, but it’s not something I would have expected.

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High Availability Options for SQL Server 2008 in an Azure VM: A #sqlhelp Story

I asked a question on Twitter yesterday: “If running SQL Server 2008 in an Azure VM (no SQL upgrade possible, extended support in place), is the best option for high availability Database Mirroring? Or something else I am not thinking of? #sqlhelp”

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Online, Resumable, and WAIT_AT_LOW_PRIORITY Operations in SQL Server

ONLINE operations in SQL Server were simple to understand for years – we got ONLINE index rebuilds in SQL Server 2005. That was it for a while.

Then, things got more complicated: we got more types of indexes. We got ONLINE options for schema changes that don’t involve indexes. We got more options for managing things like blocking, because online operations are really only mostly online: generally there’s going to be at least a short period where an exclusive lock is needed to update metadata. We now have some RESUMABLE operations coming in, too, for those big operations that are tough to handle.

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SQL Server Management Studio Is as Relevant as Ever

Sometimes you keep a classic around.

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The SQL Server Data Row Size Question: Why Is It Bigger?

This morning, I received the following question from a user:

Could you please clarify SQLServer “Data Row” size: If I run the script below on SQL Server 2012, then Slot(row) Size is 710 bytes if I run the same script against SQL Server 2016 and above, then Slot(row) Size is 724 bytes.

They then provided a script which creates and inserts a few rows into a sample table, runs the DBCC IND command to find a list of pages for the sample table, then uses the DBCC PAGE command to examine the page.

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PASS Summit 2018 - Day 1 Keynote Announcements

Good morning from Seattle, at the Summit for the Professional Association of SQL Server.

I’m lucky enough to be sitting at the blogger table this morning, watching the keynote of announcements.

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