Posts by
Phil Factor
Phil Factor (real name withheld to protect the guilty), aka Database Mole, has 30 years of experience with database-intensive applications.
Despite having once been shouted at by a furious Bill Gates at an exhibition in the early 1980s, he has remained resolutely anonymous throughout his career.
He is a regular contributor to Simple Talk and SQLServerCentral.
A Database Developer’s Guide to SQL Clone
Monitoring the Application with SQL Monitor: Website Activity
Using a Variable-length Datatype Without Explicit Length: The Whys and Wherefores (BP007/8)
(MAX) specification, which is a mistake too. Phil Factor explains the dangers and then offers a workaround for the problem, when you're importing text and... Read more
The risks of using EXECUTE (‘SQL Script’)
Execute(string) to execute a batch in a string, often assembled dynamically from user input. This technique is dangerous because the parameter values are injected before the statement is parsed by SQL Server, allowing an attacker to "tag on" extra statements. Use sp_ExecuteSql... Read more
The Whys and Wherefores of Untrusted or Disabled Constraints
FOREIGN KEY or CHECK constraints in your databases will degrade data consistency and integrity and can cause query performance problems. Phil Factor explains how to detect these and other table-related issues, during development, before they cause trouble further down the line. Read more