The ‘= NULL’ Mistake and other SQL NULL Heresies

The SQL Prompt Best Practice rule checks whether a comparison or expression includes a NULL literal ('NULL'), which in SQL Server, rather than result in an error, will simply always produce a NULL result. Phil Factor explains how to avoid this, and other SQL NULL-related calamities. Read more

SQL Change Automation Scripting: Getting Data into a Target Database

Your strategy for loading a freshly built database with data will depend on how much you need. If just a few rows, then single-row INSERT statements will be fine, but for more than that you'll need to build insert the rows using native-format BCP. Fortunately, SQL Change Automation (SCA) can be used with either strategy, as Phil Factor demonstrates. Read more

Dealing with Server Objects, Settings and Features when Provisioning Databases

If we want the behavior and performance of our test databases to mimic that observed in production, then we must consider not only the database but also the server. Grant Frtichey reviews the server-level objects, settings and features that we may need to consider, and then shows how to 'synchronize' the linked servers, user logins and SQL Agent jobs, as part of an automated provisioning process, using SQL Provision. Read more

Static Data and Database Builds

Whichever way you wish to ensure that a database, when built, has all the data that will enable it to function properly, there are reasonably simple ways of doing it. Phil Factor explains the alternatives. Read more

Simple Steps in SQL Change Automation Scripting

Phil Factor demonstrates the bare essentials of SCA PowerShell scripts that can form the basis for an automated process for database delivery or help improve your current process. Read more

How to Provision a Set of Databases to Multiple Azure-based Servers

Grant Fritchey shows how to provision a group of interdependent databases, masked to protect sensitive or personal data, to each machine in an Azure-based test cell. Read more

Database Delivery with Docker and SQL Change Automation

Phil Factor demonstrates how to integrate SQL Change Automation into containerized workflows, such as are typical of a microservices architecture. He shows how to automate database builds into a Linux SQL Server container running on Windows, and then backup the containerized database and restore it into dedicated containerized development copies for each developer and tester. Read more

A DBA’s Journey towards Database DevOps

John Morehouse describes how a quest to help solve his organization's "deployment bottleneck" led them to a place where they could both deliver application and database changes into the wild at a pace to satisfy customer demand, and achieve a better work-life balance for the team, both of which are well worth having. Read more

Running Linux SQL Server as a Container

Phil Factor starts a series of articles that will demonstrate the use of temporary SQL Server instances, running in Linux containers, into which we can deploy the latest database build, stocked with data, for development and testing work. This initial article shows how to set up a SQL Server instance inside a Linux Docker container, create some sample databases, and persist data locally. Read more

SQL Clone on your Laptop

Phil Factor provides a PowerShell script to disconnect your laptop without risking error 21, if you're working with SQL Clone and need to go offline. The same script will then bring the clone database back online smoothly, once you're reconnected. Read more

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