I attended a training session at Redgate this week by Chris Spalton. Chris’ session topic was “An Introduction into Planning User Research.” Chris pointed out that there’s much more to User Research, but that planning the research is particularly important as it is the foundation for everything you do later. If you’re a database administrator … Read more
One of the most important responsibilities for a DBA is to ensure that a database can be restored in case of corruption, a dropped table, or another disaster. In this article, Greg Larsen explains the different types of backups available with SQL Server.… Read more
More organisations are adopting DevOps, but what happens as the codebase grows? In this article, Siddharth Rao gives advice on how to implement continuous deployment at scale.… Read more
Conventional wisdom says that communication is the critical for success in just about any aspect of life, be that personal relationships or within teams or corporations. Of course, miscommunication can cause all sorts of problems. Communication has changed drastically over the past few centuries due to technology. We’ve gone from the ability to speak mostly … Read more
You can use Xamarin to develop .NET apps to run on iOS or Android instead of Windows. In this article, Julio Sampaio demonstrates the Uno Platform. You can build cross-platform applications using Uno which has even more options.… Read more
Database administrators can never stop thinking about security. In this article, Fabiano Amorim shows how data can be revealed through error messages when views are used to secure rows.… Read more
Securing data is not always easy to do, but it should be the top responsibility for database administrators. From protecting the physical servers to preventing copies of backups files from getting into the wrong hands, there is a lot to consider. In this article, Pamela Mooney covers what DBAs need to think about when securing their organisation’s data.… Read more
Have you ever longed for a way of making the delivery of databases more visible, predictable and measurable? Do you ever wish that they would be of better quality, quicker to change, and cost less? Grant Fritchey explains some of the secrets of doing Continuous Integration for Databases to relieve some of the pain-points of the Database Delivery process.… Read more
Well tuned storage is essential for SQL Server performance. In this article, Robert Sheldon explains the metrics that are important to watch. … Read more
Whenever I teach database topics to a class of beginners, someone inevitably says that Microsoft Excel is a database. Excel is an amazing tool with built-in functionality for financial calculations, statistics, and more, but it’s not a database. It’s great for keeping track and organizing small amounts of data, but it doesn’t meet the requirements … Read more
In this article, Edward Pollack describes some of the issues when querying against remote data sources. He covers remote SQL Servers and also connecting to a PostgreSQL database.… Read more
Oracle has been established as one of the top database systems used in enterprises throughout the world. In this article, Cynthia Dzikiti describes her career as an Oracle application developer and covers some of the benefits of Oracle.… Read more
No matter what you need, Azure probably has a solution. In this article Diogo Souza demonstrates how to host a static web page in Azure in just a few steps with Azure Blob Storage and Azure CDN.… Read more
Moving resources from one location to another in Azure has been possible but not easy to do. In this article, Dennes Torres introduces an exiting new Azure feature: Azure Resource Mover.… Read more
SQL Server synonyms can be used to permanently alias database objects in the same or another database. In this article, Greg Larsen demonstrates how to use synonyms and the many reasons to consider using them.… Read more
A very common tenet used when building out a DevOps style approach to automated deployment is the concept of failing fast. You want to identify issues with the changes in your code and structures as early as possible to protect the production environment. One of the most common methods to meet this requirement is setting … Read more
Business Intelligence Architect, Analysis Services Maestro, and author Bill Pearson kicks off a series to introduce the DAX financial functions. In this article, he exposes five functions that are popular in the calculation of loans and other annuities. Those accustomed to these functions within Excel will find the syntax, uses and operation of the functions familiar within the Power BI environment.… Read more
Azure Data Factory is a cloud based data orchestration tool that many ETL developers began using instead of SSIS. In this article, Rodney Landrum recalls a Data Factory project where he had to depend on another service, Azure Logic Apps, to fill in for some lacking functionality.… Read more
Compliant Database DevOps
Standardize team-based development
Automate database deployments
Monitor performance and availability
Protect and preserve data
