Blogs Dennes Torres in Blogs Identity column vs ETL Process Creating ETL process can pose so many challenges we will only fully discover them when really building the ETL. Before you complain about modelling, the... 01 March 2020 6 min read
Database DevOps William Brewer in Database DevOps Questions About SQL Server Security and Access Control You Were Too Shy to Ask For many developers, database security and Access control is just something that gets in the way of development work. However, several recent security breaches have... 04 November 2016 23 min read
Robert Sheldon SQL Server System Views: The Basics When maintaining or refactoring an unfamiliar database, you'll need a fast way to uncover all sorts of facts about the database, its tables, columns keys... 27 January 2016 19 min read
Robert Sheldon JSON support in SQL Server 2016 At last, SQL Server has caught up with other RDBMSs by providing a useful measure of JSON-support. It is a useful start, even though it... 15 December 2015 21 min read
Artemakis Artemiou Introducing SQL Server In-Memory OLTP In-Memory OLTP, aka Hekaton, originally shipped with 2014, and although it certainly helped the performance of certain types of workload, it then had certain restrictions... 30 September 2015 10 min read
William Sisson Where in the Application Should Data Validation be Done? Whereabouts in the application should the business logic of data-validation checks be made? The advantages of a layered approach to validation that includes database constraints,... 04 November 2014 12 min read
Edward Elliott Improving the Quality of SQL Server Database Connections in the Cloud To access SQL Server from the client, you use TDS protocol over TCP. This is fine over reliable LANs but over the internet these connections... 22 September 2014 20 min read
Robert Sheldon SQL Server XML Questions You Were Too Shy To Ask Sometimes, XML seems a bewildering convention that offers solutions to problems that the average database user doesn't have. To make things worse, XML experts generally... 22 April 2014 26 min read
Dwain Camps High Performance Relational Division in SQL Server Relational division is used in SQL to select rows that conform to a number of different criteria. It is a neglected but effective technique for... 24 March 2014 28 min read
Jes Borland SQL Server Indexed Views: The Basics Views are a valuable tool for the SQL Server Developer, because they hide complexity and allow for a readable style of SQL expression. They aren't... 12 February 2014 23 min read
Joe Celko SQL Server SEQUENCE Basics The SEQUENCE statement introduced in SQL Server 2012 brings the ANSI SQL 2003 standard method of generating IDs. This is a great relief to database... 06 February 2014 13 min read
Learn SQL Server Phil Factor in Learn SQL Server Primary Key Primer for SQL Server Every database developer uses keys, but without always understanding all the ramifications. They come with few hard and fast rules, but if you get them... 02 December 2013 22 min read
Dwain Camps A SQL-Based Universal Currency Formatter SQL Server isn't usually the best place to format dates or currency as strings. It can be a complex task to conform correctly with national... 07 February 2013 12 min read
Seth Delconte Precision Indexing: Basics of Selective XML Indexes in SQL Server 2012 Seldom has a SQL Server Service pack had such an effect on database development as when SQL Server 2012 SP1 introduced selective XML indexes. These... 25 January 2013 14 min read
Grant Fritchey Statistics in SQL Server SQL Server's Query Optimiser relies on statistics for providing a decent query plan. If the statistics are wrong, outdated or missing then you have little... 08 January 2013 10 min read
Joe Celko SQL VIEW Basics SQL Views are essential for the database developer. However, it is common to see them misused, or neglected. Joe Celko tackles an introduction to the... 10 May 2012 19 min read
Fabiano Amorim Window Functions in SQL Server: Part 3: Questions of Performance A SQL expression may look elegant on the page but it is only valuable if its performance is good. Do window functions run quicker than... 04 January 2012 12 min read
Robert Sheldon Incorporating XML into your Database Objects XML data can become a full participant in a SQL Server Database, and can be used in views, functions, check constraints, computed columns and defaults.... 04 January 2012 14 min read
Robert Sheldon The XML Methods in SQL Server The XML Data type has definite uses, but the way of interrogating, retrieving, and manipulating the values of properties and attributes within XML have been... 08 December 2011 22 min read
Fabiano Amorim Window Functions in SQL Server: Part 2-The Frame Fabiano continues his introduction to SQL Server's implementation of the window functions by giving a history of what got implemented and when, and explaining the... 24 November 2011 13 min read
