After a plagiarized article this week, a content for you.  Read more...

A look at Partitioned Views, their advantages, disadvantages backed up by examples and statistics.  Read more...

Mike Eastland frequently restores production databases to various development servers. The drive layouts between the servers are almost never the same. He is constantly shuffling files on his development servers due to space constraints, which in turn breaks the automated restore scripts because the MOVE clauses are invalidated. Does he have to use the MOVE clause every time he does a restore?  Read more...

Business Intelligence architect, Analysis Services Maestro, and author Bill Pearson exposes the DAX ISBLANK() function, and then provides some hands-on exposure to its use, particularly in combination with other DAX functions, in managing empty values underlying our PowerPivot model designs.  Read more...

Resilient T-SQL code is code that is designed to last, and to be safely reused by others. The goal of defensive database programming, the goal of this book, is to help you to produce resilient T-SQL code that robustly and gracefully handles cases of unintended use, and is resilient to common changes to the database environment.  Read more...

Power Query, provided as part of Microsoft Power BI self-service solution, is an Excel add-in that can be used for data discovery, reshaping the data and combining data coming from different sources. Power Query is one of Excel add-ins. Read on to learn how to install and get started using it.  Read more...

Using Log Shipping? Looking for a more automated way to fail over during a disaster? Read on...  Read more...

Alex Kuznetsov describes the agile principles, techniques and tools that allowed his development team to make frequent database refactoring a reality, without disrupting users. He explains how this allowed his team to apply an iterative, evolutionary approach to the design and development of their databases, as well as applications.   Read more...

Use this script in SQL Monitor to determine the general load on the operating system you can get a count of the processes that are in a runnable state. This value will go up and down as various systems run on the operating system. It’s only a measure of load on the system and won’t indicate the cause of problems, but will show you pressure on the system.   Read more...

Window functions are more intuitive and simpler in many cases than alternative SQL methods.  Read more...

(Be sure to checkout the SQLpassion Online Academy, where you get High-Quality SQL Server Trainings with Instant Access!) Over the...  Read more...