Now onto the bigger elephant in the room, why on earth would you have all of these fields set to the maximum storage amount of two gigabytes (1GB for NVARCHAR taking up 2GB of space).  Are you really storing that much data in six fields of EACH record?  Keep in mind that SQL Server stores records in 8K pages.  When you exceed that the data goes to an overflow page with a pointer so that SQL knows where to find the rest of the data.  I understand that it will not take up that much space if you are not actually storing that much data, but there is a potential here for these table to be problematic.  Granted this might be a good design for one field if it stores a large amount of text or notes, but six fields in the same record?  I looked at the length of the records currently entered for these six fields and I found nothing larger than 100 characters.  Overkill?  What do you think?

Enjoy!

The theme for this year’s luncheon was “BEYOND STEREOTYPES: Equality, Gender, Neutrality, and Valuing Diversity.”  The distinguished panel consisted of Rob Farley, Erin Stellato, Cindy Gross, Kevin Kline and Gail Shaw.  The luncheon was moderated by my dear friend Mickey Stuewe.  The bloggers present included Jes Borland, Mark Stacey, Karen Lopez, Grant Fritchey, Jen McCown, Jen Stirrup and Laerte Junior.  As you can see it was very humbling to be chosen amongst that lineup.

It has become a tradition at the #PASSWIT luncheon for men and women to wear #SQLKilts to support the Women in Technology.  Next year, I should be able to wear a kilt, however this year I wore pink in honor of breast cancer awareness month.  This luncheon was very moving for me this year and I found myself caught up in the conversations instead of taking notes.  However, I did manage to grab some very good quotes outlined below:

Gail Shaw was asked if she had to make an effort to fit in within the technology community to which she replied: “No I don’t because I can’t literally be bothered.”

Cindy Gross later said “Every single person is prejudiced about something…”

Kevin Kline said that stereotypes are the index pages because our brains cannot know intimate details for more than maybe 150 people, for the rest we rely on stereotypes.

Rob Farley said for us to “Stand up and be the person who champions what is right.”

Erin Stellato when asked by a question from the floor about how to make it in the industry with all of the stereotypes working against you said “How am I not going to make it?  Push through the stress and win!”

Rob Farley

Cindy Gross

Mickey Stuewe

Rob Farley and Erin Stellato

Filed under: SQL PASS Tagged: SQL Pass, Summit 2013, WIT ]]>

Rob Volk (b|t) and I had this idea to do a humorous session where we play Laurel and Hardy depicting the interactions between junior and senior DBAs.  It should be a good time for all.  Our session is Wednesday at 3pm, come by and say hi.  Enjoy!

If you haven’t registered yet, please do so now!  See you there!

1.  Go to Idaho and declare it to be “My own private Idaho” to everyone I encounter, no exceptions.
2. Spend at least one night in every single state in the Union.
3. Visit the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, Grand Central Station, watch the ball drop in Times Square, grab the bull’s balls on Wall Street, dance on the Big keyboard at FAO Schwartz.  Sing New York, New York at a karaoke bar, laugh at people falling while they ice skate in Rockefeller plaza.  Take a cab and tell him he’s going the wrong way, and jog through Central Park.
4. Have a beer and a dog at every Major League Baseball stadium.
5. Watch when the Braves win the World Series from the stands.
6. Watch when the Gators win the National Championship from the stands.
7. Take a selfie on the top of a mountain that I hiked.
8. Visit every port of call in the Caribbean.
9. Have a place that when I walk in they yell “Ed” because it’s a place where everybody knows your name!
10. Take a Mediterranean cruise.
11. Sing “We Are the Boys of Florida” and the Alma Mater from the top of my lungs at every SEC stadium.
12. Take an Alaskan cruise.
13. Dress up like Gene Simmons from Kiss in full regalia  and go grocery shopping.
14. Attend the European SQL Bits conference.
15. Attend a SQL Saturday on four different continents.
16. Pack our bags and drive with no destination in mind stopping in random places.
17. Take a vacation along route 66.
18. Parasail into some blue water source.
19. Zipline down a mountain.
20. Visit Oklahoma and sing “Surry with the Fringe on Top” to everyone you encounter, no exceptions.
21. Take a selfie in front of Mt Rushmore, the Grand Canyon, Buckingham Palace, Eiffel Tower, Musee du Louvre,  Arc de Triomphe,  the Great Pyramid of Giza, Stone Henge, the Colisseum, and the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
22. Ride the Cable Cars in San Francisco and sing the Rice A Roni song.  Visit the Golden Gate Bridge and tell everyone not to jump.
23. Sing along with the Opera in Sydney.
24. Go to Carnivale in Rio de Janeiro.
25. Go cage diving in South Africa with a great white.
26. Visit the Alamo and run across the field yelling “I remembered the Alamo!”
27. See the northern lights.
28. Learn to scuba dive.
29. Tour Europe from a train.
30. Eat chocolate in Switzerland.
31. Ride in a sleeper car on Amtrak across the country and occasionally sing the Gambler in the dining car.
32. Spend days getting lost in Italian and French art museums.
33. Ride in a gondola in Venice.
34. Find all the David statues in Florence and take a picture with his junk.
35. Walk in Caesar’s footsteps and constantly shout out “Et tu Brute!”
36. Take a European vacation and drive around the circle yelling “Parliament House, Big Ben”
37. Visit a beach on five different continents.
38. Take a polar plunge.
39. Get over my fear of ice skating.
40. Bungee jump and yell “she pushed me, please stop this ride”
41. Ride in a hot air balloon.
42. Make a difference in someone’s life.
43. Experience a sunset and sunrise on four different oceans.
44. Visit the volcanoes in Hawaii and calling it Hav-a-ee the whole time.
45. Visit at least five Castles.
46. Go to the real comic con in California.
47. Having dinner with SQL Server friends in their neck of the woods.
48. Steal someone’s bacon.
49. Write a new bucket list because you cannot die if you still have items on your list.

I am thinking the next time that I go back to campus, I will do my best to encourage this young lady with some personal stories of strong, courageous women in technology that I know.  Until then I told my daughter to encourage her and to let her know that I am rooting for her and to not give up because our STEM professions need her, our society needs her, and we need her.

So let’s do a rundown real quick of the last month.  I spoke at the very first SQL Saturday in beautiful Cocoa Beach, Florida and had an amazing time catching up with old friends and meeting new ones.  I completed my dizzying full-time college schedule with resounding success in my first semester back to the glorious University of Florida in pursuit of a Business Administration degree. Last but not least, Rob Volk (b | t) and I were selected to present our Lightning Talk for the PASS Summit in Charlotte, North Carolina.  That is an extremely humbling and terribly exciting feeling.  Our session, titled “DBAs in Toyland: Here’s Another Fine Mess You’ve Gotten Me Into!” is going to be a lot of fun to present as Rob and I are thoroughly enjoying the process of putting it together.  Enjoy!

1. Backup (or copy) the project folder (c:\Users\<<Username>>\Documents\SSMAProjects\<<Project Name>>).  Close SSMA and then delete the target-metabase.mb file in the project folder.   Now open SSMA and now you can connect to a new SQL Server and/or database.  You would want to copy the folder if you want to retain the settings for a different environment such as staging, acceptance, production, etc.  If you rename the folder for a different environment, make sure to rename the *.o2ssproj file to match the folder name.  This is the file that opens inside of SSMA.
2. The second option is to create a new project using SSMA and then copying in the object-containers.mappings, project-container.mappings, and finally preferences.prefs.  These are the project settings that you have painstakingly setup in your original project.

I hope this helps.  Enjoy!

Peter Gibbons: The thing is, Bob, it’s not that I’m lazy, it’s that I just don’t care.

Bob Porter: Don’t… don’t care?

Peter Gibbons: It’s a problem of motivation, all right? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don’t see another dime, so where’s the motivation? And here’s something else, Bob: I have eight different bosses right now.

Bob Slydell: I beg your pardon?

Peter Gibbons: Eight bosses.

Bob Slydell: Eight?

Peter Gibbons: Eight, Bob. So that means that when I make a mistake, I have eight different people coming by to tell me about it. That’s my only real motivation is not to be hassled, that and the fear of losing my job. But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just hard enough not to get fired.

I see this all the time. When I started at my current position and I worked hard on projects, everyone said: “Why bother, it’s not going to get you anywhere.” After working here for two years, I am starting to understand that logic sadly enough.  However, It goes against how I was raised.

In addition, money is the ultimate motivator, but not the only motivation.  For me it is growth, I am not out to break the bank.  But, I do want to be acknowledged with regular raises.  I personally need something to work for, a goal whether it be financial or a clear path for potential growth.  Currently I have reached a glass ceiling, there is nowhere to go and without raises, I must rely on personal motivation.  Yet, everyone around me is performing less and less due to the lack of motivation.  It is difficult not to become Peter Gibbons.  Maybe it is time to move on?  However, I must fight to remain motivated.

I have a spreadsheet that hopefully I do not forget to update when I add a new database to a server so I know who to notify in case there are issues.  When I took over this position there was very little information for most of the databases in my charge.  I thought to myself ‘shouldn’t you know what each database is for and why it is on your server?  How did it get there?  Is anyone still using it?’  As database administrators I believe we should know our data.

I am interested to hear how others handle this and if you even care?  Please send me your input.  Enjoy!

You can register here, come on you know you want to hit the beach for the weekend.  There is also a group rate code for the Hilton (SQLP), where the event is being held, that expires tomorrow (June 28th).  You can reserve your room here.  However, I will be staying just down the road at the Courtyard where my wife and I stayed on our wedding night before our honeymoon cruise to the Bahamas.  I look forward to seeing you there.  Enjoy!

The Chocolate Beach courtesy of Space Coast SQL User Group

DBCC SQLPERF

You can also use this utility to clear the sys.dm_os_wait_stats and sys.dm_os_latch_stats statistics, in such a manner:

DBCC SQLPERF(“sys.dm_os_wait_stats”,CLEAR);

Most would say that is how it should be, but the Oracle DBAs told me that the users would complain daily.  They were happy to rid themselves of those users and now I know why.

Hopefully I did not jinx myself but it looks like the domination plan is working!

Enjoy!

My part of the project included a 27-hour marathon involving migrating the data using SQL Server Migration Assistant and then numerous scripts and comparisons to day-zero databases from the vendor while upgrading the application across five different product upgrades using RedGate SQL Compare (which worked beautifully). It was a day full of Starbucks triple espressos and five-hour energy shots before I crashed and the testers took over. We then rounded out the weekend with a 33-hour ETL process which all completed successfully before the application went live at 7am this morning. Mission accomplished.

This project has great visibility in my organization and its success will open the flood gates to future migrations in showing our world that SQL Server is an enterprise level database. I am not stopping here, I want their 100 terabytes of production data! It will be mine, oh yes it will be mine.

A little over a year ago we began a plan to migrate our financial applications to SQL Server in order to retire the oldest Oracle servers on site and reduce our massive licensing footprint.  This was all part of my plan for SQL Server World Domination (said in a maniacal voice, imagine that).  We knew that if this mission critical migration was a success that we could leverage our product against the Oracle servers in-house and begin the destruction of their infrastructure in favor of my glorious SQL Servers!  (Hear the trumpets heralding the new king?)

This project, if successful, will be the Oracle death knell.  Over the last year I have prepared diligently with one goal in site:  this migration weekend.  The weekend of my birthday seems apropos to give me the present that I so desire, SQL Server Domination.  You may have noticed that the number of blog posts recently have been limited especially after blogging every day last year.  For the last few months, I have had one purpose and one purpose only:  ensuring the success of this migration!

Let the trumpets herald the coming of a new dawn.  Long live SQL Server.  I will blog again next week on the other side of this project to declare that the Queen is dead and a new King has ascended the throne!   Until then queue the Imperial March, hello Starbucks and massive four day working weekend with little sleep migration project here I come!

T-SQL Tuesday

This month’s T-SQL Tuesday blog meme is brought to us by Wendy Pastrick (blog|twitter) and the subject is “The Long and Winding Road.“

When I saw this month’s subject, I lunged forward and began to write dropping everything else that I was working on.  Why?  Any chance to incorporate SQL Server with the Beatles is worth the time and effort.  After all, they are the greatest band of all time and if you disagree then you are just going to have to live with being wrong, right?

Many moons ago, well it was actually 1997, I had written some applications in Visual Basic: yes, the old and horribly slow one, you know the one.  But then I discovered Delphi (Object Pascal for the kiddies) and wrote amazing some amazing applications.  I even wrote a few games back then just to prove to myself that I could, they were not horribly great but I felt accomplished and I often wonder where those floppies are so that I could play them again.   Programming was my passion and it felt so amazing to create something from scratch, my own creation, my own Frankenstein: “It’s Alive!”

From there a company noticed some of my freeware applications and offered to move me to Virginia and teach me to write business applications in Progress 4GL for Unix and Windows.  Wait, you are going to train me, mentor me, and pay me double my current salary.  I’m in.  Progress was an amazing product with a very well written SQL-compliant RDBMS that rivaled Sybase, Informix and Oracle only without the marketing hype.  Their claim back then was that they were in over 60% of the Fortune 500.  The problem was that with their Value Added Reseller structure, many vendors would repackage their database as their own (as was allowed if they paid enough for the rights to distribute the product), so many of those companies had no idea that their database was “Powered by Progress.”

My years with the product were amazing learning to write code that would run in Unix, compile and run in Windows and then eventually would become used inside of tags of HTML to deliver data to the web was ground breaking at the time.  I was sure that this was the future, so much so that I became a consultant for the company traveling the globe for two years helping clients with installation, troubleshooting and training.  I drank the kool-aid.  I was pretty sure that with a little marketing they would sink the Oracle juggernaut.

At one company I even administered a SQL Server 6.5 and 7.0 boxes because they had vendor software that required it and I was the database guy for Progress.  I remember thinking how SQL Server was so miniscule compared to Progress.  I remember thinking that they will never make it in this sector.  Well I was wrong about the Xbox, too.

Enter early 2004, I had just successfully completed a fulfilling project and was looking for my next contract opportunity.  The well was dry, there were no opportunities for Progress.  I had a home and a small children and my family did not want to move.  The road had ended that day.  I had to take a job as a systems administrator to make ends meet.  The dream was over.  In the words of the Beatles….

The wild and windy night, that the rain washed away

Has left a pool of tears crying for the day

Why leave me standing here? Let me know the way

Then in 2008, I started a position that was part programmer and part SQL Server DBA.  Prior to this, I contemplated going back to school and leaving the IT field.  But as the Beatles would say…

And still they lead me back to the long winding road

You left me standing here a long, long time ago

Don’t leave me waiting here lead me to your door

The dream had come full circle, I found my new passion:  SQL Server.  It really was my old passion in disguise: DATA!  Hopefully this technology will be the one for many years to come, what do you think?

SELECT * FROM fn_get_audit_file (‘g:\auditing\*’, DEFAULT, DEFAULT)

This line of code runs great for my login and I never gave it much thought because I am running it from a sysadmin account.  When asked for users to be able to run this report that is when things are getting sticky.  I cannot fathom why a simple query for log data cannot be attributed to a read-only account.  In order for you to run this select statement you either need a sysadmin level account or the CONTROL SERVER permission which pretty much gives you the keys to the kingdom.  Why would they do that?

I am sure there is a great technical reason, but why not allow it to filter down to read-only access to simply view the data?  With those permissions whoever is in charge of running the audit can manipulate the data however they see fit.  That makes no sense to me but then again who am I in the grand scheme of things?  Shortly I will post a few different scenarios in how to solve this problem.  Enjoy!

1. All of the log backups must have been taken and completed before you start the online restore.
2. If you have bulk changes in the database, the files must be online.
3. All of your bulk changes must be backed up before starting the online restore process.

In addition, I have seen it recommended that you switch your bulk-logged recovery model to the full model before starting the online process and then switching it back afterward for smoother recovery.  Enjoy!

T-SQL Tuesday

This month’s T-SQL Tuesday blog meme is brought to us by Bob Pusateri (blog|twitter) and the subject is “how did you come to love presenting?“

For me I am not sure that I am at that point.  I love being a presenter, I love going to the speaker dinners for SQL Saturday events, I love meeting other speakers and talking about presenting, but in all honesty I am not sure that I am in love with presenting.  But I am getting there.  Presenting still terrifies the hell out of me, but it is a fear that I set out to conquer last year as a goal in my personal development plan.

For a long time, if  an activity involved a public speaking component I avoided it like the plague.  Seriously.  I am not kidding here.  I coached Dixie Youth baseball and Pop Warner football and every year I had to give a first practice speech.  I would spend a couple of sleepless nights and I would vomit several times before muttering something from my note cards and then quickly move on to begin the practice.  The last few years I stopped doing it all together and went around to the parents individually and this worked much better for me.  Crisis averted.  Problem put back on the shelf for a later date.

After several SQL Saturdays, I started to think that I could do this again.  Some time ago, I was a consultant that also provided week-long training courses in addition to programming and DBA work in Progress 4GL RDBMS, but all of the material that I presented was created by a team (similar to a Microsoft training course) of professionals.  Whenever I got nervous in those courses, I could always go back into the material as it had notes on the slides.  It was fool-proof, and after doing them over and over I was a pro at it.  But after not doing this for twelve years, the fear took over again.

After presenting a lightning talk in Pensacola, a couple of user group meetings and a few SQL Saturdays, the fight or flight reflex has lessened and the vomiting is non-existent.  I can do this, I am doing this, and I will conquer this.  I can proudly say that I brushed the fear back and now think that I am getting better at this.  I am starting to love presenting, it has a foothold in the depth of my being.  What about you?