I can't put it off any longer. To further our discussion of practical optimization techniques, we need to discuss the graphical query plan. It is absolutely essential that you understand how to read …
SQL Server Query Tuning
There is a lot of literature out there about indexing and query optimization but most of the literature I have seen is relatively abstract. Authors discuss the selectivity and cardinality of the data …
Upgrade SQL Server 2000
SQL Server 2000 was a watershed release for Microsoft. It was in this version that SQL Server first became an enterprise-caliber database server. As testimony to the solidity of the product, eleven …
The Meaning of Null
A Two Million Dollar Misunderstanding If you think that this article will be confined to academic subtleties of no interest to real-world DBAs, let me first mention that misunderstanding the meaning …
SQL Server Stress Testing
Stress testing is an important element of developing any new database application. There are a number of tools and services available to do stress testing, but the well known, full-featured ones are …
SQL Server Log File Growth
I have written about log file growth several times. Parts of this article are excerpted from those previous articles I have written. The reason why I return to this topic periodically is that I see …