Today I was having a nice discussion with some colleagues about Fabric and pricing/licensing came up. I mentioned an F2 is only around €250 a month, but a colleague said “no no, it’s over €300”. A bit confused, I pulled up the sizing table of my Fabric capacity in Azure, which looks like this: Similarly, my colleague did the same for his capacity: Weird right? Turns out I created a capacity in the region North Europe, while they created a capacity in West Europe. That’s almost 14% discount, just by selecting a different region! On an F2 capacity this doesn’t seem to be much, but on higher c ..read more

As I’ve been working with SQL Saturday and managing changes to events, I’ve accumulated a lot of branches. Even though I’m a solo developer, I decided to use branches, as I expect others to share this load in the future. This post looks at how to start cleaning those up. Another post for me that is simple and hopefully serves as an example for people trying to get blogging as #SQLNewBloggers. You can see all posts on Git as well. Another post for me that is simple and hopefully serves as an example for people trying to get blogging as #SQLNewBloggers. Finding Old Branches When I ran the git br ..read more

Starting last week is a rollout of the public preview of a new and fully reimagined Microsoft Purview data governance solution. Data governance has become so much more important with the collection of more and more data. Data governance involves the processes, policies, and standards that ensure the effective use of information in an organization. It focuses on maintaining data quality, managing data life cycle, ensuring compliance with regulations, and defining roles and responsibilities for data management. This framework helps organizations achieve their goals by enhancing decision-making ..read more

Let's get one thing straight: database administration isn't the most glamorous tech job out there. You won't be building flashy user interfaces or trendy AI models. But if you like solving puzzles, ensuring systems run like clockwork, and directly affecting a company's success, then a career as a SQL database administrator (DBA) could be your calling. What is SQL Database Administrator? Think of a SQL DBA as the guardian of a company's data. They're responsible for everything related to databases: Installation and Setup: DBAs get the database software installed and configured correctl ..read more

Image by evondue from Pixabay I know if you are a SQL Server DBA using Azure SQL DB, you’ve been sorely missing the agent. Enter Elastic Jobs to help you schedule jobs more easily against Azure SQL DB. I will cover setting up and scheduling Elastic Jobs to execute Ola index maintenance. If you’ve used Elastic Jobs in the past, there are some very nice improvements with the recent GA release, so don’t feel discouraged if you didn’t like it in the past—it’s way better now! Table of Contents What Are Elastic Jobs? Creating an Elastic Job Agent Agent prerequisites Creating the agent Setting U ..read more

Yesterday was a long day in London. I arrived late in the am, and as I was walking from the plane to the border check, I went down the escalator on the entering-the-country side of the terminal. I had this view: There’s nothing special here, but through the glass there are the outbound escalators that I’ve taken up and a Caffe Nero coffee shop. That’s a place I used to stop often on my way out of the UK early in my time at Redgate. I used to always stay at a hotel near the airport, first the Renaissance Hotel with Brad McGehee and later at the Hilton or DoubleTree with Grant. I’d often have a ..read more

It was awesome to see the Kentucky data community come out for the first Derby City Data Days in Louisville, KY! Bringing together communities from Ohio, Tennessee, and Kentucky, the Derby City Data Days event was an excellent follow-up to Data Tune in March and deepened relationships and networks made at the Nashville event. In case you missed it, below are my notes from the sessions I attended as well as the resources for my session. Be sure to check out these speakers if you see them speaking at a conference near you! Schedule Building Self-Service Data Models in Power BI by John Ecken ..read more

Tomorrow, April 16, 2024, I will be giving another webcast; this one will be on SQL Server security. It’s scheduled for 1 PM EDT / 5 PM UTC. Sign up link As always, the registration is free. Here’s the abstract: Data is the lifeblood for almost every organization. As a result, platforms like Microsoft SQL Server are high-value targets for attackers. However, knowing what to do and not do can be daunting. In this webinar, we’ll walk through a framework to secure your SQL Servers from end-to-end. Starting with the install and walking through surface area, permissions, backups, encryption, and co ..read more

the wends– n. the frustration that you’re not enjoying an experience as much as you should, which prompts you to try plugging in various through combinations to trigger anything more intense than roaring static, as if your heart had been inadvertently demagnetized by a surge of expectations. That is quite a definition. I don’t know if I experience the wends often, or not to that extent, but I do sometimes look at an experience that everyone around me seems to be enjoying. Or many people I know are enjoying. And I’m not. Or not much. Sometimes this is music, where lots of people like something ..read more

The world runs on data, and SQL is the key to unlocking its secrets. If you're ready to level up your SQL game, online training is a power move. But with a dizzying array of options, finding the perfect advanced SQL course can feel overwhelming. Don't sweat it – I've done the research, so you don't have to. Here's the lowdown on the 7 best advanced SQL courses to fuel your data analysis mastery in 2024 and beyond. Course #1: Advanced SQL Overview: This course promises to take your SQL skills from competent to confident. It dives into complex queries, window functions, common table expressio ..read more