June 2009 - Posts

• Best Thing I Learned at PASS Summit

  I have only been to one PASS Summit and it was the one in November 2008. If you had asked me last year this time about attending a large convention like PASS Summit, TechEd or SQL Connections, I would have told you to save your money for something more Read More... Posted Monday, June 29, 2009 4:12 PM by Jonathan Kehayias | 5 Comments Filed under: Miscellaneous, Presentations

• Customizing the TCP Port for the Dedicated Administration Console (DAC)

  If you have a multi-instance SQL Server 2005/2008 Server that is behind a firewall, and you want to be able to remotely connect to the DAC, you have to create firewall rules that allow the TCP ports for the DAC through the firewall.  You can easily Read More... Posted Friday, June 26, 2009 1:30 AM by Jonathan Kehayias | 1 Comments Filed under: Database Administration, Security

• Using user_settable Event in Extended Events

  A question came to me on Twitter today from Jason Hall regarding the user_settable Event in SQL Server 2008's Extended Events.  You can find the event in the the sys.dm_xe_objects DMV with the following query: SELECT * FROM sys.dm_xe_objects o WHERE Read More... Posted Wednesday, June 24, 2009 6:42 PM by Jonathan Kehayias | 1 Comments Filed under: Extended Events, SQL Server 2008

• Luck, Preparation, and Opportunity

  Thomas LaRock recently posted a blog post Luck, Preparation, and Opportunity on his blog that really rang true with my own personal experiences in life.  I recommend reading his original post because it is really good, but one quote from his post Read More... Posted Monday, June 15, 2009 1:41 PM by Jonathan Kehayias | 3 Comments Filed under: Rants and Ramblings

• SQL Quiz: Here on Gilligan's Isle

  It happened again, only this time Tim Ford is the antagonist initiator,  instead of Chris Shaw.  Once again a chain blog question is circulating around the SQL Server community.  This time I was tagged by Jeremiah Peschka .  I have Read More... Posted Sunday, June 14, 2009 10:39 PM by Jonathan Kehayias | 0 Comments Filed under: SQL Quiz

• Product Reviews: Tools for the SQL Server DBA

  In the last year, I've had been contacted by almost every vendor for Database Administration tools for SQL Server to try out there application for monitoring SQL Server in my environment.  While interested in giving the applications a look, I really Read More... Posted Friday, June 12, 2009 1:33 AM by Jonathan Kehayias | 10 Comments Filed under: Product Reviews

• Understanding Third Party Backups and SQLVDI

  If you use a external or third party backup tool like NetBackup, BackupExec, or one of the many other tools available for backing up SQL Server databases without having to write your own backup scripts, you have no doubt encountered problems along the Read More... Posted Tuesday, June 09, 2009 12:35 AM by Jonathan Kehayias | 1 Comments Filed under: Database Administration

• Building a SQL Server Cluster for Testing - Part2

  Its been a few days since the first post in this series, and I have learned a lot about clustering in Windows Server 2008 with SQL Server 2008. The first thing I learned over the last few days is that there are some significant changes in Windows 2008 Read More... Posted Monday, June 08, 2009 12:26 AM by Jonathan Kehayias | 2 Comments Filed under: Database Administration, SQL Server 2008, Virtualization

• Getting Log Space Usage without using DBCC SQLPERF

  Every now and then I get a SQL epiphany and figure out another way of doing something.  Forever, I have used DBCC SQLPERF('logspace') to get the utilization information for the database transaction logs in SQL Server.  A question on the forums Read More... Posted Saturday, June 06, 2009 2:10 AM by Jonathan Kehayias | 4 Comments Filed under: Database Administration, DMV's, MSDN Forums

• Building a SQL Server Cluster for Testing - Intro

  At some point as a SQL Server DBA, you have to learn how to install and configure a SQL Server Cluster.  I personally haven't dealt with a SQL cluster since SQL Server 2000, and I've never had to install one from scratch, so I've decided to jump Read More... Posted Wednesday, June 03, 2009 1:31 AM by Jonathan Kehayias | 3 Comments Filed under: Database Administration, SQL Server 2008, Virtualization

• Rant: One sided Whitepapers

  I like reading technical whitepapers, and not just related to SQL Server, but anything IT that expands my knowledge and/or view of something I generally find interesting. I was reviewing my blog reader today and noticed the following blog post on the Read More... Posted Tuesday, June 02, 2009 4:47 PM by Jonathan Kehayias | 6 Comments Filed under: Rants and Ramblings