Search results matching tags 'sql server' and 'Customer Contact'

A SQL Saturday in Cambridge – Buck Woody’s Ragtime Database Workshop

BuckWoody — Mon, 30 Jul 2012 20:49:00 GMT

The SQL Server community is really engaged. They are an active bunch on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn, they help each other on forums, they attend conferences. But that isn’t enough interaction – the community started a grass-roots effort to hold local conferences on a Saturday. Free conferences. Odds are there’s one near you… http://www.sqlsaturday.com/default.aspx … and if not, you can start one.

Sessions at SQL Saturdays are all over the map, and there’s something for (almost) everyone, from Business Intelligence to Database Administration and Development. Some of these events have “training days” associated with them – longer, more in-depth training that has a fee. I’ve taught quite a few of these, and of course I’ve done my share of other presentations at the events as well.

I’m honored to be presenting at the Cambridge, UK SQL Saturday this year (http://www.sqlsaturday.com/162/eventhome.aspx) in September. For one thing, I used to live near there and plan to take the family with me to show them my old stomping grounds. For another, I’m excited about the sessions I get to present.

The Training Day

Friday I’ll be leading one of those training days – and I’ll be delivering a very important workshop, where I’ll cover SQL Server – all of it. OK, maybe not *all* of it, and maybe you won’t be a complete PhD after the class, but we’ll do a complete immersion in learning SQL Server as a product from the ground up. It’s a workshop format, so no sitting and listening to someone droning on and on for hours. You’ll be asked to bring a laptop, and do actual work on the product from the first few minutes of the 8-hour day to the last of the workshop. You’ll be jumping in from the very start, and in deep until the end of the day.

But wait – this is kind of a “beginner” thing, isn’t it? Shouldn’t I be doing something on the internals of the locking mechanism of the hashing system in memory on x64 architectures, with complete code diagrams? Shouldn’t you be able to snatch the T-SQL pebble from the master’s hand when you’re done, or be able to shoot the wings off of an XML fly when you’re done?

No.

We need this kind of session. For one thing, you can get that depth in other sessions. For another, we need to have a place for someone that wants to learn SQL Server but doesn’t have a lot of time to do that. We need something relatively inexpensive that a boss can send a developer, administrator or new employee to learn how to take over the SQL Server, or augment the DBA team. We need a place where good habits are formed, and where someone can branch out into a new part of technology, into one of the best places in tech to be – data.

After you’re done with this session, stick around for Saturday – now all those presentations will make more sense. And you’ll be able to network with a lot of folks that already do what you learn about on Friday, and who knows – find out where to look for work in this amazing career field.

What will you learn?

You’ll start with knowing that SQL Server is a database product by Microsoft. That’s all the pre-requisite you need, other than being the technology industry. From there we’ll cover:

The Data Professional Career
Installing, setting up and configuring the right Edition of SQL Server for the job (including SQL Azure)
Database engine fundamentals – How does the engine work, what are the components, what can you configure and tune
Transactions, Locking and Blocking
Creating and managing databases
Database options and their impact
Database Objects including Tables, Views, Stored Procedures, Functions and more
General maintenance including backups and recovery
Security fundamentals including users, roles, and object security
Performance tuning fundamentals including indexes and query research tools
Multiple resources to help you get to the next level

In 8-hours. Come ready to learn. You’ll need a laptop, and complete focus for a few hours. You’ll leave with the ability to manage and work with a SQL Server system – and you’ll learn what to do next.

Who should go?

If you’re new to Relational Database Management Systems (RDBMS’s) but not technology, and you’re looking to expand your technical reach, coming from another platform (to be sure, there will be some repeat info here), want to explore a new tech career area, want to learn more about developing against an RDBMS or know someone who does.

The registration for the training day is here: https://www.regonline.co.uk/?eventID=1120017&rTypeID=242030

What else are you doing whilst (I love saying whilst) there?

I’m also pleased to be providing the keynote on Saturday. (I can’t wait to see what I’m going to say), as well as two other sessions – more on those soon. My daughter wants to be a Zoologist, so while we’re there we’ll be visiting the Zoology museum at one of the colleges, I’ll probably eat too much and potentially go punting. I’ll also mingle with you, my SQL Family, and we’ll just generally have a good time.

If you’re not busy in September, and even if you are, make plans to come check all this out. It promises to be awesome. (Americans think everything is awesome)

See you there.

SQL Saturday 27 (Portland, Oregon)

BuckWoody — Mon, 24 May 2010 13:49:00 GMT

I’m sitting in the Seattle airport, waiting for my flight to Silicon Valley California for the SQL Server 2008 R2 Launch Event. By some quirk of nature, they are asking me to Emcee the event – but that’s another post entirely.

I’m reflecting on the SQL Saturday 27 event that was just held in Portland, Oregon this last Saturday. These are not Microsoft-sponsored events – it’s truly the community at work. Think of a big user-group meeting – I mean REALLY big – held in a central location, like at a college (as ours was) or some larger, inexpensive venue like that. Everyone there is volunteering – it’s my own money and time to drive several hours to a hotel for the night, feed myself and present. It’s their own time and money for the folks that organize the event – unless a vendor or two steps in to help. It’s their own time and money for the attendees to drive a long way, spend the night and their Saturday to listen to the speakers. Why do all this?

Because everybody benefits. Every speaker learns something new, meets new people, and reaches a new audience. Every volunteer does the same. And the attendees? Well, it’s pretty obvious what they get. A 7Am to 10PM extravaganza of knowledge from every corner of the product. In fact, this year the Portland group hooked up with the CodeCamp folks and held a combined event. We had over 850 people, and I had everyone from data professionals to developers in my sessions.

So I’ll take this opportunity to do two things: to say “thank you” to all of the folks who attended, from those who spoke to those who worked and those who came to listen, and to challenge you to attend the next SQL Saturday anywhere near you. You can find the list here: http://www.sqlsaturday.com/. Don’t see anything in your area? Start one! The PASS folks have a package that will show you how. Sure, it’s a big job, but the key is to get as many people helping you as possible. Even if you have only a few dozen folks show up the first time, no worries. The first events I presented at had about 20 in the room. But not this week.

See you at the Launch Event if you’re near the San Francisco area tomorrow, and see you at the Redmond SQL Saturday and TechEd if not.

How to get Microsoft to speak at your event

BuckWoody — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 14:35:36 GMT

If you’re holding a special event, such as a SQL Saturday or a user group, one of the challenges is to get speakers for the event. Now, the best speakers come from the community – people who use the product day-in, day-out. They have a wealth of expertise, and many of them are really great presenters.

But from time to time you might want to get a Microsoft person to speak at your group or event. Microsoft is a big company, and you can get everything from Marketing (yes, there’s a place for that) to deep technical topics in that skillset. But how can your group get Microsoft to speak for you?

It might be easier than you think.

Microsoft has three or four main areas that you might be able to pull from, starting with the folks that are closest to you: Sales.

Don’t make that face, there is sales and then there is sales. Within the sales team are four kinds of folks – your account manager, who owns the relationship between Microsoft and your company, the Sales professional, who owns the revenue and licensing for your account, the Account Technology Specialist (ATS) who knows about multiple Microsoft products, and the Technology Specialist (TSP or TS) that has a deep knowledge in a single technology, like SQL Server. These last two folks are the people who could deliver technical talks, especially around the newest products. And many of them are willing to do it. They are tied to a geographical area, so if your group has people in it that work at a company that is headquartered in that geography, the TSP and ATS might be willing to come out and chat with your group. And you might even want a Salesperson to come. Ever have a licensing briefing? Ever have questions? Ask them!

How to find them: Call your local Microsoft Office (the building, not the software). Find yours here: http://www.microsoft.com/worldwide/

The product group. If you live in the Redmond area, you should be coming to the PASS chapter monthly user group meetings here. It’s held at the Microsoft campus, it’s free, and it has a Microsoft product group member speaking just about every month. When I ran a user group for five years, it was impossible for me to get this kind of attention from the product group. It’s amazing.

Wait – you don’t live next to Microsoft? Not to worry. If you have a projector and a good set of speakers, the product teams can set up a LiveMeeting and present. I’ve done this several times myself.

How to find them: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn. Lurk on forums and see what the signature blocks say. Let’s see….oh, how about blogs like this one. You can find lots of blogs from Microsoft folks here: http://www.microsoft.com/sqlserver/2008/en/us/community.aspx

There are other groups at Microsoft that are willing to speak, and all you have to do is ask around. From “evangelists” to marketing, from training to even the documentation group, folks are out there that have really deep knowledge in just about every area of the product.

How to find them: TechEd, PASS and other conventions. Give them your card, get their e-mail addresses.

Here’s something to keep in mind: Microsoft works us pretty hard. In fact, sleep is really a luxury most of us aren’t granted; I think you get to do that when you’re a president or something. Maybe. So the folks you contact will be busy – really busy – just like you. I have traveled out of my district to present from time to time, but I have to take vacation time to do it, and Microsoft doesn’t pay my flight, hotel, food, anything like that. Any time we give you is “out of our own pocket”, so travel and late nights should be taken into account. So don’t abuse them, don’t always expect the invitation to be accepted. Most of us don’t get paid by Microsoft to do the extra presentations any more than you do, so keep that in mind and be polite and understanding. But do ask – most of us are really enthusiastic about this technology, and we love to help others learn, and to learn from the folks we meet.

The SQL Server Health Check

BuckWoody — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 14:16:05 GMT

My friend Brent Ozar, who is a top-notch SQL Server Professional, mentioned on his blog (http://www.brentozar.com/archive/2007/04/sql-server-health-check/comment-page-1/#comment-17520) that he brought in Microsoft Support to do a “Health Check”. There were some questions about what this actually entails – so I thought I would post that description here.

A SQL Server Health Check from Microsoft is an offering provided through our support and consulting branches. If you’ve purchased a Premier support agreement, you can use the hours you pay for to have someone come out and check out your systems using two basic vectors: standard best practices, and the best practices for your environment. Let me explain that a little further.

Microsoft Consulting Services (MCS) has an advanced set of tools and techniques to reach deep into your systems to evaluate them against a set of criteria that we establish for the best performance, safety and reliability for SQL Server. But your SQL Server Instances will be different than someone else’s, so the consultant will also spend some time in an interview with various teams to find out how you’re using the system. They’ll consult with experts in that area back at Redmond, and at the end of the engagement you get what I feel is the most valuable part of the exercise – the report. The report shows what was done, how it was done, what the findings are and what recommendations the consultant makes. It’s a thing of beauty.

You don’t have to have a Premier agreement to get a SQL Server Health Check, and companies other than Microsoft have versions of this as well. The prices vary, so if you want a Microsoft person then contact your local Microsoft office and ask for the Consulting Manager for your area. They will get you to the right person and you can work out the costs from there. If you take a hard look, most of the time the cost is well justified.

On a related note, I think it’s fantastic that Brent has the foresight to bring in “another pair of eyes” on his systems. Brent is actually in the program to gain a SQL Server “Master” certification – something only a few people in the world have. He works for a software development firm that creates fantastic products for – wait for it – SQL Server! He could evaluate his own systems, and of course he does. But he realizes that there’s always something more to learn, and someone out there may know one more little detail that he doesn’t. This is the mark of a very bright person.