Do you know where SQL Server is installed - everywhere it is installed?  Do you really know where SQL Server is installed?  Are you looking for a tool that will help you discover any rogue instances so you can better manage these instances?  The Beta 2 for the Microsoft Assessment and Planning (MAP) Toolkit 5.0 is now open. Join ...

The Enterprise Policy Management Framework version 3.0, a new version of the framework to support policy automated policy evaluation for SQL Server 2000 and 2005, has been posted to codeplex. For those who are not familiar with the tool, the Enterprise Policy Management Framework is a reporting solution on the state of the SQL Server enterprise ...

A very well written study of the compression is now available: Data Compression - Strategy, Capacity Planning and Best Practices.  This study provides guidance on best practices for designing, implementing and managing compression in your environment.  I found this whitepaper to be full of useful guidance and scripts to monitor and ...

Just a quick note that we again can modify whether system messages are to go to eventlog/errorlog again. I.e., we can change the is_event_logged column in sys.messages. This is very valuable in general and specifically is you want to define Agent alerts (for which Agent polls the Eventlog). For instance: SELECT * FROM sys.messages WHERE ...

This week Thales announced that their nCipher product line now integrates with SQL Server 2008 EKM.  This announcement follows SafeNet as our second vendor to support EKM. 

The next version of the Enterprise Policy Management Framework has been published to CodePlex.  The new version includes error trapping and error reporting, and a few bug fixes.  Please be sure to download the documentation as well, which will help you understand how to use the PowerShell variables to scale the execution in your ...

I have been working on some new materials for an upcoming webcast on leveraging Policy-Based Management using the Enterprise Policy Management Framework.  As I was working through some sample policies, I noticed that my SQL Server 2008 instances were not consistently configured for history retention and to log on success.  Well, I ...

In my previous blog I reviewed the different policy evaluation modes available in SQL Server 2008.  In this next installment I will detail how to initiate a policy on demand using PowerShell. PowerShell integration with SQL Server 2008 is getting more press lately.  In past blogs I noted a few resources to help learn PowerShell, and ...