Time after time I have been called only when problems bubbled up to management who made the decision to call-in an experienced person to diagnose "the database problem".

The problem's cause,...

Developers are knowledgeable about narrow topics. They think in tiny bits and move from bit to bit in the process of creating software. A truly experienced DBA thinks years down...

There are a few things to consider about Microsoft's reorg that put the thing in perspective.

1) they do this every few years

2) it does not change the patterns that have...

check the permssions on the database files after confirming they exist in the location expected. you may find that the permission has been damaged. Re-add the SQL Server service account...

even though u successfully loaded the raw xml into a table you still processed the data one row at a time. It is much better to use OPENXML and pivot...

Phil:

Well stated. Let me add that I too deeply appreciate the loyalty of the SQL Server creation team at MS. They are the exception who ideally will continue when the...

Overtime abuse is definable as free hourly labor. If you agree to a salary of 100K and a 40 hour week the employer can legally assume a 60 hour week.

However,...

Are your ears burning yet from all of us screeching at you for this one?

If I look at the code I wrote 10 years ago I cringe I want to...

Not a bug in SQL Server because you can choose a different collation when you are setting up SQL Server. It is more of a human bug for not checking...

When you create the non clustered index it will immediately be invalidated by creating the clustered index and as such, useless.

All your indexes should be created on the partition. If...

Phil,

In my mere 15 years I rarely if ever receive a request to document a database. That covers hundreds of them over hundreds of projects. In my programming days it...