The 183rd edition of T-SQL Tuesday is hosted by Steve Jones. He has picked everyone’s favorite (cough) topic: permissions, and how to manage them. I am lucky. With my specialization in query performance tuning, I don’t often have to deal with permissions. (Well, apart from of course not getting the permissions I need to do... The post T-SQL Tuesday 183 – Permission hell appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

(I wrote this well in time. Really. I swear. And then … forgot to publish it in time. Oh well. This will then be my T-SQL Wednesday, I guess?) Welcome to the first T-SQL Tuesday of 2025. Hosting duty this time falls on Rob Farley’s shoulders. And he has found a great topic: Integrity. I... The post T-SQL Tuesday 182 – Integrity appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

It’s December. The last month of the year, and hence also the last T-SQL Tuesday of the year. Edition 181 is hosted by Kevin Chant. His chosen topic for this episode is to have us talk about which SQL Server announcement excited us the most. This posed a bit of a problem for me. The... The post T-SQL Tuesday 181 – Amazing announcements appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

Another month, another T-SQL Tuesday. Edition 180 already. Our host is Josephine Bush, and she opens a topic that hits close to home for me: is good enough, perfect? I know my weaknesses. I know that my perfectionism is one of them. I know that striving for perfect is not always the best thing to... The post T-SQL Tuesday 180 – The enemy of good? appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

November is near. Traditionally (in the USA, at least) the month of the Black Friday sales. I have decided to once more join in on that tradition! During the entire month November 2024, I offer a 50% discount on all prices for the SQLServerFast Execution Plan Video Training. And that discount even stacks with the... The post Black Friday again appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

This post is for T-SQL Tuesday 178, hosted by Deepthi Goguri. She invites us to write about a recent technical issue we resolved. So let’s talk about the time I discovered that information in the Query Store might not be what it appears to be. Unexpected delays I was hired by a customer who had... The post T-SQL Tuesday 178 – Misleading data in Query Store appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

Welcome back to my plansplaining blog series, where I dissect execution plans in order to increase our understanding of how SQL Server processes specific queries. We’re at part 33 already, and I’m still looking at cursors. After discussing the basics, static cursors, dynamic cursors, and keyset cursors, I will now look at the last of... The post Plansplaining part 33 – Fast forward cursors appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

We’re already at part 31 of the plansplaining series. And this is also the third part in my discussion of execution plans for cursors. After explaining the basics, and after diving into static cursors, it is now time to investigate dynamic cursors. As a quick reminder, recall that a static cursor presents data as it... The post Plansplaining part 31 – Dynamic cursors appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

In part 30 of the plansplaining series, we’ll continue our discussion of cursor processing. I recommend first reading the previous post, where I explain all the necessary basics. Sample query Throughout the series, I will keep using the same sample query, that grabs some sales and product data for sales of more than 10 units,... The post Plansplaining part 30 – Static cursors appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more

For edition 174 T-SQL Tuesday, Kevin Feasel asks us to write about our favorite job interview questions. I don’t like job interviewing. Never have, never will. And while the process changed a lot once I shifted to contracting, my dislike for the interview process has remained. I am not hiring So I decided not to... The post T-SQL Tuesday 174 – Job interview questions appeared first on SQLServerFast ..read more