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Getting Started with Always Encrypted Part 1
New to SQL Server 2016 are several new security features, each aimed at protecting your data in a very specific way. Dynamic Data Masking allows you to create rules to mask data that you choose so...
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Getting Started with Always Encrypted Part 2
In this blog post I am going to continue discussing the new Always Encrypted feature in SQL Server 2016. There are 2 main aspects to Always Encrypted – first is generating the Column Master Key and...
View ArticleLoad Testing SSAS with PowerShell
Over the years, there has been much confusion as to the best way to load test Analysis Services. I have seen solutions ranging from as simple as using ascmd to completely custom console apps in Visual...
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Easier SQL Server Cluster Upgrades with Windows Server 2016!
One of the major complaints that I hear from the field has to do with how hard and time consuming it is to upgrade Windows Server versions and SQL Server versions in a clustered environment. In the...
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Azure RM: SQL Server AlwaysOn Availability Groups Listener configuration with...
I want to thank to Ruben Gonzalez for his guidance. This blog post explains how to configure SQL Server AlwaysOn AG with an External Listener in Azure VMs running in Resource Manager model....
View ArticleFind users under a specific database role for all the servers in my environment
Recently I was working with a customer who wanted to know all the users in their environment who had ssis_admin permissions within their Integration Services environment. In SQL Server 2008 R2, a new...
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SSDT BI Gotcha on VS2015 – New Target Server Version Added to Project Properties
If you are upgrading your SSIS packages to SSDT on Visual Studio 2015, you may not notice the TargetServerVersion project property that is new. There may be some odd side effects due to this, so I...
View ArticleQuickly create A LOT of SQL Instances
Recently I delivered a demo on Policy Based Management for a customer. To show this off well, I really wanted to have a larger number of SQL servers to show how PBM can be used to manage SQL Server...
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How Many Tables Can I Have In SQL Azure DB & SQL Server
Hello Dear Reader! This is my first full fledged blog for my friends here at the PFE blog. I wanted to start off with something interesting. A friend asked a very intriguing question yesterday....
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Azure SQL Database Migration Performance
TLDR -> If you are like me, this section will be all your read: Use the P11 Service Tier or higher when you Migrate your database to Azure SQL DB. Once you have completed your migration, drop down...
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What Does Installing Polybase Add to My SQL Server?
In this post, I want to show you some of the components that are added to your SQL Server when you install the Polybase feature and where they reside. Introduction: Polybase is a new feature with SQL...
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Learn SQL 2016 Polybase with HDP – Part 1 – Build the Environment
I have been working with Polybase in Parallel Data Warehouse for a few years now, so I was quite excited to hear about this great feature making it into SQL 2016. It is a great was to use tools and a...
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Learn SQL 2016 Polybase with HDP – Part 2 – Learning Polybase along with...
In part 1, I showed you how you can create a Hortonworks sandbox and a SQL 2016 instance with Polybase. In this post, I will show you how to query Hadoop data with Polybase as well as how you can...
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Finding What Availability Group Listeners Applications Are Using To Connect
Background Information While on site helping with AlwaysOn Availability Groups, it was tasked to a DBA to meet with all of the application owners and figure out what listener they were currently using...
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Where is a record really located?
Recently I had a question regarding “What happens to records when they are deleted” – so I wanted to dig into what happens under the covers when just such a thing happens. The answer is somewhat...
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CPU_ID Gaps in SQL Server sys.dm_os_schedulers
We all know (or should!) that SQL Server is NUMA aware. In fact, there are certain background processes that are created and run per NUMA node inside of SQL Server, which is why the soft-numa changes...
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DBCC CHECKDB Fails on a Database with files in Azure Blob Storage
Starting with SQL Server 2014 you can use SQL Server with Data Files in Microsoft Azure Blob Storage. This feature is very common when you work with SQL Server on Azure VM’s, the steps to accomplish...
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SQL 2016 Backup Compression with TDE Enabled Databases
The Background Before SQL Server 2016, businesses has to choose between securing their databases with Transparent Data Encryption (TDE) and database backup compression. While you technically can...
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SSIS version number is not valid error
In a previous blog post, I showed you how you can set a target server version for an SSIS project in SSDT on VS2015 in order to deploy packages to multiple versions of SSIS catalogs. This is pretty...
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