I started the year with 10 Goals for 2010 and now I'll end it by looking at how many of those goals I met.

1 . Start A PASS Chapter
I filed the paperwork with PASS HQ in November and MagicPASS's first meeting will be Jan. 19, 2011. More details to come, but consider this one done!

2. Implement a BI solution
Earlier this month I talked with someone at work who was running queries from Excel to generate reports. She would start them in the morning and if she was lucky she'd have the data for the reports by mid afternoon. Spotting an opportunity to solve a major problem, I built a cube that had the report data waiting for her when she got to work each morning. It was a temporarily solution - just something to get through the holidays - but it was enough to get me put on a new project in 2011 to build the next generation of my company's data warehouse and reporting platform.

3. Present 6 times
Here's where I presented this year:

• SQLSaturday #33 - Charlotte (Mar 6)
• Orlando .NET Code Camp (Mar 27)
• SQLSaturday #41 - Atlanta (Apr 24)
• OPASS (Jun 15)
• SQLSaturday #49 - Orlando (Oct 16)
• Sarasota SQL Server Users Group (Sep 21)
• PASS Summit 2010 (Nov 9-11)
• East Iowa SQL Server Users Group (Nov 16)

4. Write 4 articles
I fell short here, only writing one published article:

• Troubleshooting Transactional Replication, SQL Server Magazine, June 2010

5. Meet 50 new people in the SQL community
I said I'd use my LinkedIn connected count as a measuring stick for this. I started the year with 155 connections and I'm at 298 as I write this. I have no doubt I've met many more than 50 SQL People this year.

6. Answer 100 forums questions
As best as I can tell I had 20 posts for the year on SQLServerCentral.com, though half of those were either multiple posts within the same thread or not answering a question at all. I've answered a lot of questions on Twitter posted to the #sqlhelp hashtag, but I don't know how to go back for the entire year and measure how many. In all likelihood, though, I probably fell short of answering 100 questions in all.

7. 100 blog posts
This post makes #46 for 2010. That's less than I had in 2009 (65). Hmm, I guess this year was about quality, not quantity.

8. Go to the 2010 PASS Summit
I went. You can read all about it here if you want to know what the experience was like.

9. Redesign this blog
I didn't overhaul this blog like I really wanted to but I did make one subtle change that you might not have noticed - I switched the domain name to kendalvandyke.com. Perhaps a redesign is in the works for 2011. 

10. Lose 10 pounds
I'm still at 180, plus or minus a few pounds at any given time. I need to do better with this in 2011.

Closing Thoughts for 2010
For those keeping track that's 5 goals met and 5 goals I came up short on. Am I disappointed? Not at all! To quote John Lennon, "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans"…and that's how I'll look back at this year. Although I started with some achievable goals my priorities in life shifted along the way and some of those goals got bumped down the priority list. For starters, shortly after 2010 began my role at work changed and I spent much of the year doing other things not entirely focused on SQL Server. In August my wife and I had our third child (a girl); I spent the first half of the year preparing for the new arrival and the rest of the year trying to adjust to life with another baby in the house. Oh and somewhere along the way I became involved with this little thing called SQLRally. None of those things were on my list at the start of the year yet all three of them were life altering (some in more ways than others) and none could be ignored for the sake of meeting the goals I started with.

As the year comes to a close I'm happy with what I've accomplished and I'm looking forward to all the things that 2011 has in store. See you all next year!