Sabbatical 3 Review
I’m back. My last day of work was Jun 27 and I came back a few days ago, on Aug 13. Just over six weeks away and I am...
2025-08-15
16 reads
Blog Posts
SQL Server Maintenance Plans
If you’re a DBA, sysadmin, IT manager, or Accidental DBA, you’ve probably seen SQL Server’s built-in Maintenance Plans. They live right there in SSMS under the “Management” node, quietly...
2025-08-15 (first published: 2025-07-30)
426 reads
SQL Server Migration Made Easy: A Complete Guide to Microsoft DMA and Its Successors
Migrating SQL Server databases is a critical task for IT teams aiming to modernize infrastructure, improve performance, or transition to cloud platforms. One of the most widely used tools...
2025-08-15 (first published: 2025-07-30)
330 reads
Getting Started with Microsoft Fabric: Why It Matters and What You Gain
In today’s data-driven world, organizations are constantly seeking ways to simplify their analytics stack, unify fragmented tools, and unlock real-time insights. Enter Microsoft Fabric, a cloud-native, AI-powered data platform...
2025-08-14
196 reads
Managing Enterprise Storage with Pure Storage Fusion in PowerShell
When managing storage infrastructure at scale, one of the most powerful approaches is treating related storage resources as cohesive Workloads rather than individual components. This becomes especially important when...
2025-08-14
25 reads
SQL Server Management Studio uses the Visual Studio installer
Yes, SSMS 21 uses the Visual Studio installer. No, you don’t need to download it every time. No, you don’t need a Visual Studio license to use it.
The post...
2025-08-14
26 reads
DBCC CHECKDB: Just Because It’s Quiet Doesn’t Mean It’s Safe
Corruption isn’t a “maybe someday” problem – what you need to do now. Stop. Don’t panic. You just ran DBCC CHECKDB for the first time in a while (or...
2025-08-13
23 reads
From AI to JSON: What’s New in SQL Server 2025 Data Types (With Scripts)
🚀 Introduction SQL Server 2025 is a landmark release that redefines how developers and data professionals interact with data. With the rise of AI, unstructured data, and real-time analytics,...
2025-08-13 (first published: 2025-07-29)
1,925 reads
SQL Server 2025: Not Just a Database; A Data Engine Reimagined
Let us be honest; most database upgrades feel like a patchwork of performance tweaks and security updates. But SQL Server 2025? It is not just an upgrade. It is...
2025-08-13 (first published: 2025-07-29)
2,588 reads
Terraform Commands
I realized I never created a post to show how to deploy Terraform from VS Code. I haven’t done that in a while because I don’t do it at...
2025-08-13
54 reads
Blogs
Presenting with Visual Studio Code
A while back I wrote a quick post on setting up key mappings in...
Advice I Like: In 100 Years
By Steve Jones
In 100 years a lot of what we take to be true now will...
dataMinds Saturday 2026 – Slides
At Saturday the 21st of February I’m presenting an introduction to dimensional modelling at...
Forums
AllocationType as ROW_OVERFLOW_DATA
Hello, I inherited a number of tables with like 20-30 column using nvarchar(256) in...
is it true we cant debug c# scripts in ssis anymore under vs
Hi, i'm running vs2022. I'm trying out a c# script that i'd like to...
Question of the Day
Missing the Jaro Winkler Distance
I upgraded a SQL Server 2019 instance to SQL Server 2025. I wanted to test the fuzzy string search functions. I run this code:
SELECT JARO_WINKLER_DISTANCE('tim', 'tom')
I get this error message:Msg 195, Level 15, State 10, Line 1 'JARO_WINKLER_DISTANCE' is not a recognized built-in function name.What is wrong? See possible answers