If you've been a SQL Saturday organizer for a few years, you might remember that prior to March of 2014, PASS handled much of the finances. All money collected from sponsors and meal fees went into a trust account managed by PASS which was earmarked for that specific event. Organizers then requested their funds from …

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I've found myself working with PowerShell more frequently as of late, in no small part due to the amazing dbatools module. This has led to me trying to figure out how else I can utilize it for some of my personal internal processes. I like to use public datasets for experimentation and presentation demos, especially …

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Next week I am happy to be presenting for the Chicago Suburban SQL Server User Group, which meets in Downers Grove, IL. I will be delivering my session Locks, Blocks, and Snapshots: Maximizing Database Concurrency. This takes a look at SQL Server’s available isolation levels, what they are, how they differ, and why the …

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I'm very pleased to be returning to Wisconsin in April to speak at SQL Saturday Madison 2018! This has always been one of my favorite events. Not only is it close to home, but it's in a wonderful location and full of great friends. Thank you so much to the organizing committee for all of the hard work you do! This year …

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I think one of the reasons I like computers is that they're so much easier to deal with than people. They're predictable, emotions never get in the way, and there's always a logical explanation for everything if you dig deep enough. All that being said, I am grateful for my hobbies that don't involve sitting in front …

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If you've done any amount of work in Linux from Windows, chances are pretty good you've used PuTTY at some point. PuTTY is a free and open-source terminal emulator that supports a variety of protocols, including SSH. I've been using it since college and have always been very happy with it. It's free, it's tiny, and it …

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Months are funny. Unlike other parts of a date, they vary in length: The last second of a minute is always 59. The last minute of a hour is always 59. The last hour of a day is always 23. But the last day of a month? Well that depends on what month it is. And the year matters too because a leap year means February gets …

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I am extremely fortunate to have been named a Friend of Redgate for a fifth year! If you're not familiar with the Friends of Redgate program, we work with the Redgate development and product teams to provide feedback on existing products, new tools, and feature enhancements. You can also find us doing things like …

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SQL Server Mirroring has had a rough time the past few years. It was deprecated in SQL Server 2016, and now it's more or less being replaced by Basic Availability Groups, (which I love to refer to as "BAGS"). Database Mirroring hasn't gone the way of the Dodo yet though. Perhaps it won't be quite so popular …

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I'm so proud to be speaking at SQLBits – Europe's largest SQL Server conference! It took me several years of abstract submission before I was accepted to speak at PASS Summit. Once I spoke there, I set my sights on presenting internationally. After some more attempts, I now have the amazing opportunity to present in …

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