Chris Miller Blog

RocketScientist's Miscellaneous Ramblings

SQL 2005 and Deadlocks

So I've got a deadlock issue I'm having trouble tracking down. I have the deadlock tracking trace flag turned on, and this is the part I'm having trouble with: KEY: 5:72057594325499904 From everything I've found, the layout of that item is supposed to be: KEY: [Db_ID]:[Object_ID]:[Index_ID] That 7205… number is way too large to be an object_id (those are all type int, and that number is a bigint). Read more →

UPS WorldShip and SQL Server

So, we're trying to get UPS WorldShip to work with SQL Server 2005. So here's how it looks from the user's perspective: Put in your order number (WorldShip pulls the shipping information) Put in the package weight (Worldship figures out the cost) Hit OK to confirm everything and then wait 45 seconds' Get a tracking number Now, our shipping department sends out 100 packages a day. Read more →

Windows Media Player vs iTunes

So Graz has this ongoing vendetta against iTunes, mostly because the interface doesn't follow Windows guidelines. And I just got Microsoft Office OCS here at work. And if I use Windows Media Player (WMP) then it'll auto-pause music when I get a phone call. Read more →

The great sp_ mystery….

I saw Mark's post earlier bringing up how you're not supposed to use sp_ as the start of a stored procedure name…. Here's *why* it does that. Go to any user database (NOT MASTER) you have and put in a proc like this: create proc sp_addlogin as begin select 'hah, PWND! Read more →

Hyperbac anyone?

Does anyone have anything bad to say about Hyperbac? I've searched google, blown through every article there, blog entries, and everything. I can't find a single bad thing about the product. Read more →

Changing your SA Account

I just went through an exercise to change the name of my SA login. I renamed it to something confidential, set it with a strong password, and then created a new login called 'sa' with the same password as the old SA. Read more →

Netezza and OLE DB

This all applies to SQL Server 2008 btw. You may run into a whole bunch of problems trying to get OLE DB drivers to work with a Netezza NPS for the purposes of linked servers. Read more →

SQL Management Studio 2008

Wow, it actually does suck 85% less than SQL Server Management Studio 2005. When I look up online help, it takes 1 second to start instead of 20. When I type "Backup Database" in the Look For box it returns me syntax help for (get this) Backup Database for SQL Server, instead of an article about which backup strategies to use for SQL Server Mobile Edition. Read more →

Net Start….

The Net Start command, with no service argument, will show you the services currently running on a server. Basically, it gives you a list of all of the services available to stop. Read more →

An actual SQL post for a change

This is a pretty interesting blog from Microsoft about how networking works in SQL Server: http://blogs.msdn.com/sql_protocols/default.aspx I found them when I did a google search for a sql server error 18456. Read more →

Smartest guy in video games

The smartest guy in video games just did something absolutely incredible. Steam is really good stuff. Steam encapsulates many of infrastructure needs of a gaming company. Software distribution, advertising, pre-sales, sales, post-sales, special sales, credit card payment, subscription sales, on-line matching, cheat prevention, ranking systems for online matching. Read more →

What I'd Like to See in the Next Windows

I was reading an article on Slashdot (here) about a piece of software that creates a customized Windows Vista installation. Nothing new there, Windows has had functionality to create custom unattended installations for a long time. Read more →

DTS, VBA and the Future

As part of today's MacWorld festivities, I was reminded of something. Office:Mac 2008 doesn't support VBA anymore, and VBA support for the next version of Office for Windows is supposed to be limited to the ability to upgrade scripts to whatever new thing Microsoft has to replace VBA. Read more →

Thoughts on Query Complexity

I'm working with a vendor's system that has a very severe performance problem. I'm looking at it because despite the fact that I told the vendor there was a problem with a particular query back in OCTOBER and that the problem was going to degrade linearly with the data size they didn't (1) fix the query or (2) provide us with a data archive system, and now it's an emergency. Read more →

Maintenance Plans for Backups = FIRED

Message Executed as user: CUSTSVCDB01\SYSTEM. Microsoft (R) SQL Server Execute Package Utility Version 9.00.3042.00 for 32-bit Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp 1984-2005. All rights reserved. Started: 4:00:00 PM Progress: 2007-08-14 16:00:11.66 Source: {4E701E84-81ED-4B7D-A3B4-ACBF7D0CAC3F} Executing query "DECLARE @Guid UNIQUEIDENTIFIER EXECUTE msdb. Read more →

Show Execution Plan

Examining execution plans is the key to improving query performance. The knowledge and experience necessary to look at a query plan and say "yeah, that's where it screwed up" and fix it makes all the difference in the world. Read more →

The SQL Server 2005 Tools

I still hate them. But not as much as I did. With a massive computer upgrade they're now performing tolerably. Not great, but tolerably. They use something like 118 mb of RAM and take forever to load, but not as long a forever as it used to be. Read more →

Database Mirroring

One of the things I'm investigating is DR, actually not really disaster recovery, more of a "service availability" problem. I'm not trying to address the DR situation yet, just the "OMG SERVER CRASH" problem. Read more →

Data Structures I'd Like to See

I want to see a structure that I can resolve the following for without using a table scan: Find me all of the appointments that Amy, Bob, Charlie and Dyan have been in that have ever occurred on Wednesdays in July, August, or September between 8 AM and 3 PM between 1/1/2003 and 12/31/2006. Read more →

So, this Whole Vista Thing

Anybody upgraded yet? For gamers, I've only seen very very disappointed reviews about frame rate performance, apparently because hardware vendors weren't quite ready yet, especially for NVidia cards. Belkin Nostromo drivers appear to be available if you email their tech support folks. Read more →