The nomenclature used for referencing software releases and updates can be quite confusing. Let's consider an example to illustrate what the various terms mean. As a new version of a product is being developed, it may be made available to select customers and community members for early testing.
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As most you already know, Notification Services is not part of Microsoft SQL Server 2008. I think this is a shame since SSNS is really a great product. It may be rather complex at first glance, but it's a great product nonetheless.
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Ocassionally, I see a question in the MSDN Forums where someone wants to know how to retrieve a list of column information for a table using only T-SQL. Although there are several ways in which to approach this, I like the following method.
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I hope that everyone that works with Microsoft SQL Server is aware of the MSDN SQL Server Forums. If not, you should really go check them out. They're a great resource when you're staring at a tough SQL Server-related problem.
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The most common way to create a SQL Server Notification Services instance is to craft a valid and well-formed XML document for the Instance Configuration File and the Application Definition File.
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At the 2007 PASS Community Summit in Denver, a keynote speaker made a passing comment about how there has not been a security bulletin released for SQL Server in over three years!
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Thanks to all 60+ people who braved the flood warnings in Nashville to attend the SQL Server User Group meeting earlier today. I hope you found it to be worth your while.
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If you've used SQL Server for a while, you're probably familiar with the @@version function. Selecting the function in a query window produces the following results on my system.
From this, you can quickly determine that I'm running SQL Server 2005 Developer Edition version 9.
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Interested in learning more about Microsoft SQL 2008 Server Reporting Services? I recently stumbled upon a White Paper on the Microsoft site that provides a good overview. While weighing in at only 14 pages including the title page, table of contents, and copyright stuff, it does provide a good, abeit somewhat general, overview of the product and it's capabilities.
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I recently worked with Buck Woody to turn one of my blog posts into a podcast. It's my first podcast! :) I recorded it about midnight one evening after everyone else in my family had retired for the evening.
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I just completed teaching a Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services class in Charlotte, North Carolina - a wonderful and beautiful place to visit! In a couple of the demonstrations, we used some predefined formatting strings to customize the way a user can see a value in a report.
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Last week, I completed an upgrade of a SQL Server 2000 server to SQL Server 2005. Not really a big deal; servers are routinely upgraded to a newer version of software.
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A very astute SQL Server professional and reader of this blog posed the following question in a comment to a prior posting entitled "Does the order of criteria the WHERE clause matter?
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Recently, I demonstrated that the order of columns in a composite index greatly determines its usefulness. Microsoft SQL Server can efficiently resolve queries using a composite index if the search criteria includes the first column in the index.
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After blogging yesterday that you can try the latest Microsoft SQL Server 2008 CTP online for free on the SqlServerBeta site, Microsoft has announced the release of a new CTP. The February CTP available!
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Had a chance to play with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 yet? If so, you've probably downloaded the most recent Community Technology Preview (CTP). It's not small either. The DVD's can take almost an hour to download at T1 speeds.
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The old adage "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" can be applied to many topics and areas of life. And while it has its origins in personal health care, nowhere is it more true than in an IT shop.
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A single column index is fairly straightforward to understand. You may have heard it compared to the index in the back of a technical book. When you want to find some information in the book, say DBCC INPUTBUFFER, you turn to the index in the back of the book and look up DBCC INPUTBUFFER.
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That's right! After a bit of a break, the Nashville SQL Server User Group is getting back together again. Our first meeting back will be this Friday, February 15th at 11:30am.
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To prepare for an upcoming technical presentation, I need to create some test data to use in a demo. I'm planning to show how different T-SQL programming techniques directly affect SQL Server's efficiency in resolving the query.
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