Rhonda Tipton's Blog » SQL Server

Nice Tutorial – 31 Days of SSIS

Rhonda — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 01:40:10 +0000

Database Architect Jason Strate composed a 31-Day series containing tips for SQL Server Integration Services. I recommend checking it out when you have time.

31 Days of SSIS

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Happy Learning!

Houston Area SQL Server User Group – 03/08/11

Rhonda — Fri, 18 Mar 2011 15:27:34 +0000

I attended the March Houston Area SQL Server User Group meeting. Below are my notes.

Announcements

SQL Saturday – Dallas is April 2/2011

Main Topic – Keeping Up with the JOINes

Speaker – Brian Dudley

From Clause can include

Tables and Views
Derived tables
Common Table Expressions
Table Value Functions
Join
Apply
Pivot & Unpivot

Inner Join

Matching records from both tables
Often used for code lookup

Self-Join – join a table with itself

Can also be used in an Update and Delete statement

Outer Joins

Partial Join (Left or Right) – All records from one table and matching records from another table (example: orders and shipments)

Full Outer Join

All records from each table combined where matching
Null values for columns not matched
Example: Customer activity combining order and shipments
Nulls on a full outer join – do not compare

Cross Joins (Cartesian Product)

Every row in one table is joined with every row in another table
Visualize as a matrix or spreadsheet
Example: Tally table ( http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/t-sql/62867)

Apply

Right side is evaluated for each record on the left side
Outer Apply/Cross Apply
Best used with Table-Value Functions
Example: Geo-Spatial functons

SQL Saturday #57 – Houston

Rhonda — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 17:49:53 +0000

I attended/volunteered at the first SQL Saturday (57) Houston. The event took place this passed Saturday at the Bammel Church of Christ and with about 185 in attendance (350 registered), the event was a success (IMO).

Main Picasa Photo Set for SQL Saturday #57

My Picasa Photo Set for SQL Saturday #57

Photos taken by Sri Sridharan of SQLRocks.com

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Below is a roundup of SQL Saturday 57 recaps and reviews. I will update it as I see new posts come up.

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Can’t wait to see what the next Houston SQL Saturday holds…

SQL Server String Functions

Rhonda — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 20:44:03 +0000

Manipulating strings is a common task in T-SQL. Below are a few of SQL’s built-in functions that make dealing with strings easier.

LEN – determines the length of a string value.
Syntax: LEN ( string_expression )

LEFT – returns the specified number of characters from the left side of the string value.
Syntax: LEFT ( character_expression, integer_expression )

RIGHT – returns the specified number of characters from the right side of the string value.
Syntax: RIGHT ( character_expression, integer_expression )

SUBSTRING – returns the specified number of characters from the middle of the string value.
Syntax: SUBSTRING ( expression, start, length )

REPLACE – replaces characters in the string
Syntax: REPLACE ( string_expression, string_pattern, string_replacement)

STUFF – inserts characters in the string
Syntax: STUFF ( character_expression, start, length, character_expression )

T-SQL Code Sample

DECLARE @testString VARCHAR(20)
SET @testString = 'Big Bang Theory'

SELECT LEN(@testString) AS _Length,
    LEFT(@testString,3) AS _Left,
    RIGHT(@testString,6) AS _Right,
    SUBSTRING(@testString,5,4) AS _Substring,
    REPLACE(@testString,'Bang', 'Bazinga') AS _Replace,
    STUFF(@testString,5,0,'Big ') AS _Stuff

T-SQL Listing on GitHub

T-SQL Code Sample – Result

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Great T-SQL Resource: Beyond Relational

Rhonda — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 00:53:37 +0000

I recently ran across the site Beyond Relational. It is full of great information on SQL Server. My favorite areas of the site are T-SQL Challenges and T-SQL Challenges for Beginners.

Whether you are just learning T-SQL or sharpening your querying skills, these two areas contain some great assignments to learn from. Check them out.

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HASSUG Meeting – 04/13/10 – Recap

Rhonda — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 17:20:11 +0000

For the first time in a while, I attended the Houston Area SQL Server User Group meeting and I am glad I did. Especially since I walked away with a free (signed) copy of the book SQL In A Nutshell.

The speaker was Kevin Kline (@kekline) and the topic was The Top 10 Mistakes on SQL Server.

High Points Gleaned

10. Disks – Thinking space not IO (insufficient I/O, poor choice of RAID type, not enough spindles, etc.)

09. Ignorance – As an IT professional you should know how SQL Server works at an “internals” level.

08. No trouble-shooting methodology

07. Going with the defaults – Autogrow/autoshrink on DB’s, default filegroups, etc.

06. Security as an afterthought – SQL attacks are the #1 hack on the internet today.

05. Inadequate automation

04. Wrong feature or technique for the job

03. Apathy without change management

02. Inadequate preventative maintenance

01. Backups <> Recovery

Links

Announcements

May Meeting: TUE 5/11 @ 11:30AM – How to Protect SQL Server with DPM 2010 – Presenter: Javier Calvillo, Microsoft

Special Meeting: TUE 5/18 @ 6:30PM – Essential Database Maintenance – Presenters: Kimberly Tripp & Paul Randal, SQLSkills

July Meeting: TUE 7/13 @ 11:30 – Topic TBD – Brent Ozar

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SQL Pass 2009 Recaps and Live Blogs

Rhonda — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:58:45 +0000

For people (like myself) who could not be present at SQL Pass 2009, I have listed some great recaps and live blogs below.

Michelle Ufford – Live Blog Posts

Pinal Dave – Recaps

Brent Ozar – Live Blog posts

Jack Corbett – Daily Recaps

Denny Cherry – Recap

#sqlpass is over. Some thought, comments, and reviews

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Until next time…

SQL Pretty Printer Add-In for SSMS – Review

Rhonda — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 14:20:08 +0000

I came across an online Instant SQL Formatter a while back and have been using that for some time to format SQL code that I get from other people. Now I see there is an add-in for SQL Management Studio from the same author of the online version. I downloaded and installed the SQL Pretty Printer Add-In For SSMS (not free) and have really found it very helpful.

Once installed, you will see the following toolbar in SSMS.

I created a couple of quick queries without paying too much attention to formatting.

Here is the same code after using the Pretty Printer SQL Formatter. Nice!

There are also numerous settings for the formatting, which is also very cool.

In closing, if you are like me and have an OCD when it comes to consistently formatted code, you will find this tool useful. The place where it is really useful and time-saving is on REALLY long Stored Procedures. I have had to deal with this lately, so I use this tool daily.

SQL Pretty Printer Add-In for SQL Server Management Studio

Instant SQL Formatter

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Until next time…

SSMS Tip – Display Results in a Separate Tab

Rhonda — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 12:30:14 +0000

One of my co-workers pointed out a setting in SQL Server Management Studio that has been extremely useful to me. It is the [Display Results in a Separate Tab] setting. This setting is helpful if you want to see more T-SQL code and/or more data in the return set. I am a fan of both.

To enable this setting go to Tools > Options…

Select Query Results > SQL Server > Results to Grid — and check Display results in a separate tab as well as Switch to results tab after the query executes

As you can see, when you execute a query, the results are displayed in their own tab.

I have found this setting helps a lot with really long stored procedures. It is nice to be able to see more code at one time.

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Until next time…

SSMS Tools Pack – Review

Rhonda — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 12:40:16 +0000

I downloaded the SSMS Tools Pack about 3 weeks ago at the urging of a co-worker. Boy I am glad I did. There are many useful tools in this collection from Mladen Prajdic.

Below are the tools that I have used the most (and LOVE)

Text document Regions and Debug sections – This helps with very large Stored Procedures. I know this because for the passed month, I have had to wade through very large ones.
Window Connection Coloring – This tool is awesome if you are having to constantly switch between Development, Staging and Production servers. It has already saved me several times.
New Query Template – Nice tool to help speed up creating a new query by defaulting in items from a template.

Other useful tools included in the pack

Query Execution History (Soft Source Control) and Current Window History.
Search Table or Database Data.
Uppercase/Lowercase keywords and proper case Database Object Names.
Run one script on multiple databases.
Copy execution plan bitmaps to clipboard.
Search Results in Grid Mode and Execution Plans.
Generate Insert statements for a single table, the whole database or current result sets in grids.
Running custom scripts from Object explorer’s Context menu.
CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) stored procedure generation.

So far, I find the SSMS Tools Pack extremely useful and am happy my co-worker recommended it.

SSMS Tools Pack Website

Mladen Prajdic’s Blog

Mladen Prajdic on Twitter

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Until next time…