Microsoft has publicly stated that SQL Server 2008 will RTM in Q3.  It is Quarter 3 now.  Where is it?  :-) I'm sure that the final touches will now get taken care of now that Bill Gates is no longer a full-time MSFT employee.  I'm sure that his ''short-timer'' attitude trickled down to the develpers working on the product and ...

Whenever I do a webcast or presentation, I always ask the audience to indicate where their organization is in relation to running SQL Server 2000 or running SQL 2005.  Recently, in an audience of about 40 people, more than half of the audience still had more than 50% of their production servers running SQL Server 2000.  One of the ...

If you have systems that are stil on SQL Server 2000 and that you are preparing for SQL Server 2005, run the Upgrade Avisor for SQl Server 2008 as well.  So, while you are under the hood of your database and app getting it ready for 2005, get it ready for 2008 too.  There are a lot of new features in 2008, but nothing that was taken away ...

Details are here http://blogs.technet.com/dataplatforminsider/archive/2008/06/07/sql-server-2008-rc0-now-available-for-subscribers.aspx More info once I have mine downloaded and installed under Hyper V

Ever had to take over the code for a system you did not define? Ever found the documentation for such an app, to be ahemmm lacking?   Its  a fairly common ask from new app developers/ DBAs to find out if certain code is still being used for apps that have evolved over  a number of years. In SQL 2005 we added a DMV that allows you ...

Again, I wanted to blog about something that still does not change between 2005 and 2008. At a recent conference, there were some great questions/ideas that should make it to Connect if they haven't already. When DB Snapshots were first introduced, one of the questions that I always heard was ''Can I perform a Backup on the ...

After spending the past couple of weeks at the MVP Summit in Seattle and at SQL Connections in Orlando, I thought I should blog about things that do not change in 2008 (at least partially). One of the reason s to partition your tables is to make it more managable.  Although there has been some enhancements in the manner that partitions are ...

In SQL Server 2008, you can have what is called a ''Filtered Index''.  What does this mean?  An index may be created for a subset of rows in your table.  For instance you could create a filtered index for a ''state'' column if the value is ''CA'' for California; the rest of the states would not have a value.  When you create ...

It's Official, today! We have a party for SQL Server 2008 in LA!  The product may not be shipping, but that won't stop us from having our party. Seriously, Today marks the beginning of a more useful Launch than the 2005 launch.  What am I saying?  The Launch Events will probably be more educational for you this time around because ...

In the latest PASS Community Connector, there is a call for Speakers for this year's summit in Seattle in November.  If you have never been to Seattle in November, it really makes you want to learn more about SQL Server in the breakout sessions. ;-)   But seriously, it is a great venue to meet other SQL Server professionals and ...