Stairway to Reliable Database Deployments Level 6 – Managing Changesets Over Time

As database changesets accumulate over time, they gradually become more than deployment artifacts. This level explores how a well-organized changeset library evolves into a replayable representation of the database’s structural history, supporting not only reliable deployments but also reconstruction, auditing, and long-term maintainability. Through practical examples and a real-world case study, it shows why maintaining coherent Create and Rollback scripts continues to provide value long after a successful production deployment.

The Service Name

VACATION!

Yeah, I've got the Go-Go's running in my head because I'm going on vacation tomorrow (holiday for you UK types). I've been slogging through a really dense book, War in Human Civilization. Total recommendation. Get it. Read it. However, I'm right near the end and there's been a lot of discussion about the impact of […]

Why SQL Server Database Attach fails and how to repair it

This article covers a few common errors when attaching database files to an instance, with some information on how to resolve the issues.

Big data: what it is, why projects fail, and how to get value from it

Although ‘Big Data’ (and more specifically, the analysis of it) offers several benefits, organizations often fail to derive the correct insights – the data that could help them make better business decisions. So, in this article, I’ll reveal exactly how organizations can take full advantage of these large datasets to make those better business decisions and improve operational effectiveness.

AI Observability Challenges in FinOps as a DBA

I was performing research for requested AI work and noticed that I was viewing the risks from a database perspective.  As the saying goes in the tech industry, “Once a DBA always a DBA…”  As foreign as some of the views were, much of it feels familiar and I simply begin to look at it […]

Exposing a SQL injection vulnerability you’ve never heard of

This article documents a SQL injection vulnerability I discovered in sys.sp_dbmmonitorupdate, a Microsoft-signed system stored procedure. For other SQL Server security vulnerabilities I’ve discovered, see the full series here.

Limiting Checkpoints

Pros and Cons of Database Sharding for Performance and Maintenance

Large databases usually have a negative impact on maintenance time, scalability and query performance. For maintenance, these large single databases have to be backed up daily while the amount of actual changing data might be small. For performance, tables without correct indexes result in full table or clustered index scans. As the data grows the total query time increase linearly. How can we decrease downtime for the maintenance window for large databases and optimize the performance of daily queries?

BIT_COUNT II