Book Description

SQL Server 2008 represents a sizable jump forward in scalability, performance, and usability for the DBA, developer, and business intelligence (BI) developer. It is no longer unheard of to have 20-terabyte databases running on a SQL Server. SQL Server administration used to just be the job of a database administrator (DBA), but as SQL Server proliferates throughout smaller companies, many developers have begun to act as administrators as well. Additionally, some of the new features in SQL Server are more developer-centric, and poor configuration of these features can result in poor performance. SQL Server now enables you to manage the policies on hundreds of SQL Servers in your environment as if you were managing a single instance. We’ve provided a comprehensive, tutorial-based book to get you over the learning curve of how to configure and administer SQL Server 2008.

Whether you’re an administrator or developer using SQL Server, you can’t avoid wearing a DBA hat at some point. Developers often have SQL Server on their own workstations and must provide guidance to the administrator about how they’d like the production configured. Oftentimes, they’re responsible for creating the database tables and indexes. Administrators or DBAs support the production servers and often inherit the database from the developer.

This book is intended for developers, DBAs, and casual users who hope to administer or may already be administering a SQL Server 2008 system and its business intelligence features, such as Integration Services. This book is a professional book, meaning the authors assume that you know the basics about how to query a SQL Server and have some rudimentary concepts Download Now »

Book Description

SQL Server MVP Deep Dives, Volume 2 lets you learn from the best in the business—64 SQL Server MVPs offer completely new content in this second volume on topics ranging from testing and policy management to integration services, reporting, and performance optimization techniques…and more.

To become an MVP requires deep knowledge and impressive skill. Together, the 64 MVPs who wrote this book bring about 1,000 years of experience in SQL Server administration, development, training, and design. This incredible book captures their expertise and passion in 60 concise, hand-picked chapters.

SQL Server MVP Deep Dives, Volume 2 picks up where the first volume leaves off, with completely new content on topics ranging from testing and policy management to integration services, reporting, and performance optimization. The chapters fall into five parts: Architecture and Design, Database Administration, Database Development, Performance Tuning and Optimization, and Business Intelligence.

What’s Inside

• Discovering servers with PowerShell
• Using regular expressions in SSMS
• Tuning the Transaction Log for OLTP
• Optimizing SSIS for dimensional data
• Real-time BI Download Now »

Book Description

SQL Server 2008 Transact–SQL Recipes: A Problem–Solution Approach is an example–based guide to the Transact–SQL language that is at the core of SQL Server 2008. Learn to create databases, insert and update data, generate reports, secure your data, and more. Author Joseph Sack takes common Transact–SQL tasks and breaks them down into a problem/solution format that is quick and easy to read so that you can get the job done fast when the pressure is on.

• Focused on solutions: Look up what you need to do. Learn how to do it. Do it.
• Current: Newly updated for SQL Server 2008.
• Comprehensive: Covers 30 different Transact–SQL problem domains.

What you’ll learn

• Create databases, tables, and indexes.
• Query and manipulate data.
• Store and manage XML inside the database.
• Move business logic into the database.
• Encrypt data and capture changes for compliance purposes.
• Implement Full–Text Search. Download Now »

Book Description

Get a detailed look at the internal architecture of T-SQL with this comprehensive programming reference. Database developers and administrators get best practices, expert techniques, and code samples to master the intricacies of this programming language—solving complex problems with real-world solutions.

Discover how to:

• Work with T-SQL and CLR user-defined functions, stored procedures, and triggers.
• Handle transactions, concurrency, and error handling.
• Efficiently use temporary objects, including temporary tables, table variables, and table expressions.
• Evaluate when to use set-based programming techniques and when to use cursors.
• Work with dynamic SQL in an efficient and secure manner.
• Treat date- and time-related data in a robust manner.
• Develop CLR user-defined types and learn about temporal support in the relational model.
• Use XML and XQuery and implement a dynamic schema solution.
• Work with spatial data using the new geometry and geography types and spatial indexes.
• Track access and changes to data using extended events, SQL Server Audit, change tracking, and change data capture. Download Now »

Book Description

Tackle the toughest set-based querying and query tuning problems—guided by an author team with in-depth, inside knowledge of T-SQL. Deepen your understanding of architecture and internals—and gain practical approaches and advanced techniques to optimize your code’s performance.

Discover how to:
* Move from procedural programming to the language of sets and logic
* Optimize query tuning with a top-down methodology
* Assess algorithmic complexity to predict performance
* Compare data-aggregation techniques, including new grouping sets
* Manage data modification—insert, delete, update, merge—for performance
* Write more efficient queries against partitioned tables
* Work with graphs, trees, hierarchies, and recursive queries
* Plus—Use pure-logic puzzles to sharpen your problem-solving skills
Download Now »

Book Description

Even if you have little or no knowledge of T-SQL, Beginning T-SQL 2008 will bring you up to intermediate level and teach you best practices along the way. You’ll learn how to write code that will help you to achieve the best-performing applications possible.

You’ll find an introduction to databases, normalization, and SQL Server Management Studio. You’ll understand how data is stored in a database and learn how to use at least one of the available tools to get to that data.

Each subsequent chapter teaches an aspect of T-SQL, building on the skills learned in previous chapters. Exercises are included in each chapter because the only way to learn T-SQL is to write some code.

This book will do more than just give the syntax and examples. It will teach you techniques to help you avoid common errors and create robust and well-performing code.

• Imparts best practices for writing T-SQL
• Helps readers avoid common errors
• Shows how to write scalable code that yields good performance Download Now »