Performance Monitoring with Azure SQL Analytics

Do you have Azure SQL Databases or Azure SQL Managed Instances? Are you looking for database performance monitoring solutions without going broke or implementing your own?

Azure SQL Analytics might be the solution for you. But is Azure SQL Analytics really good enough for the job? Can it be a decent competitor to powerhouses such as SolarWinds, Red-Gate, Apex, Quest, and others?

Join Eitan to see how to get started, learn about the pros and cons and how it stacks up against 3rd party monitoring platforms, and see a live demo.

Dynamic Search Queries in T-SQL - The Ninja way

What is the solution for implementing truly dynamic search queries? Not just a stored procedure with optional parameters, but something even more dynamic than that? Let the end-user choose the exact fields and, more importantly, the operator types to use on them, in order to get the results that they need. And how do you achieve this level of dynamic interactivity without risking SQL injection? This presentation will answer these questions and give you a solution involving some advanced T-SQL martial arts!

More info here:
https://eitanblumin.com/portfolio/advanced-dynamic-search-queries/

Development Lifecycle Basics for DBAs

What is source control? What is version history? What are unit tests? What do CI and CD even mean, and what the heck is an Artifact?? In this new era of Agile development, DevOps, DataOps and other weird buzzwords, we the DBAs gotta learn to keep up. It's time to add our monstrous database into the continuous integration pipeline. But first, we need to know what we're going into and need to familiarize ourselves with the terms and methodologies of the world of software development lifecycles.

More info:
https://eitanblumin.com/portfolio/ci-cd-ssdt-development-lifecycle-basics-dbas/

SSDT Methodologies for SQL Server DevOps

In this session, we will cover the concepts and methodologies in SSDT that allow DBAs to implement a continuous database development lifecycle.

SSDT in general (SQL Server Data Tools), and the SQL Database Project specifically, are very effective tools for integrating the database development with the software development lifecycle. Source control, version history, unit testing, and CI/CD - SSDT has it all - and it's completely free!

More info here:
https://eitanblumin.com/portfolio/ci-cd-ssdt-methodologies-for-db-devops/

How to HADR Your SQL Jobs

You have a couple or more SQL Servers with some sort of High Availability solution between them (AlwaysOn Availability Groups, Database Mirroring, etc.). You also have a bunch of scheduled jobs which you need to be run on the Primary server.

But wait…. How would you make these jobs run only on the Primary server? After all, if they try to run on the Secondary, they might fail (whether because the database is inaccessible or because it’s read-only). Additionally, you would need to consider a failover where the Primary and Secondary servers would switch roles.

This means that you would have to create these jobs on both servers, and then implement some sort of mechanism that would detect, for each job, whether the instance it’s being executed at is currently the Primary.

There are a few ways to go about doing this. During this session we will cover possible solutions, downfalls, tricks, and much more.

SSDT Tools and Features for SQL Server DevOps

Meet SSDT (SQL Server Data Tools), that comes with the SQL Database Project as an effective tool for integrating the database development with the software development lifecycle. Source control, version history, unit testing, and CI/CD: SSDT comes with an answer for all.

In this session, the 3rd of a multi-part series, we will cover the rich tools, features, and concepts in SSDT that allow DBAs to implement a continuous database development lifecycle. We will also learn about solutions to common fears and objections coming from naysayers, common problems while starting with SSDT for the first time, and various problematic edge cases and how to solve them.

SSDT in general (SQL Server Data Tools), and the SQL Database Project specifically, are very effective tools for integrating the database development with the software development lifecycle. Source control, version history, unit testing, and CI/CD - SSDT has it all - and it's completely free!

More details here:
https://eitanblumin.com/portfolio/ci-cd-ssdt-tools-and-features-for-db-devops/

How to Save Money on Your SQL Server Hardware

Having a production machine with SQL Server in your organization is no cheap feat. Significant costs could accumulate due to expensive hardware and licensing.

How could we find whether our SQL Server machine is wasting your money? What are common pitfalls? How to detect them and how to remedy them?

Learn all this and more in this session, based on real world experience.

This session is relevant to both on-prem as well as cloud environments.

More info here:
https://eitanblumin.com/portfolio/how-to-save-money-on-your-sql-server-hardware/

Contained Availability Groups in SQL Server 2022

While being an awesome feature introduced in SQL Server 2012, Availability Groups were always missing the ability to synchronize server-level objects between replicas. This finally changed 10 years later, in SQL Server 2022, with the introduction of “Contained Availability Groups”.

A contained availability group is an Always On availability group that supports:

- managing metadata objects (users, logins, permissions, SQL Agent jobs etc.) at the availability group level in addition to the instance level.
- specialized contained system databases within the availability group.

In this session, you will:

- learn about the similarities, differences, and functionalities of contained availability groups.
- see a live demo of the creation and usage of a contained availability group.
- learn how to work with the feature of contained availability groups and its pros and cons.

For more info: https://eitanblumin.com/portfolio/contained-availability-groups-in-sql-server-2022/

Troubleshooting Common SSDT Errors

You want to implement DevOps for your SQL Server database. So, you created a SQL Server Database Project in Visual Studio or VSCode using SSDT. Maybe you even have a CI/CD pipeline all ready to go...

But now, you're starting to see all kinds of errors and problems that you're not sure how to tackle. Maybe you have some kind of edge case in your target environment. Maybe you need to store something in your project and you don't know how. Maybe you're having trouble with your unit tests. Maybe your project can't even be built properly without getting a bunch of errors.

You're starting to doubt... Was SSDT even the right choice?? CAN this even be done at all???

Join me in this important session for you to learn How To Do It Right. Based on my real-world experience of consulting and mentoring multiple organizations in their implementation of SQL Server DevOps.