Storing sensitive information in a database, like passwords or social security numbers, is common practice. However, storing them securely is less common. Unfortunately, one of the most typical approaches is to store sensitive information in a table as clear text. That means that anyone with access to that table can see all of that sensitive…
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I’ve lost count of the times I’ve been called after hours due to a drive filling up. The usual culprit? Transaction file log growth. Monitoring the growth of your SQL Server transaction log files is crucial for maintaining database performance and ensuring system reliability. Unchecked transaction log growth can lead to disk space issues and…
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Since security and permissions are a big part of a DBA’s job, it’s important to be able to find out things like who has elevated login permissions or when a login was last used. Here are a few queries to help you check your server and database access. Most of these scripts are based off…
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In SQL Server 2022, Basic Availability Groups provide a limited, cost-effective solution for high availability and disaster recovery in the Standard Edition. However, they have several limitations when compared to a standard Availability Group in the Enterprise Edition. Although Basic AGs were introduced before SQL Server 2022, we’ll focus strictly on the latest version. Let’s…
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Your SQL Servers are the backbone of your company’s data operations. They power critical applications and store valuable information. They enable financial decisions, undergird operational activities, and support your sales processes. But what happens if there’s a problem? What happens when data is lost or corrupted? Or if one of your key systems is down…
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With each new release of SQL Server, we gain exciting new features—but also face the reality of deprecated features that should be phased out. Although these deprecated features aren’t immediately disabled, they won’t be supported in future SQL Server versions. Ideally, you should start removing them from your code now to avoid potential issues during…
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SQL Server Availability Groups can present challenges after a failover, such as missing logins, outdated passwords, or absent SQL Server Agent jobs. Some clients address these issues by requiring the primary replica to remain on the same instance. If a failover occurs due to an outage or patching, they generally request to revert the AG…
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No one wants a slow, unreliable SQL Server that leaks data like a sieve. No, they want a fast, reliable, and secure database environment. However, they may not want it right now. Creating a better SQL environment can wait until later, right? It might seem that way, but the risks will only grow while you…
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SQL Server is designed to efficiently manage memory on its own. It requests memory when it’s needed and releases memory back to the system when it’s not. However, the default settings may not be ideal for your situation. An experienced database administrator will usually fine-tune these settings to optimize performance and server stability. Minimum server…
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As a DBA, one of the most critical aspects of managing SQL Server is ensuring the integrity and reliability of database backups. SQL Server’s native backup functionalities offer robust tools for securing your data, particularly for databases utilizing the full recovery model. However, mixing SQL Server native backups with disk or VM snapshots can lead…
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