Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

  • The Last SQL Server Service Pack

    I wrote The Last Service Pack a few years ago, thinking that SQL Server 2016 SP2 might end all large updates. At the time, Microsoft was moving to a Cumulative Update process, with the aim of releasing small patches for each version every couple of months. They’ve done a good job of that, and SQL Server 2017 now has CU 26 with more coming.

    With little fanfare, we got Service Pack 3 for SQL Server 2016 recently, with a long list of fixes.  Even Pedro Lopes notes this is the final service pack for any version. That means I expect that in the next few years, I’ll start to encounter people working with technology who have no idea what a service pack is or what those are used for.

    Visual Studio has “updates”. VS Code and ADS just tell you constantly they need an update, with no deal designation about versions. SSMS has slowed their pace of changes, but the tool really just gets a new version every few months. With Windows we get a large update periodically, but those seem to be called a May 2021 update (or something similar).

    I wonder if we are moving towards the era of commercial software being continuous, with updates being released continuously and available for install by customers. Certainly this is the way many of us build software inside organizations, constantly enhancing and fixing code and deploying it out. We often don’t give our customers much choice in whether we deploy changes, and I suspect commercial software is going this way in many instances.

    I not-so-fondly remember digging into Service Pack changes and trying to test them against applications, sometimes for weeks before a deployment across an estate. These days, I tend to apply cumulative updates a few weeks late, after ensuring I don’t see many reports of issues on the Internet. I don’t mind keeping up to date, but I don’t like to be the first one to do so.

    I don’t know that I care if Service Packs go away. I’ve gotten comfortable with Windows updates, Cumulative updates, and even the random changes in VSCode/ADS that seem to come monthly. I don’t see applications crashing often enough to stop trusting most vendors. Hopefully that feeling continues.

    Steve Jones

    Listen to the podcast at Libsyn, Stitcher, Spotify, or iTunes.

  • Daily Coping 8 Oct 2021

    I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.

    Today’s tip is to avoid saying “I should” and make time to do nothing.

    Today is quarantine day for me. I’m in Belgium, actually, who knows. I flew to London overnight, then a trip to Brussels. I have to test and quarantine until I get results, so this is really a day of travel and doing nothing.

    My wife and I will likely just relax in the airport between flights and then relax in a hotel in Brussels, avoiding trying to do work or get things accomplished. I’ll likely even avoid any exercise with the quarantine and long travels. If I have results and feel better in the evening, maybe I’ll walk or lightly exercise, but overall, I want to have a day of rest.

  • Security Concerns with the Tesla Payment

    This is part of a series that covers my experience with a Tesla Model Y.

    Before we could get our car, we needed to make our down payment for the car. I wrote about the ordering experience. Part of that process was choosing the loan (or case or lease) and payment. I had left it near the default of US$4500 and two days before our pickup appointment, we got an email that we needed to check the paperwork and make the payment.

    As we logged on to the Tesla site, part of the workflow asked us for the credentials for our bank account.

    Wha?!?!?!

    We backed out and looked again and sure enough, when you click make payment, you get a popup from the Tesla site asking for your bank (Wells Fargo for us) and your login credentials.

    This isn’t a recurring payment, and this isn’t from Tesla. The fine print shows this is from Plaid, a financial company. Lots of banks use their service, and maybe I use them for something, but I hadn’t seen a request to give my credentials to a third party. This is apparently a model being used as other businesses ask this from customers.

    I’m not comfortable.

    A Workaround

    Fortunately, I searched and found a few posts from Tesla owners. This one noted that you can click the “X” in the dialog and then get a popup to enter the bank routing information. We did that, and it worked fine.

    I think this is a poor business model. I’m not even sure this is legal with some of the computer security acts in the US. While some posts indicate this generates a token from your bank that is used for access, I think providing login credentials is a problem.

    If you run into this with any other company, I’d try clicking the X and using a semi-more secure method of entering routing and account info.

  • Crossing Borders

    I’m about to cross a country border for the first time in almost two years. I last left the United States in December 2019. Today I’m flying to Belgium for Data Minds Connect and then to the UK for some work in the office.

    I’ll be in and out of touch for the next week as I adjust to travel, moving around, and a strange schedule. After being either in my home office or the Redgate Pasadena office for the last 22 months, I’m finally working and traveling to a different environment.

    Next week the blog will be quiet, other than coping tips, as I navigate a familiar, but somewhat forgotten world.

    Hopefully I have packed everything in my laptop bag, but if not, I’m sure I can purchase what I need.

    Glad to be back to traveling, even with restrictions and hassles.