Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

  • Daily Coping 6 Apr 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 appreciate nature around you, wherever you are.

    I am lucky that I live in a rural area, with animals, so nature is always around. I try to get outside and regularly enjoy and appreciate how amazing nature can be. I’ll stop and watch the horses, or even pause during a drive to see the deer run by.

    Recently I went on a hike with family and dogs, and while we went through an open space near neighborhoods, I stopped to look and enjoy the trees, the landscape, more of nature than just animals. Apparently my dog was interested in the trees as well.

    20210320_134939

    Or maybe what was behind them.

  • Running Scripts in Parallel with SQL Multi Script

    One of the lesser known tools in the Redgate Toolbelt is SQL Multi Script. While few customers used it, those that did loved it, as it solves a problem that many people have: deploying a script to a lot of servers at once. While Central Management Servers help a little here, they don’t quite have all the features of Multi-script, which is not only a management, but a deployment tool as well. With companies using sharding and multiple systems for clients, this is becoming more important all the time.

    A few years ago a customer asked me if we could make this run faster. At the time, we had limited the tool to 25 threads at a time, which made sense when it was developed. However, with modern hardware, I asked the developers to remove this limit. This was an easy change, and now you can scale up your script execution.

    You can do this with the “Application Options” in the menu. As you see below, parallel execution is enabled.

    2021-03-24 09_59_07-Application Options

    What’s more, this value is dynamic. If you start executing this agaisnt a series of databases and need to scale up or down, you can change this value and it will take effect immediately.

    If you’ve never given SQL Multi Script a try, and have the need to run scripts against a lot of servers, give it a try. It’s a little known, but incredibly valuable, tool.

  • Daily Coping 5 Apr 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 take an extra break or two today during work.

    I had to do this last week a few times. After the snow in Colorado, I went out a few days to help my wife clear things up and ensure animals were cared for. In doing so, I decided to manhandle the tractor front bucket to get it connected. Doing so, I ended up tweaking my back.

    As a result, I decided to give myself a few breaks during the next couple days, not pushing too hard, but taking some breaks to relax and rest a bit during the day. I didn’t want to completely stop life, but I recognized that I needed to go a bit slower.

    I am usually pretty good about taking breaks, but not always. I’m trying to be more consistent, especially as my day often starts early to talk with UK colleagues. I need to remember that if I’m working until 5 or 6, I need to have breaks in the middle.

  • Republish: I Hate To Send This Email

    My first plane flight in over a year. Out in Philly today, coaching youth volleyball, so you get: I Hate To Send This Email