Voice of the DBA

Author: way0utwest

The Separation of Tools

I’ve got a question for you today. Is it better to have SSMS and ADS available as separate downloads?

If you installed SQL Server prior to 2017 (the year, not the version), you had the option to add Management Studio (SSMS) to your installation. In fact, that was the only way to get SSMS back then. There was no separate tools download, which was a pain for many customers.

Since then, there have been multiple releases of SSMS separately, starting with 16.x and moving through v17 and now v18. In fact, it’s been roughly every quarter we’ve gotten new releases of the tooling. In addition, we’ve gotten Azure Data Studio (ADS), which is based on Visual Studio Code, but built with connections to the data platform as the primary goal.

There are now separate downloads for SSMS and ADS, though the latest SSMS download notes that starting with v18.7, ADS is automatically installed alongside the tool. That generated a feedback item, which requests that this bundling be removed. While I don’t find this to be an issue, I do understand that this can be a problem for many organizations.

I think that Microsoft moving to provide a more customized and flexible tooling experience makes sense. Give us the options to configure our systems as we desired. Let us add new features that are appropriate for us, or easily remove them from the install. I would include the requirement that ADS be installed with SSMS, as noted above. That being said, the ability to add in various extensions might be of concern to many organizations. Flexibility includes the ability of both users and organizations to control the allowed and prohibited list of features.

I will admit a fondness for SSMS that ADS has not replicated, but I do find myself using it more and more as new tooling items are available only in ADS and not in SSMS. Perhaps as I use notebooks more, I’ll find myself more enamored with ADS. After all, I loved isql/Windows for years, even when other tools became the standard.

Steve Jones

Listen to the podcast at Libsyn, Stitcher or iTunes.

November 2, 2020
Azure DevOps–Using Variable Groups

I was in a webinar recently and saw a note about variable groups. That looked interesting, as I’ve started to find that I may have lots of variables in some pipelines, and I thought this would keep me organized. However, these are better than that.

When I go to the variable screen for a pipeline, I see this my variables, but on the left side, I see “Variable groups”. If I click this, I see some info.:

The top link takes me to a doc page, where I see this sentence: “Use a variable group to store values that you want to control and make available across multiple pipelines.”

Now that is interesting. I have been thinking about different pipelines, so having variables that work across them is good.

To create a variable group, I need to go to the Library, which is another menu item under the Pipelines area. I get a list of groups, of which I have none right now.

When I click the blue button, I get a form with the group properties, and then a variables section below.

I add a couple variables and add some group info. In this case, I want some secret values that are useful across different pipelines.

You do need to click Save at the end of this.

In my pipeline, I see I have some variables. On the left, again, is a Variable groups item.

When I click that, I don’t see any, but I haven’t linked any. Here I need to link my group.

When I click this, I get a blade on the right. I can then see my group(s), and I can set a scope. I do need to click the group and then I can click link at the bottom.

Now I see the variables available in my pipeline.

That’s pretty cool, especially as I am starting to see separate pipelines for different downstream environments becoming more popular.

November 2, 2020
The Spookiest Year

Last Halloween I was in Chicago, in one of the biggest cities in the US visiting a customer. This was near the end of a very busy travel year, where I’d been to England 5 times, Australia twice, and was returning home for the weekend before heading back out on a trip to Seattle for the 2019 PASS Summit.

This year I expected more of the same, even into early February, before the COVID-19 pandemic hit the world. Since then, much of the world has changed, certainly travel, conferences, SQL Saturdays, and most other types of gatherings have changed. Not just work events, but work itself, with many of us, perhaps most, working from come. Concerts, comedy, sporting events, and more have been cancelled or changed to taking place without spectators. While some things are starting to come back, they’ve forever changed.

I have started coaching volleyball again, and while we’ve started competition, we do so without spectators, which is a very strange experience. As I sat between matches recently, my wife and I noticed how quiet it was and how calm. In a good way, but also a strange feeling for us.

Perhaps one of the strangest things is watching media more than in the past, and seeing people without masks, in crowds, living life in a way that I assumed would always exist a year ago. It’s certainly jarring, and I wonder to what extent we’ll return to that world in the future.

Tomorrow is Halloween, and while it’s not an event I’ll participate in, I’ll think about the spooky feeling of this entire year, where nothing seems to have gone in the way I’d have expected. I hope that does change in 2021, but for now, I’m assuming we have at least seven more months, through at least April of 2021, living in the same world. Hopefully, I’m wrong.

Steve Jones

October 30, 2020
Goal Progress– October 2020
This is my report, which continues on from the Aug report. After that report, I made an effort to work a little harder. This is where I am.

Reading Goals

Here were my goals for the year.
- 3 technical books
- 2 non-technical books
Books I’ve tackled:
- Making Work Visible – Complete
- Pro Power BI Desktop – 60% complete
- White Fragility – 82% complete
- The Biggest Bluff – 100% complete
- Team of Teams – NEW
- Project to Product – NEW
I made an effort during some lunches and breaks to work on Making Work Visible and finished it. The middle of the book was hard, but the end got me thinking again. I’ll write a review soon.

No Power BI or White Fragility. I’ve been a little unfocused and struggling to cope for a couple months and trying to let my brain relax when I can.

I added the last book after hearing the author talk about poker and how it relates to life and decision making. So far, it’s a mix of poker, fear, and the challenges of imperfect information.

Project Goals

Here were my project goals, working with software
- A Power BI report that updates from a database
- A mobile app reading data from somewhere
- A website that showcases changes and data from a database.
I started compiling some data, grabbing some stats from my life. I’m loading that into a db , as a part of life and some content work, so I’ll write about that. Once I get that loaded, I’m thinking to use that db as a way to kick start some of these items.

Work is not slowing this fall,but I did take a bit of time and start to build a PowerBI report that has some data in a database. Early days here, and I really think this is about 10% done, but it’s moving.

Nothing on the mobile app, nothing on the website for now.
October 30, 2020