Category: Blog

I noticed the scores for the first part of the PASS nomination process were posted recently. These were the aggregate scores that the nominating committee gave to the applications that each of us sent in. I took a look to see where I was:

Middle of the pack. Four higher, four lower.

The scores went from 33 to 54, with my falling in as a 47, roughly exactly in the middle. You can see the criteria used for ranking in this document, which is basically a score sheet. Each person is ranked from 1-4 in various categories. My guess is that I rank lower on the volunteerism stuff and maybe education. I’m sure there are quite a few people with MBAs that would set the bar high.

The cutoff must have been around 40 as the last two candidates were not selected for interviews. I don’t think that they were bad candidates, but probably just lacking in an area or two.

My interview is tomorrow, so we’ll see if I’m still a part of this process next week.

I like way that the SQL Rally is being run. Having the community interact with the organizers and try to pick a logo is a great idea.

The final votes are being taken now, so check out the designs, and vote.

My pick is this one:

That’s one of the ones I voted for in the first cut of designs. I favor a clean, simpler design, especially one that will look good on a shirt or mug.

However pick the one you like and cast a vote.

Continuing on with my Thursday series of SQL Saturday posts, this time I wanted to talk about keynotes.

I’ve been to a few events in my time, and one of the things that seems to get many people going in the morning is the keynote session. Even crappy ones, and we’ve had some amazingly crappy ones at the PASS Summit, still manage to get a large turnout.

Not every SQL Saturday will have a large space to hold a keynote, but you can get creative and casual. If it’s good weather, hold it outside. Note to Patrick LeBlanc, Baton Rouge in August DOES NOT have good weather.

If there’s a large foyer, have one there. You don’t need a formal room, tons of AV, etc., just a place where people can sit, sip some coffee (or tea, as Brian Kelley would do ), even if they are on the floor or standing, and someone is speaking in the round. Just work with the speaker to manage their expectations.

I think this is a great way to open the day, and there are some really interesting people in the SQL community that can entertain people for 15 or 20 minutes. They can set the stage for the rest of the day, make a few announcements, and kick the event off right. You don’t need a Steve Ballmer to have a good keynote.

I’d suggest that you pick one of your good speakers early on and ask them to give a short keynote, no slides, to open your event. I bet most of them would be thrilled to do so. I know I was honored to do so in Charlotte and am looking forward to doing it again in Baton Rouge.

The short answer is it doesn’t. I guess that’s the long answer as well.

A few people have posted questions about whether the PK needs to be the first column, and does it matter if you have CHAR or VARCHAR together, should integers be first, etc.

It doesn’t matter. Fixed width data is stored first, variable length is offset from the end of the page, and LOB data is either in row with variable data, or on another page.

However since the server reads a page at a time, and has to rip through the row to get the next row anyway, it doesn’t matter where you put the data in design.

I tend to put the PK first, but I have done things like put a datestamp first, just to make it easier to read when I query the data.