Category: Uncategorized

This would probably be a good editorial, but I thought I’d drop it out here as a short note.

You ought to be tracking the build (or version) of all your SQL Server instances and Windows. I’d suggest you automate this, maybe even drop it in a table in every (user) database every day.

With the constant release of patches, the changes you might make to a server, it’s easy to lose track of what build a server is at. You might think all your servers are at SP1 or SP2, but you never know when an application might not support the latest version and you’re behind.

The more time that passes between the application or deployment of patches, and a disaster, the less likely you’ll be sure of what patch level you’re on. And if you have dozens of instances, you won’t be sure.

In a disaster, the last thing you want to do is have doubt about what you’re restoring. Track the builds and you’ll be fine. And bookmark my build list pages (2005 and 2008)

The Prius is having a few issues. I’ve had a slow leak in a tire that required two trips to the tire guy to get fixed. It wasn’t so bad since I had to get an oil change as well. I combined a few trips and things worked out well.

I ran into this survey that said half of US citizens would buy a plug-in electric hybrid, or consider one. That’s interesting to me as a hybrid owner. It’s worked out well for me, but it was more an economic decision for us living in the country, with relatively good weather. We drive a lot, and the 50mpg has helped us.

My last tank of gas, with the kids watching, got us to 482mi, with about 9.3 gallons of has. It averaged out at almost 52mph (51.8), which is pretty cool. Especially as we crossed 50,000 miles this month on the Prius. That’s 50,000 in 25 months, quite a lot of driving! A lot of commuting from the country to kids’ schools and even ski trips. I bet half my trips to the mountains last year were in the Prius. Saving fuel, money, and enjoying myself.

The survey above also surveyed people why they weren’t interested. Almost half (45%) listed that they weren’t sure about the technology. I think that’s interesting because the Prius has been around since 2001. While it has matured, a lot of people don’t trust it. I have a friend, who works for the city of Denver. He heard from a friend that all the Prius’ purchased by the city were being sold because of maintenance. He said that in 3 years they needed to have their batteries replaced as a recommendation from the manufacturer.

Hogwash. I can’t convince him it’s not true, even with my owner’s manual. I think his friend (and likely him) have a thing against the idea for some reason. I have a 2nd gen Prius, 2004-2007 age, and my manual doesn’t say anything like that. I’ve seen lots of people putting 200k miles (reportedly ) on their cars before replacing the hybrid batteries.

There’s also a lot of stink about the batteries being polluting and worse for the environment than a Hummer. I can’t believe it. It seems that some people are just upset for no good reason. Maybe they just want big cars, or more power. The batteries are mostly recyclable, as is most of the car. I know these are figures from Toyota, and might be cooked, An argument from Bad Templeton, and an interesting rebuttal as well in the first comment is worth reading.

I’m not sold that hybrids are the answer for the long term, or that they work for everyone, but they’re not horrible cars that break down all the time either.

There’s a cross country tour, using a hybrid that runs on a renewable fuel made from algae underway now. They’re driving from San Francisco to New York in 10 days, stopping in various cities. They go to Salt Lake City, and Cheyenne, but skip Denver. I would have gone to see it, so I’m a little disappointed.

The idea of using a renewable fuel made from algae is great, but I’m a little skeptical that they aren’t saying how much energy is needed to produce the fuel. Ethanol seems OK, but it isn’t necessarily the most efficient way to produce fuel.

However it’s another area of research, which is good to see. The more things we try, the more likely we are to find a good, renewable alternative.

(cross posted to SQL Musings)

All the Denver area groups are having their meetings this week. If you’re in the area, try to attend a meeting. You’ll meet some great people and learn a few things.

• Boulder SQL Server User Group – Tuesday night, Sept 15, 2009, Level 3 in Broomfield. A discussion on SQL Server Clustering.
• Colorado Springs – Wednesday, Sept 16, 2009 – Consortio services office – Tuning By Janis Griffin of Confio
• Denver SQL Server Group – Thursday, Sept 17, 2009 – Ameritech, Denver Tech Center –
• SSRS 2008 R2 – What’s New So Far By Steve Wake of Visa and SQL Tuning By Janis Griffin of Confio

I won’t make any meetings this month with a busy home schedule, but I’ll try to get back to one of them next month.

I saw a post recently that asked about backing up the Resource database. The person said they just realized that it wasn’t included in their backup scheme and was worried.\

Don’t worry, you don’t need to back it up.

The page at MSDN describes the Resource database as essentially a large lookup table(s) for the SQL Server itself. It can find the system objects that are used: tables, views, DMVs, DMFs, etc. When the server is upgraded, a new copy of the Resource database is copied over. The objects don’t have to be built from scripts with DROPs and CREATEs.

This means, however, that each time you patch your server, you potentially could be copying over a new version here if some system object changes. That means that you don’t really want to back up this database.

If you are restoring to a new server, when you install that server, it will have the correct copy of the Resource database for your system. If you were to copy over an incorrect version, the system objects might not match up with the system code in the SQL Server executables and DLLs. That would be bad.

I haven’t seen notes about the Resource database becoming corrupted, but it could. In that case, I’d suggest you copy the files from another SQL Server of the same version, or install SQL to another machine, patch it up, and then copy the files to your damaged installation. That could be a problem, but it does mean one other thing.

You ought to be tracking your SQL Server version and build on a regular basis as part of your monitoring.