Voice of the DBA

Tag: Redgate

SQL Clone at Scale with Striped Backups

I had a customer recently reach out to ask if SQL Clone would work with 20 backup files. I decided to test this.

This is part of a series of posts on SQL Clone, which is a virtualization product from Redgate Software.

The Scenario

A customer asked about SQL Clone working with a lot of backup files (striped), like 20. Our support org said this should work and handle the max number of files, which is 64 for the backup command.

I know SQL Clone works with striped backups because I wrote an article on it, but I only tested 7 files. How to test more than that?

First, get the backups. To do this, I used a GenAI to quickly get me a command. Once I had this, I ran it and got a lot of files.

Now to get the SQL Clone image.

Image Creation

I decided to start with the GUI. This has changed since I wrote the article in that it now puts each file in a separate text box. By default you get two. I pasted in my file path and file, and then copy/pasted in the 2nd box. I continued adding them, clicking the “Add another file” at the bottom each time (see the image).

It was tedious, but it was a quick way of testing this. I likely would have taken longer than the 3-4 minutes of copy/pasting to write a PoSh script (though I need to do that). You can see most of my files below.

Once I had 32 of them, I clicked “Continue” and entered the name and location for my image. Then clicked “Create”.

It worked. The image shows my SQL Clone image being created successfully and a clone from this image.

These were small files, so the restore time was quick. Each is about 3MB, so we’re not looking at much.

Summary

This shows that SQL Clone can work with 32 files. I assume it works with 64, but that will have to wait until I have time to mess around with the PoSh to make the image command creation easy.

If you are looking to save storage space for multiple copies of databases, or give each user a consistent copy in seconds, check out SQL Clone.

Video Walkthrough

See this article in video below.

October 27, 2025
The Book of Redgate: Don’t be an a**hole

This was one of the original values:

The facing page has this text: No matter how smart you are, or how good you are at narrowly defined tasks, there is no room for you here if you’re an asshole.

This is a similar value to that I’ve seen at a few companies, such as Google’s: Don’t be evil.

I think this is one of those values that has held true over time. We try to be professional and respectful with each other. We don’t want to offend others or treat them poorly. The Oxford dictionary has this definition: “a stupid, irritating, or contemptible person.”

I probably stretch the limit of this at times, but I’m not trying to be out of balance with my pressure on others to do better work alongside my respect for them and my desire to be positive. I might not always get the balance right, but I am willing to apologize if I’ve stepped over the line.

I don’t think of anyone at Redgate as being an a**hole, which is a nice feeling. Hopefully, I’m not one.

I have a copy of the Book of Redgate from 2010. This was a book we produced internally about the company after 10 years in existence. At that time, I’d been there for about 3 years, and it was interesting to learn a some things about the company. This series of posts looks back at the Book of Redgate 15 years later.

October 17, 2025
Back in the EU

I flew to Amsterdam last night and hopefully by the time this publishes I’ll be at my hotel, catching up on messages and prepping for another Simple Talk Podcast recording.

This is my fourth trip across the water this year, with one more coming at the end of next month. It’s a lot of travel, but it’s also a lot of fun. I meet so many interesting people, learn new things about other cultures, and I really, really enjoy the food in Europe. It’s so much fresher and better than the US (on average).

This week is a day in the Redgate Amsterdam office, two days at the PASS On Tour event, and Friday at the Redgate Summit. If you’re anywhere near me, register and come join me. The events in New York and Dallas were informative, invigorating, and exciting. It will be the same here.

Please feel free to stop me and say hi if you’re attending. I always enjoy meeting people and talking about data.

September 29, 2025
Monday Monitor Tips: The Jobs Report

A customer wanted a report they could email to their boss about jobs, something that showed failures. This isn’t hard to get in Redgate Monitor, though it is manual (for now). Here’s how to do this.

This is part of a series of posts on Redgate Monitor. Click to see the other posts.

The Estate View of Jobs

Under the Estate menu item, there is an entry for jobs.

Click this and you get to the estate view of jobs. Here I see an overview, and I can click the scale in the upper right for day/week/month.

Below this I see the failed and successful job details, though only for the most recent execution. Otherwise this is a ton of data. Good to note that the 10 jobs that failed must have succeeded on a subsequent run.

There is a button to see the details. Click Export:

This downloads an Excel sheet of my jobs. There is a summary tab of the status with some details by day.

In the job details, I see the last run status for jobs. In this case, I don’t have any failed jobs (last run). However, I downloaded this earlier in the day, when I did have a job that failed in its more recent execution. Here’s what I see in the details if I scroll across. Look at the top line, which is the failure.

I can see the reason the job failed and the date/time.

If I were grabbing this every day, I’d have a nice report of how things are going. I would like to see a more detailed version of a report, and if you want it, please email sales@red-gate.com and request it.

Summary

Getting reports to share with others is important. As much as I’d just like to get people to look at the tool, I do understand having periodic reports. I used to self-generate these and store them off in a secure place. These were invaluable for auditors and kept them from asking me lots of questions.

You could do this as well, and Redgate Monitor makes it easy to get this info. Look for enhancements in this area in the future that might help you with estate level reports for your management (or auditors).

Redgate Monitor is a world class monitoring solution for your database estate. Download a trial today and see how it can help you manage your estate more efficiently.

September 22, 2025