Voice of the DBA

Tag: Redgate

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
The Book of Redgate: We Value Teams

This value is something that I still hear today: our best work is done in teams. On the facing page, there is a short description of what this means.

I do think that teams are very helpful, especially when building software. Our products aren’t simple inside, and they have a lot of pieces and parts assembled to try and keep tasks simple for you.

Working in teams is good, and remembering that the hierarchy matters is good. This has helped us in the past, though I find myself reminding people that the company matters more than the team. At times, teams seem to think they shouldn’t be disturbed or altered. I’ve also see people resistant to working as individuals at times. The team is important, but we can work separately to get things done.

I find many companies not stressing teams, and individuals not wanting to work with others. I get that sometimes it can be comfortable to work on our own, at our pace, the way we want, but I also know that teams allow us to get more done than we would individually.

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.

September 19, 2025
A Prompt AI Experiment

Prompt AI released recently and I decided to try a few things with the tool that might help me in database work. I’ve had to do this task, but I had a customer recently ask me about this as well. They were wondering where they were short FKs.

This post showed what I tried with Prompt AI.

This is part of a series of experiments with AI systems. This is part of a series of posts on SQL Prompt. You can see all my posts on SQL Prompt under that tag.

Help Me Query the Database

In a recent post, I looked at the MSSQL agent in VS Code to query my database. I decided to try a few things with Prompt AI, working inline. First, I connected to the database and then I asked a question of the AI: who hit the most home runs.

From the time I shot the video, I had updated Prompt, and possibly the AI got smarter, because this was the result: I had a qood query.

I wanted more, so I asked for seasons. You can see the prompt at the bottom, but seasons were added.

Click Accept and then run it and I get the correct answer.

How nice would this be for some of the BI analysts to use this to get work done?

Getting Help Fixing the Database

In this db, there aren’t any FKs. I decided to (poorly) ask about this.

Note the misspelling. One of the amazing things is the AI recognizes little errors, just as a human would, and corrects them. I get an OK result, but not great.

I rewrite my prompt to ask which ones “should” have FKs. I get this:

Helpful, but I don’t want to work through this list.

I get this. No code, and I feel like I’m talking to a junior dev who is either trying to avoid work or doesn’t have the understanding that I want work done. I’ll try again.

I get something I can use. I wouldn’t likely create all these at once, I’d test things, I might start to add these as migration scripts I can deploy over time, after I’ve verified this isn’t going to break an app or cause issues. Or there aren’t already data issues.

Still, this is one of those nice time savings for me writing a script to try and create these or working through time one by one. Now I can just set up tests.

Or ask Prompt AI to help

Summary

The new features in Prompt AI let you keep coding inline, but add some AI help to what you do. I’ve seen some neat things, and some frustrating ones, but overall, it’s helpful to produce code.

If you haven’t tried SQL Prompt, download the eval and give it a try. I think you’ll find this is one of the best tools to increase your productivity writing SQL.

Video Walkthrough

This isn’t exactly what is above, because LLMs aren’t deterministic.

September 17, 2025
Join Other Database Pros Coming to the Netherlands

In a few weeks I’ll be heading to Amsterdam for a few events. I’ll be working for a day before a short train ride down to Utrecht, a place I’ve never been and am looking forward to visiting.

It’s a packed week with PASS On Tour, the Redgate Summit, and Data Saturday Holland. If you live in the EU, this is an easy way to learn a lot about different aspects of databases, see what others are working on or concerned about, and network with fellow professionals.

Plus it’s in the Netherlands. I’ve never been to Utrecht, but my wife and I love Amsterdam. In fact, she’s meeting me there and we’ll likely spend a few days before taking a holiday.

The PASS On Tour and Redgate Summits in New York were great. Lots of interesting talks, good conversations and questions, and some fantastic networking. Looking forward to the same in the Netherlands.

Register today and join me for a short week of database discussions in October.

September 16, 2025