Voice of the DBA

Tag: syndicated

  • Daily Coping 1 Dec 2021

    I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.

    Today’s tip is to try a different radio station or TV show.

    I don’t listen to a lot of radio these days, outside of Spotify radio, but I do listen to some. I also don’t watch a lot of TV, actually I’ve cut the cord, so I only see streamed things on Prime or Netflix.

    My tastes would run to sci-fi and thrillers, something silly, stupid, and very unrealistic. My wife tends towards more dramatic items. I don’t typically do documentaries, but after reading Eat a Peach, I decided to try David Chang’s series, Ugly Delicious. I downloaded a few episodes before a recent plane trip and started watching.

    I like to cook, and while I don’t consider myself a foodie, I like simple, fun food. This series looks at different cuisines each episode talking about how they are prepared in different countries, but different chefs. Some fancy, some not.

    My wife didn’t enjoy it, but I really liked the different ways people go about preparing simple foods. It certainly makes me rethink how I might experiment as I get back to traveling, and enjoying what people make in different places more than searching out something specific I expect or want.

  • Daily Coping 30 Nov 2021

    I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.

    Today’s tip is to set aside a regular time for a month to pursue something you enjoy.

    I do a lot, and I like routine, but I haven’t always been good about setting aside time. This month I’m going to try something. I’m setting aside 30 minutes 3 times a week.

    2021-11-19 11_03_57-Guitar - Appointment Series

    We’ll see if I can do it, and if it helps me learn a few new songs.

  • Hiding Email with a Dynamic Data Masking Function–#SQLNewBlogger

    Another post for me that is simple and hopefully serves as an example for people trying to get blogging as #SQLNewBloggers.

    Dynamic Data Masking is a feature that provides some pseudo-security features. This lets you return a portion of data while hiding other portions for unauthorized users. The classic example is preventing someone from seeing PII data if they are a customer service rep or other non-privileged user.

    Note: THIS IS NOT A SECURITY function, though it is somewhat marketed and talked about it this way. I say pseudo-security, but be careful here. I have a larger article on why.

    A Scenario

    I have a simple table here. I’ll give you some DDL and DML.

    create table DDMEmailTest
    ( MyID int not null identity(1,1) constraint DDMEmailTestPK primary Key
    , MyName varchar(100)
    , Email varchar(100)
    , Salary int)
    go
    insert DDMEmailTest select 'Steve Jones', 'steve.jones@sqlservercentral.com', 200
    insert DDMEmailTest select 'Bob Jones', 'bob.jones@acme.com', 300

    Now, if I query this as a normal user, I see something like the image below. Note I can read the email address.

    2021-11-18 12_05_41-SQLQuery2.sql - ARISTOTLE_SQL2017.sandbox (ARISTOTLE_Steve (57))_ - Microsoft SQ

    Limiting Access

    I can prevent this from occurring by adding Dynamic Data Masking to the column. This is a column level feature, which doesn’t need activating. It’s in SQL Server 2016+ databases. You add masking with an  ALTER COLUMN like shown below. The email() function is built into SQL Server.

    alter table DDMEmailTest ALTER COLUMN Email ADD MASKED WITH (FUNCTION = 'email()')

    When I now query the data, I see this:

    2021-11-18 12_08_18-SQLQuery2.sql - ARISTOTLE_SQL2017.sandbox (ARISTOTLE_Steve (57))_ - Microsoft SQ

    Users that are not admins, or have been granted the UNMASK permission will get masked data. This mask specifically is the first character and then the XXX@XXXX.com value.

    Use it if this fits your scenario.

    SQLNewBlogger

    I was working with DDM to show something to another person and decided to throw this post together. I’d set up the scenario, so I just had to write. This was about 15 minutes of my day.

    You could do the same thing, but explain how you might use this in your organization.

  • Daily Coping 29 Nov 2021

    I started to add a daily coping tip to the SQLServerCentral newsletter and to the Community Circle, which is helping me deal with the issues in the world. I’m adding my responses for each day here. All my coping tips are under this tag.

    Today’s tip is to find a new way to tell someone you appreciate them.

    I have a friend going through a hard time. I really enjoy their company and haven’t seen them since the pandemic hit, but I have chatted a few times. I decided to just send a picture recently, a memory of times together. No words, just a picture.

    I got a pleasant response and a picture back. It was a good way for us to remember the importance of our friendship.