6:30 PM Meet & Greet | 7 PM Presentation

Topic:

To meet the needs of rapid application development and the rapidly changing needs of the business, your database code needs to be resilient.  Even the most resilient code can become incredibly expensive when things break.  Catching issues early in a development cycle saves time, money, and a lot of sleepless nights.  In this session, we will go over the basics of unit testing and how to apply the unit testing framework that ships with SSDT coupled with Team Foundation Server to add continuous integration testing to your database code.

Bio:

Mike Hotek is the Senior Business Intelligence Architect for CBRE. He has been building SQL Server systems and database management best practices for almost 20 years having worked with thousands of companies and on the largest, most complicated platforms in the world. Mike has delivered hundreds of sessions and training events around the world and has published numerous articles along with 9 books. He is currently working on book two a four book series on SQL Server.

Contact URL: http://www.ChampionValleySoftware.com

They will be discussing:

• Obtaining reliable and relevant information via data governance
• Using ER/Studio for key governance ingredients: enterprise information maps and metadata collaboration
• Mapping  ER/Studio features to data governance maturity milestones

I am excited to announce we have finally have Brian Swales on stage! He and Brian G have lead the certification groups in the past when he's not solving the world's SharePoint problems for Microsoft. We have long wanted to hear his experience taming Sharepoint!

Topic: Indexes, statistics and other maintenance for SharePoint databases may be thought of as no different than any other application which uses databases. This is not quite true. SharePoint has been coded and optimized to make the best and exclusive use of SQL Server. SQL Server is the engine for the framework known as SharePoint. And SharePoint has been designed to work easily with minimal intervention. Of course, larger implementations will have additional needs. We will be covering the things you can do to optimize your SharePoint database environment and scale it properly.

Bio: Brian Swales is a Support Escalation Engineer for SharePoint at Microsoft specializing in SharePoint Performance and Publishing. He is a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist - MCTS: SQL Server 2008, Implementation and Maintenance

These weekend classes are a great way to build a solid foundation to be confident and capable with SQL Server. They also provide a great way to get to know the other SQL Server professionals in the area.

Training of this quality and this depth and length does not come around for free very often.  This will be the only class from Mike Hotek this year.

The course material will follow this book: SQL Server 2012 Data Design and Retrieval by Mike Hotek

You may purchase the class text book http://championvalleypress.com/data-design-and-retrieval.aspx.

You may still reserve your seat http://hoteksql.eventbrite.com.

For those of you who have signed up already, can't wait to see you and here are a few things to remember:

• In the training lab your cell phones will have very limited signal.
• Mark has graciously made wireless available, but that many laptops is a challenge for the access point.
• There are vending machines and microwaves upstairs.
• We break for lunch and go off site. This is a great time to get to know your classmates.
• If you bring your own coffee and snacks, please be respectful of the space we have been granted for the class and cleanup after yourself.

Class dates: April 6, 13, 20 & 27 (all four Saturdays)

Class Times: 9 AM -  4 PM

We are happy about this because in replacement, we are offering you the return of the Weekend SQL Server classes! Instead of a small lecture, we're offering you 24 hours of solid SQL Server 2012 education!

Seating is limited, so reserve your spot here:  http://hoteksql.eventbrite.com

Mike Hotek is donating his Saturdays in April to the SQL community!

 The weekend SQL classes are back for a SQL Server 2012 round! For the veterans who have drank from this particular flavor of fire hose, we've missed you and we can't wait to see you again.

 We are excited to be able to invite you all back for four Saturday classes in April. They will be April 6, 13, 20 & 27 from 9 am to 4pm.

 For those of you who have not yet experienced Mike Hotek's training, what ever your experience level you will benefit from spending time talking about SQL Server with someone who has tirelessly worked with this product since its very beginning in more industries and sizes of environments and countries than you can imagine. 

The class is designed to go through the first book in a series of four. The book will be available just in time for the class. Check here at the end of March for class materials: http://www.championvalleypress.com/books.aspx

SQL Server 2012 Data Design and Retrieval

Courseware Modules:

Installation and Configuration

• SQL Server Tools

• Creating Databases
• Database Structure
• Contained Databases  

• Designing Tables
• Data Modeling
• Data Types
• Hierarchy
• Constraints
• FileStream
• FileTable

• Storage Engine Internals

• Data Manipulation
• Manipulating Hierarchies
• Bulk Loading Data
• Change Tracking

• Transaction Management
• Locking
• Isolation Levels
• Row Versioning

• Data Retrieval
• Joins
• Subqueries
• Aggregates

• Advanced Data Retrieval
• Set Operators
• Table Expressions
• Window Functions
• XML

• Spatial Objects
• Spatial Calculations
• Geography Data

• Indexes
• Clustered
• Non-Clustered
• Filtered
• Covering
• Statistics
• Index Internals
• Forwarding Pointers
• Indexing Hierarchies
• XML Index
• Selective XML Index
• Spatial Indexes
• Index Maintenance
• Columnstore Indexes

• Full text index
• Word Breakers and Stemmers
• Stop Lists
• Document Properties
• Querying Full Text Data
• Semantic Search

• Partitioning
• Functions
• Schemes
• Partitioning Tables and Indexes
• Modifying Partition Functions
• Manipulating Partition Tables

Topic:  Data Warehouse Mistakes You Can’t Afford to Make

Bio:  David Stein is a Data Warehouse Architect with RealPage Inc. in Carrollton, TX. He’s worked in SQL Server Business Intelligence for almost a decade in many roles as both a consultant as well as a corporate employee.  He’s designed Data Warehouses from scratch as well as saved projects in serious jeopardy.

Wednesday, January 16th, 2013

6:30 PM Meet & Greet | 7 PM Presentation

Happy 2013 everybody! Welcome back to another year with the Fort Worth SQL Server Users Group! We're happy to crack open the new year's lecture series with Mike Hotek. He always brings crazy amounts of industry experience and knowledge to the discussion.

Topic:

A large number of people, including many at Microsoft have bought into the marketing BS called “Big Data”.  When you hear “big data”, everyone automatically assumes that you have to do this in some other database platform being foisted on IT.  The marketing myth that many have bought into is that SQL Server can’t handle “big data”.  This session will walk you through the architecture and build out of a real world data warehouse, built entirely with SQL Server, which is currently in excess of 10 Exabytes.

Bio:

Mike Hotek is the Senior Business Intelligence Architect for CBRE. He has been building SQL Server systems and database management best practices for almost 20 years having worked with thousands of companies and on the largest, most complicated platforms in the world. Mike has delivered hundreds of sessions and training events around the world and has published numerous articles along with 8 books. He is currently working on a four book series on SQL Server 2012.

Contact URL: http://www.ChampionValleySoftware.com

See you there!  Location

We wish you and yours a wonderful Thanksgiving break!

We will not be meeting in November or December in deference to holiday mania.

Last month was a wrap up for the year. Michael Bourgon gave a great presentation despite a few server driver issues. Even with out his prepared VM, his interpretive dance and shadow puppets were quite illustrative! If you weren't there, you really missed out on the Baking DBA.

Even though Dallas Give Camp is closed for the 2012 cycle, this is a group to watch. I can't wait to see what they spin up for 2013: http://dallasgivecamp.org/

It's a chance to use your technical skills to help local charities. Very cool. Thanks for the tip off, Lisa G. 

Enjoy your Texas winter and see you in January!

We'll be kicking off the season with Mike Hotek. We'll also be looking for speakers to round out the 2013 schedule. 

Bio: Michael Bourgon is the Senior Production DBA for Emdeon Pharmacy Services.  He started work with Sybase on RS/6000 over 15 years ago, and has been meddling with some form of that SQL Server codebase ever since.  He's done everything from training Sales Reps to building cubes to actually building a run-book from scratch that carries his name.  He's always looking for a better way to be a Lazy DBA - spending far too many hours automating processes in order to accomplish that.  In his spare time he listens to weird music, reads Science Fiction, and tries to ensure his daughter grows up a nerd, too. 

Food at 6:30

Lecture at 7PM

Data Modeling Best Practices for Tabular Models
The new Tabular models in SQL Server 2012 give us a powerful analytic engine that is faster and easier to implement than traditional multi-dimensional cubes using Analysis Services. In this session, you'll see how to develop analytic models using your existing data sources and learn best practices for preparing data so that it can be effectively used as a Tabular database. In addition to creating the model, you'll see how to quickly add measures, hierarchies, and calculated columns to provide a rich user experience and how the model works with Excel and Power View.
 

You can download Carlos Bossy's presentation slide deck HERE: 

http://carlosbossy.wordpress.com/downloads

Carlos Bossy (MCTS, MCP SQL Server 2008 BI, CBIP) is a Consultant with 25 years experience in software and database development. As the Principal of his company Carlos focuses on developing Business Intelligence solutions including modeling data warehouses, predictive analytics, integration and reporting. He has worked with SQL Server for 12 years and is very enthusiastic about its powerful features. Carlos has developed warehouses and BI solutions for a variety of industries and state agencies.
Contact URL: http://www.carlosbossy.com

Kellyn Pot'vin, (pronounced Poet-Vaughn) has been a Database Administrator for over twelve years, specializing in large database performance tuning for myriad of platforms, including Oracle, MSSQL and MySQL. In recent years she's been working with large SSD databases and Exadata, taking advantage of the newest technology and performance tuning features. Kellyn is known for her technical blog, dbakevlar.com and resides on the board of directors for the Rocky Mountain Oracle User Group, (RMOUG).  She is an Oracle ACE recipient and database track volunteer for ODTUG’s, (Oracle Developer Tool User Group) KSCOPE 2012 Conference.  She's performed numerous presentations in the US and Europe, along with articles for various technical newsletters and websites.  She is a current contributor to oradbpedia.com and a contributing author for Apress.  Kellyn lives with her partner, Tim and her three children in Broomfield, CO and currently is honing her technical skills at Enkitec, an Oracle-centric consulting partner, (www.Enkitec.com)

Food at 6:30

Lecture at 7PM

​See you there, 

​The folks at the Fort Worth SQL Server Users Group

​We meet the third Wednesday of most months

The T-Sql Merge statement, introduced in SQL 2008, is powerful, versatile, and performant. However, it is also one of T-SQL's least understood statements. Most DBAs know they can use It to insert, update, and delete data in a target table in a single transaction, generally outperforming separate statements. Fewer know, however, that it can be used to load slowly changing dimensions, facilitate auditing, and for many other uses. Come to the user group meeting and learn the in and outs of T-SQL Merge. I'll even show you how to write complex Merge statements with lightning speed.

David Stein is a Senior Business Intelligence Consultant with WaveTwo in Irving, TX. He’s worked in SQL Server Business Intelligence for almost a decade, designed Data Warehouses from scratch, as well as saved projects in serious jeopardy. He is also very active in the community, having spoken at PASS events at all levels, including the PASS Summit, SQL Rally, and at numerous SQL Saturday events and user groups.

You can learn more about Data Warehousing, Business Intelligence, and other technical topics on his blog at Made2Mentor.com or follow him on Twitter, @Made2Mentor.

Food at 6:30

Lecture at 7PM

​See you there, 

​The folks at the Fort Worth SQL Server Users Group

​We meet the third Wednesday of most months

Abstract: The SQL Server error log is essential for managing SQL Server.  Unfortunately it is a flat text file that defies efficient analysis.  There is a new open-source tool (a PowerShell module) that breaks the contents of the error log into data that can be queried and aggregated.  Come and learn how to finally unlock all of the valuable information that has been hiding in your log files!

Speaker biography: Trevor has been a production or escalation DBA for almost a decade. He recently joined Microsoft CSS as a Senior Support Escalation Engineer for Microsoft SharePoint. Trevor's passions are automation, performance tuning, and troubleshooting.  He has spoken at dozens of user group meetings, SQLSaturday events, and conferences.

​See you there, 

​The folks at the Fort Worth SQL Server Users Group

Can you imagine being able to finally dump unstructured files into SQL Server and still be able to access them in their native format in windows explorer? There's no ugly GUID names as there was with File Stream only in 2008. Your existing apps can simply reference a file share and not have to be rewritten to go through SQL Server. Sound too good to be true? Try implementing it and you will learn there are trade offs. 

Two of your comfortable old tools, a SQL Server  table and a file folder,  will look like they used to but will behave in quirky knew ways till you get used to the new combination.

Other considerations:

Just how well does File Table play with Antivirus? What does the security look like? What nasty files and apps could someone drop onto my SQL Server??  What do you mean non-transacted data? Can I track who is looking at files this way? Can I replicate these files and back them up? What happens if I detach a file table? Will it ever reattach? What happens if I reference my file table rows in other tables to add metadata? We can't get to demos for all those questions in one hour, but they are the sorts of things to start asking yourself if you think this might be a great solution for some of your business needs.

 I've been dragging my feet on emailing you the monthly meeting announcement because it's me speaking this time around. We meet the third Wednesday of most months in southwest Fort Worth. Thank you  Mark Valentino and Freese & Nichols for graciously hosting us!

Food and friends at 6:30

File Table exploration at 7PM

Judith

Brian Guarnieri SAN TOPOLOGY 101: How do I know if my SAN Administrator is lying to me?

Your job is to use up disk resources and the SAN man's job is to protect and keep those resources. So the fight is on! G.I. Joe says knowing is half the battle. Here's some of what Brian will arm you with:

What is a SAN Anyway?

• Quick review of RAID 5, 0, 1, 10, 1+0

• Common SAN Data Protocols
  •   SCSI
  •   i-SCSI
  •   Fibre Channel

• Connective Media
  •    Fibre Optics
  •    Ehternet

• SAN Components
  •    HBA (Host Bus Adapter)
  •    PCI Express BUS
  •    SVC (San Volume Controller)/Zoning
  •    SAN FABRIC 
  •    SWITCHES
  •    Disk Array / Striping

• A SAN by ANY Other Name
  •      SAN in a Box//Card - Direct Attached Storage (External & Internal)
  •      NAND Flash Drives (Fusion IO)
  •      RAM SAN (RAM SAN) 

• How does a SAN work?
  •      SAN Fabric, Management, HotZones
  •      Zoning
  •      CLUSTER AWARENESS and SOFTWARE RAID by VERITAS: Why it hurts and how bad.  
  •      Putting it all together

• How do I know if My San Administrator is lying?
  •      What does he look like? Is he shifty? 
  •      Latency verse Bandwidth
  •      T-SQL Queries to show the Jig is up
  •      SQL Simulator
  •      IOMeter
  •      How many spindles is enough? Spindle Gluttony.
  •      Why does my Latency graph have a Heart Beat?

​Food and Wookiee Language Lessons at 6:30 (See Jack)

Fun with SANs at 7:00

​See you there, 

​The folks at the Fort Worth SQL Server Users Group

​We meet the third Wednesday of most months

He's back in March with DBA 101: Figuring out THE most important deficiency 

You walk into or are handed a completely dysfunctional SQL Server environment, where do you start and how do you fix it without going insane or working 200 hours a week.

The yellow laptop rides again!

Bars, lines, dots, bullets and pies. The choices can be overwhelming. Data visualization is the art of using shape, color, size and proximity to tell stories with your data. In this session we will explore the building blocks of data visualizations, discuss some of the most common visualization types and talk about when and how to use them to tell stories with your data.

We meet most 3rd Wednesdays of the month. See you at 6:30 for snacks and and shared SQL stories and 7 for the presentation.

We have a topic for each end of the experience spectrum. For those that have done quite a bit with SQL Server:

1.      Using the HIERARCHYID data type

What a tree is and the basic rules around trees, what is a hierarchyid, inserting data, retrieving data, changing the tree structure (reparenting and adding new branches)

For those of you getting into it and for those who are about to move companies again here's a great reminder topic:

2.      DBA 101 – Figuring out what is THE most important deficiency

You walk into/are handed a completely dysfunctional SQL Server environment, where do you start and how do you fix it without going insane or working 200 hours a week.

It's Mike Hotek so you know there will likely be something relevant no matter what your experience level.