SQL Data Partners Podcast

They're just numbers, right?  A date's a date.  It's just string data, who cares?  I admit I have posed those questions before and only much later did I understand how complicated it can get. Angela Henry, our guest for today, has heard these same phrases many times before and she chats with us to enlighten us on the issue and ways we can get around it.

Listening to Microsoft marketing and all the MVPs out there, it can certainly seem like we are getting further and further behind each day we aren't use cloud services.  Sure, lift and shift of VM resources are straightforward at this point and they are happening with more frequency; however, this doesn't mean everyone is leveraging cloud services. In this episode, we talk with Jim Donahoe about making the transition from our traditional SQL Server environments to using Azure SQL Database.

I invited our fearless panelists Kevin Feasel and Eugene Meidinger to join me for a podcast discussion.  We couldn't agree on a topic so we'll just call this episode Meeting of the Minds.  You're welcome.

What’s in a name? That which we call a rose, by Any Other Name would smell as sweet.  We could say the same for analytics -- there are plenty of similar or related words we use to describe the role or process of working with data.  In this episode, we talk with Nicki Tinson about her journey into analytics, how others, like you, might break into the fields, and what has remained the same even when the names change.

Everybody does things a little differently and this is one of the things I LOVE about the podcast--chatting with others about how they get work done.  In this episode I chat with Tom Norman about how he uses Visual Studio for source control, deployments, and keeping his sanity.  We explore the setup process and how we have a reverse 80/20 rule when it comes to importing databases with Visual Studio.

Normally we have one specific topic we focus on each episode.  This episode is a little different.

I was a bit shocked to hear Microsoft was releasing another database technology in 2017; however, the team leading the charge was very impressive and it looked like it was solving problems other database engines could not.  In this episode, we talk with Sidney Andrews about the Cosmos platform, what we can expect from the product and how it differs from SQL Server.

While the ability to shrink data files is available in SSMS, the conventional wisdom is don't do it.  I was extremely curious when I read an email from our guest suggesting the opposite.  In this episode we explain the 'real world' and discuss why you might consider shrinking files and the how it will affect you.  Nigel has a great sense of humor and I know you will enjoy today's episode.

Bang! Pow! Crash!  Besides just awesome fighting techniques, are there things we can learn from superheroes?  My guest, Will Fehringer, gave that very question some thought and came up with some very interesting ideas I thought were worth passing along.  Wonder Woman and the Amazonians give us something to thing about preparing for our ultimate goal.  Drax, from the Guardians of the Galaxy, gives a great example of the Fool's Choice in conversation.

Big Data.  Do you have big data?  What does that even mean?  In this episode I explore some of the concepts of how organizations can manage their data and what questions you might need to ask before you implement the latest and greatest tool.  I am joined by James Serra, Microsoft Cloud Architect, to get his thoughts on implementing cloud solutions, where they can contribute, and why you might not be able to go all cloud.

Heroes in a half shell, PowerShell!  Well, maybe that wasn't the original line, but you know from this program and other places on the internet, PowerShell is all the rage.  In this episode, we wanted to chat about other ways people are using PowerShell and we are happy to have Warren Estes talk with us about some of his experiences.  Warren shares some ways he has used PowerShell to push the easy button and how it lead to a contribution on the Microsoft SSRS toolkit.

Books online state: “There is nothing a graph database can achieve, which cannot be achieved using a relational database.” Why then are we putting graph technology in SQL Server?  To help me answer this question, I invite my friend AZ to chat about the Graph feature in SQL Server 2017 and introduce how graph differs from a relational model.  If you have every tried to implement complicated hierarchies in SQL Server, you know what a pain this can be.

To Devops or not to Devops, that is the question.  We've talked before about how the developers have all the cool new tools, but this is slowly changing.  For those in development or dare I say agile (gasp!) environments there is more need for automation, but getting there can be a real challenge.  In this episode, we chat with John Morehouse about how he actually put into practice automated deployments for the database, some of his challenges, and how long it took to get there.

There has been a remarkable shift introduced in the new features of SQL Server--programming languages have been embedded into the database.  This has led to a few "What are you thinking" questions from myself and others.  It also opens new opportunities for those working with SQL Server and in this episode, I chat with Andy Roberts and Chris Hyde and discuss the new features of R and Python--why they are included, how data teams are changing, and what this means for the rest of us.

Have you attended a SQLSaturday? They are great events and in this episode we chat with a few organizers about what goes into putting on an event and what they think the future of these events looks like.