One of the most common problems when running SQL Servers is slow queries. The help desk or database team usually hears that described as the application is slow or ...

As I discussed in an earlier column, SQL Server keeps a plan cached for each query it sees (assuming the query requires planning in the first place, of course). That's great for speeding up processing ...

A common SQL habit is to use SELECT * on a query, because it’s tedious to list all the columns you need. Plus, sometimes those columns may change over time, so why not just do things the easy way? But ...

One of the most common problems when running SQL Servers is slow queries. The help desk or database team usually hears that described as the application is slow or ...

I know, I try to avoid them as well whenever I can substitute them with DML statements that work correctly on a group of records. Cursors, they are great for less-technical people to describe intended ...