SQL - Structured Query Language


Web Sites
Database Mirroring in SQL Server 2005 - Database mirroring is a new SQL Server 2005 technology available for review for increasing database availability. Database mirroring transfers transaction log records directly from one server to another and can quickly fail over to the standby server.
Frequently Asked Questions - SQL Server 2000 - Setup - This article addresses frequently asked questions regarding the setup and installation of SQL Server 2000, including instructions on how to rename a Windows Server running SQL 2000.
How to use Kerberos authentication in SQL Server - You can use Kerberos authentication with Microsoft SQL Server 2000. SQL Server 2000 supports this functionality as part of a typical Microsoft Windows 2000 or Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Active Directory domain installation. With Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 3 (SP3) and Windows Server 2003, you can enable Kerberos authentication on server clusters.
HOW TO: Configure ODBC Logging in IIS - Nice step-by-step guide showing how to configure SQL logging on IIS (or any other ODBC database). Very practical if you want to do further analysis on the traffic on your site. For websites with a lot of traffic scheduled bulk import is recommended instead of this approach (links on this site shows you how to do that).
HOWTO: Display Images Stored in a BLOB Field (Q173308) - Displaying BLOB (Binary Large OBjects) data in a browser can be done with a neat little trick, described in this article. The same approach can be used for displaying other data than .gif's.
INF: Disaster Recovery Articles for Microsoft SQL Server (307775) - This Microsoft website has several links to articles dealing with disaster recovery on SQL, versions 2000, 7.0 and 6.5. Valuable articles referred are e.g. "Instructions on how to backup the last transaction log when the master and database files are damaged". Read'em before you need'em!
INF: How to Configure SQL Mail - This article describes how to properly configure your mail client so that it works with SQL Mail. The article also describes some common pitfalls that you might encounter when you set up SQL Mail to work with Exchange or Internet mail servers.
INF: How to Run a DTS Package as a Scheduled Job (Q269074) - Data Transformation Services is a powerfull technology for exporting, importing and transforming data among multiple homogeneous or heterogeneous sources and destinations. DTS actions can be scheduled by using DTS packages . To avoid problems when scheduling DTS packages read this article.
INF: Installation Order for SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Edition on Microsoft Cluster Server (Q243218 ) - Get the details of installing SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Edition on a Microsoft Cluster. The information in this article is taken from Books Online and Microsoft recommends Books Online to be the main reference when installing SQL clustering.
INF: Understanding and Troubleshooting the Copy Database Wizard in SQL Server 2000 (Q274463) - The Copy Database utility in SQL 2000 allows you to easily copy or move databases from one server to another. Before running the utility in a production environment you should get an understanding of it by reading this article.
Learning Resources for Microsoft SQL Server 2005 - Various links to training on Microsoft SQL 2005. This includes several free e-learning courses with interactive demos.
Log Shipping in SQL Server 2000 - Log shipping increases a SQL Server database's availability by automatically copying and restoring the database's transaction logs to another database on a standby server. This article is from the December 2001 issue of SQL Server Magazine.
MSDN SQL documentation - Get the latest technical information on SQL Server and related topics, including new technical articles and downloads, links to the product documentation, community and support resources, and more.
Satisfy Your Users with Views - SQL has lots of nice features for securing data on the table and colomn level - but how do you secure your data individually on the row level? One approach is using views and "suser_sname()", a method that exposes the user name and SID. This gives you easy and secure administration and complete integration with native Windows 2000 security.
SQL Server 2000 Operations Guide - This guide describes processes and procedures for improving the management of SQL 2000 in an IT infrastructure. This material should be useful for anyone planning to deploy this product into an existing IT infrastructure, especially one based on ITIL.
TechNet Virtual Labs - Ever wanted to test Microsoft's newest software in a sandbox environment? Wouldn't it be great to be able to test new servers immediately, without formatting hard drives or dedicating one or more computers to the project? Now you can, with the TechNet Virtual Labs.
What is the best way for maintaining a standby SQL Server? - Since SQL Server provides so many options for copying data between different databases and servers, novice/inexperienced DBAs often get confused, as to which option to go with, for maintaining a standby server. Some of those options include Data Transformation Services (DTS), BCP, Replication, Clustering, Backup/Restore, Logshipping. This article tries to define what a standby server is and how to maintain one. It also discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the various options.

White Papers
Database Mirroring in SQL Server 2005 - Database mirroring is a new SQL Server 2005 technology available for review for increasing database availability. Database mirroring transfers transaction log records directly from one server to another and can quickly fail over to the standby server.

Programs
SQL Prompt - SQL Prompt provides Intellisense® style auto-completion for Microsoft SQL Server editors. It will tell you the exact formatting you should use for your SQL commands, while you are writing them and will therefore help you write fast, perfectly formatted SQL statements. This tool is free.
SQL Server 2000 Security Tools - SQL Server 2000 security tools are used to scan instances of Microsoft SQL Server 2000 and Microsoft SQL Server Desktop Engine (MSDE) 2000. The tools help detect instances vulnerable to the "Slammer" worm, and then apply updates to the affected files.