Home » Blogs » indupriya » Free SQL Server Training ResourcesFree SQL Server Training Resources

Yesterday I stumbled across this site while looking for something else. I couldn't find who the author is for this peice of work.

This page contains a very comprehensive list of resources for SQL server developers and DBAs. Here is a snapshot of the table of contents from thsi site.

Table of Contents
Training: Labs
Training: Podcasts
Training: Tutorials
Training: Videos
Training: Webcasts
Training: Whitepapers
General Skills
Skills: SQL
Skills: Windows Scripting
SQL Server
SQL Server 2008 R2
SQL 2008 R2: Virtualization
SQL Server 2008
SQL 2008: Administration
SQL 2008: Analysis Services (SSAS)
SQL 2008: Data Mining
SQL 2008: Filestream
SQL 2008: High Availability
SQL 2008: Integration Services (SSIS)
SQL 2008: Performance
SQL 2008: Reporting Services (SSRS)
SQL 2008: Power Shell
SQL 2008: XML
SQL Server 2005
SQL 2005: Administration
SQL 2005: Analysis Services (SSAS)
SQL 2005: Data Mining
SQL 2005: High Availability
SQL 2005: Failover - Cluster
SQL 2005: Integration Services (SSIS)
SQL 2005: Integration Services (SSIS) Migration
SQL 2005: Performance
SQL 2005: Reporting Services (SSRS)
SQL 2005: Windows Scripts
Virtual Server

SQL Share a very useful video resource -- some positive changes that are helpful

For those of you who don't know about SQL Share here is a snippet from thei About Us page.

SQLShare is a division of Fourdeuce Inc, an Orlando, FL based company that also owns End to End Training, a well known provider of technical training. Fourdeuce is owned by Andy Warren, Brian Knight, and Steve Jones.

I have been getting daily emails from SQL Share since my subscription in April 2010. I used to watch some of the videos. These are small videos that cover various aspects of SQL SERVER by various authors. This is a very good resource for beginners and sometimes helps professionals as well. Everybody will learn something from here. There is no doubt about it.

But getting the email today made a difference compelling me to watch it as soon as I saw the email.

The reason for it is below. Have a look at the image below.



I just couldn't click on "Watch it Later" because I wanted to see because it is written in bold writing clearly that it is going to take only 3 min.

If you don't click on the link after seeing the "Learn Something today in 3 min. 46 secs" which is a minute fraction of 24 hrs in a day then I must say that you are not commited to learning. I looked at the topic and thought "Let me see what I will learn in this which I do day in and day out" But I did learn two points which I have posted in my previous blog.

Andy in his email said that he is experimenting this week. I think this little change will influence a lot of peopl in their learning goals and also credit the author of each featured video who take lot of pains recording it to be useful for the community.

Thanks to Andy who is doing a good job of sending these innovative emails.

Another very important change that was done is when you finished watching the video automatically two multiple choice questions come up to test whether you were really concentrating on the video which I found really useful.

Added to this there is a link "challenge your friend" which I quite like that we can send to colleagues for them to answer if they can.

Using Login Auditing in SQL SERVER by Brian Kelly

Today featured video in SQL Share was Brian Kelly's "Using Login Auditing in SQL SERVER". I watched this 3 min. video and learnt the following.

I know that we can view sql server error logs. I monitor them on a daily basis but I didnt know that the login audit requires a setup that is a bit similar to the normal windows event log set up. This can be set up when you right click on the sql server connection in the management studio and choose properties and then choose Security. There is n option to choose Failed logins only, Successful logins only and both failed and successful logins and of course the none option aswell.

These login auditing will not only appear in the sql server error logs but in the windows event logs as well.

The best part that we are getting as part of watching the sql share videos is testing the knowledge we have acquired immediately after the video finishes which I think is very innovative.



If you would like to watch the same video click on the link

What is Sargability?

I planned to attend Rob Farley's 24HOP session but could not make it. I didn't know what Sargability meant at the time and thought I will google it.

And here is what I have found out thanks to the internet.

Here is a blog post which gives the history of how the word came into existence back in 2005 where Brad McGhee explains that the sargability is a real word but it is used a lot in the SQL Server world.

So what exactly does Sargable mean?
SARG is a contraction for Search ARGument ABLE as mentioned in Rob Farley's article.

I am looking forward for the recording of this 24HOP session. Meanwhile you can have a look at the posting by Rob Farley in his blog where he gives links to the resources he has mentioned in his presentation.

My takeaways from Adam Jorgensen's 24HOP session -- Zero to cube

Here are my takeaways from today's fantastic session of Adam

• The first basic point was you can use "." instead of "localhost" to choose the localhost server.
• Defining the attribute relationship was very clearly explained that the relatiosnhps should be from the lowest level to the highest level.
• Proactive caching -- available in from SQL SERver 2008 but the refresh property is available in Excel 2007 but sometimes may not work properly.
  

The following two resources which are quite useful was also discussed.

The Data Warehouse Toolkit: The Complete Guide to Dimensional Modeling

Microsoft SQL Server Product Samples: Database

Free SQL Tools as blogged by

Today I stumbled across this very useful post by Mladen Prajdić

Click here to read more

As he says in the end ...

Even if none of this stuff helps you at the moment it's good to know they exist.

Because DBA-ing is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get :)

What are plan guides?

Just a while ago I was watching a video on sqlshare Creating a Plan Guide for a Parameterized Statement By Andy Warren . Only then I heard about plan guides. I didn't know what plan guides were. Here is my find from googling


In SQL Server 2005, there is a new feature called Plan Guides that can help out in some cases where you discover poorly performing queries that you don't have direct control over. Essentially, a Plan Guide allows you to add or modify query hints to queries on the fly, just before they are executed. Click here for a detailed article on plan guides by Brad McGehee.