Past Presentations


This page includes listings of past presentations along with materials and links to additional information.

Please continue to check back for updated material.

Date	Topic
Tuesday Dec 9, 2008 7:00pm	Upgrading to SQL Server 2008 Performing a major version upgrade can be a daunting task considering how many moving parts today's applications typically have. Verifying that your application will work without problems is no small feat. Issues such as TSQL compatibility, system and user function, security models, etc., all contribute to making your testing efforts harder. This presentation covers both tools and application compatibility testing methodology as well as showcases the key improvements to installation and configuration of SQL Server 2008. Speaker: Rob Walters, Microsoft
Tuesday Nov 11, 2008 7:00pm	Recovering from a Crashed SQL Server Speaker: Unitrends
Tuesday Oct 7, 2008 7:00pm	Big Data: Working with Terabytes in SQL Server Data partitioning concepts and working with large datasets. Speaker: Andrew Novick
Wednesday Sep 3, 2008 7:00pm	SQL Server and Hardware Best Practices Speaker: Pete Tassmer, EMC
Wednesday Jun 4, 2008 7:00pm	Design Planning We all complete a full design document prior to coding, don’t we? What elements should be included in the design document? This session will explore a number of techniques for producing a solid design document and obtaining buy-in from the end users. This session is presented from the viewpoint of a SQL Server developer but the majority of the information provided will apply to all software projects. Sample documents from real system implementations will be provided. Speaker: Michael Lato
Wednesday May 7, 2008 7:00pm	Performance Management Speaker: Quest Software
Wednesday Apr 2, 2008 7:00pm	Replicating SQL Server Data Speaker: Paul Wilson, Gomez Inc
Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 7:00pm	Automating Perfmon & Trace Do you put off performance monitoring tasks because it is time consuming and cumbersome to set up or deal with? Would you like to automate this whole process? Do you know how to script a trace, start perfmon or load a trace file programmatically? We will address all of these questions and demo the techniques as well. Speaker: Andy Kelly, Solid Quality Mentors
Wednesday Nov 7, 2007 7:00pm	Enhanced SQL Server Performance and Data Protection with Intelligent iSCSI SANs Speaker: EqualLogic During this presentation we will review best practices in deploying SQL Server in an intelligent iSCSI SAN and the resulting dramatic improvements in deploying, optimizing, protecting, and recovering SQL databases with EqualLogic Smart Copy technology for SQL Server databases.
Wednesday Oct 3, 2007 7:00pm	What’s new in SQL Server 2008 Speaker: Rob Walters, Microsoft
Wednesday Sep 12, 2007 7:00pm	SQL Server Integration Services Security Speaker: Mike Bishop
Wednesday May 2, 2007 7:00pm	User Defined Functions and Enhancements with SQL Server 2005 Speaker: Andy Novick, Novick Software
Wednesday Mar 7, 2007 7:00pm	Introduction to SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services Speaker: Greg Robidoux, Edgewood Solutions
Wednesday Feb 7, 2007 7:00pm Downloads	Practical Performance Monitoring in SQL 2005 Andrew Kelly, SQL Server MVP, Solid Quality Learning Come see what counters and statistics every good DBA should be aware of. We will cover each of the areas of the database and hardware that give us the biggest bang for the buck in terms of monitoring. See how to narrow down where your performance issues really are. Stop chasing your tail and start making an impact in the overall performance of your SQL Server.
Wednesday Dec 6, 2006 7:00pm	SQL Server Integration Services Speaker: Mike Bishop Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways
Wednesday Nov 1, 2006 7:00pm	ADO.NET 2.0 Enhancements for SQL Server 2005 Speaker: Adam Machanic, SQL Server MVP, Data Manipulation Group, Inc The new versions of ADO.NET and SQL Server can more seamlessly interact than any previous combination of DBMS and data access framework. The combination of the two allows for much easier development of a wide variety of database-centric applications. In this session you'll learn to use such features as Query Notifications, MARS, asynchronous commands and bulk copy. These features provide a powerful new foundation for creating heavily data-driven applications. Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways
Wednesday Oct 4, 2006 7:00pm	TSQL Exception Handling in SQL Server 2005 Speaker: Rajib Bahar Exception Handling is one of the Industry wide best practices among application developers. Many of us rely heavily on @@error or raiserror() for validation mechanism. This session goes over introduction to exception handling, practical examples to show its proper usage, and address performance concerns. Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways
Wednesday Sep 13, 2006 7:00pm	SQL Server 2005 Security and Auditing Speaker: Jeremy Kadlec, Edgewood Solutions Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways
Wednesday Jun 7, 2006 7:00pm	Schedule Collisions and the Effect on SQL Server Performance Speaker: Steve Wright, MCSD, MCDBA from the sqlSentry Support Team, sqlSentry Heavy contention for disk resources can dramatically impact SQL Server performance, and SQL Server Agent jobs can be some of the biggest offenders. In this presentation we'll cover: How and why jobs and job collisions can cause disk contention How to isolate the sources of disk contention using Windows performance counters and analyze the data How to reduce contention in general via "leveling" your job schedules. There will be a drawing for several giveaways including one license (a $1,190 value) for sqlSentry, which you may recall won the SQL Server Magazine Reader's Choice Awards for Best Job Automation and Scheduling Tool and Best Alerting/Notification Software. Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways
Wednesday May 3, 2006 7:00pm	SQL Server 2005 Service Broker Speaker: Andy Novick, Novick Software Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways Intransa - Giveaways
Wednesday Apr 5, 2006 7:00pm	SQL Server Reporting Services Speaker: Anthony Mann, Mann Publishing Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways DataWatch - Giveaways
Wednesday Mar 8, 2006 7:00pm	No presentation - presenter unable to make the meeting. Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza and Giveaways sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways
Wednesday Feb 8, 2006 7:00pm	SQL Agent’s New Features in 2005 including Proxy Accounts and the New Maintenance Plans Speaker: Andy Kelly SQL Server MVP, Solid Quality Learning Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways VaultLogix - Giveaways
Wednesday Jan 18, 2006 7:00pm	SQL Server development tools and development approaches Speaker: Todd Monjar, ApexSQL Sponsors Red-Gate Software - Pizza sqlSentry - Speakers Fund Mann Publishing - Book Giveaways ApexSQL Software - Giveaways
Wednesday Dec 7, 2005 7:00pm	SQL Server 2005 New Features and Adoption Speaker: Greg Robidoux, Edgewood Solutions We will take a look at the new features in SQL 2005 and results from a recent study Edgewood Solutions did about the adoption of SQL 2005. Sponsors Quest Software - Pizza sqlSentry - New Members
Wednesday Nov 9, 2005 7:00pm	SQL Server 2005 Launch Come find out about the newest version of SQL Server 2005.  The product will be officially launched on November 7, 2005, so come meet other SQL Server professionals and find out what plans people have for implementing SQL Server 2005.
Wednesday Sep 7, 2005 7:00pm	Design Reports in Microsoft Office and Deliver Using SQL Server Reporting Services Chris Baldwin, SoftArtisans In this presentation, you will see how to use Microsoft Office (Excel and Word) to design reports that are delivered using SQL Server Reporting Services. Microsoft Excel and Word become your Reporting Services design tools through the use of a simple Microsoft Office add-in created by SoftArtisans. In a series of quick demos, you'll see how your knowledge of Microsoft Office can be utilized to create powerful, centralized, easy-to-deploy reports that preserve every Excel and Word feature. Then discover how to use Reporting Services Report Manager to retrieve reports (configured in Visual Studio .NET) from Reporting Services servers and how easy it is to add Excel and Word to those existing RDL files.
Wednesday Jun 1, 2005 7:00pm	Data Transformation Services (DTS) Greg Robidoux, Edgewood Solutions Overview and demonstration of SQL Server Data Transformation Services. We will take a look at how you can use DTS in your environment to simplify admin tasks of moving data and objects along with dynamic properties for easy reuse of your DTS packages.
Wednesday May 4, 2005 7:00pm	SQL Server Reporting Services Don Jelley Overview and demonstration of SQL Server Reporting Services.
Wednesday Apr 6, 2005 7:00pm	Programming SQL Server 2005 with .Net Andrew Novick, Novick Software SQL Server 2005 opens up the opportunity to run .Net code right inside SQL Server Engine on a par with T-SQL. This gives the programmer an expanded choice of programming language. This presentation shows you how to write C# or VB.Net routines and execute them in SQL Server as one of the supported SQL object types: Stored Procedure Scalar or Table User-defined Function Trigger User-defined Type User-defined Aggregate Each of these objects has its own requirements .Net code to work in SQL Server. Included in the presentation are two key factors that must be accounted for in all SQL/.Net code: Using SQL Types and .Net Types Working with the SQL Server managed data provider The presentation also touches on high level topics such as: When is it appropriate to use .Net code versus T-SQL A preliminary look at performance of .Net code.
Wednesday Mar 2, 2005 7:00pm	SQL 2005 Management Views Andy Kelly, SQL Server MVP
Wednesday Feb 2, 2005 7:00pm	SQL Server Development Dave Swanson, Imceda Software SQL Server bundles many great tools; Query Analyzer, Profiler, Wizards, etc… With all of these tools there often isn’t a need to look further or utilize any other toolset. With SQL Server replacing many mainstream production environments the development landscape becomes more complex and often does require additional tools and procedures. Come hear Dave Swanson, from Imceda Software, talk about how to develop better and faster code utilizing many of the enhanced products in the marketplace. You will learn tips and techniques for better development procedures as well as how a feature rich development environment will make you a more productive developer and DBA.
Wednesday Dec 1, 2004 7:00pm	C# and SQL Server 2005 Andy Kelly, SQL Server MVP Andy showed us how to create a C# application using customized maintenance plans for SQL Server.  We had a sneak peak of what is to come and how SQL Server development will changing in SQL Server 2005.
Wednesday Nov 3, 2004 7:00pm	General discussion about SQL Server with the entire group.  Each participant talked about a real life SQL Server problem and the group offered suggestion on how to resolve the problem.
Wednesday Sep 8, 2004 7:00pm	SQL Server Replication Greg Robidoux, Edgewood Solutions Overview of SQL Server 2000 replication. Learn how to: Setup replication Uses for replication Maintenance and monitoring
Wednesday July14, 2004 7:00pm Resources	SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services Anthony Mann, author "The Rational Guide To: SQL Server Reporting Services" Get up to speed fast with Microsoft's new reporting technology: SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services.  This presentation takes a rational, no-nonsense approach to this new reporting environment. Learn how to: Author Reports Manage Reports Deliver and Use Reports
Wednesday Jun 2, 2004 7:00pm	SQL Server 2005 - The New Frontier Andrew Kelly, SQL Server MVP Microsoft has officially named "Yukon", the next version of SQL Server, SQL Server 2005.  Come hear Andy Kelly talk about the new features, enhancements and the general concepts behind the latest installment for SQL Server.
Wednesday May 5, 2004 7:00pm	SQL Server Contention: Diagnosing and Resolving Blocking Problems John Theron, Quest Software As we develop SQL Server applications with more and more concurrent users, there is inevitable contention as users compete for data resources. They are either forced to wait for each other or face the risk of reading inconsistent data due to in-progress changes.  This trade-off between correctness and throughput is critical, and can have a major impact on SQL Server performance. This presentation discusses the detection, diagnosis and resolution of SQL Server blocking problems and covers the impact of blocking from both a business and technical perspective. We’ll also explore blocking concepts including lock granularity, lock modes and transaction isolation. The consequences of blocking can be painful and expensive for your business.  Careful application design, and the introduction of tools and processes to speed the detection, diagnosis and resolution of blocking problems can ease the pain and keep your applications running smoothly.
Wednesday Apr 7, 2004 7:00pm	Change Management for SQL Server Greg Robidoux, Edgewood Solutions Establishing Change Management for your SQL Servers is no easy task without a formalized process. You not only have to coordinate with multiple departments, but also need to be able to rollback the environment in case the new code is detrimental. Needless to say, without a formal process coordination and fire fighting can quickly become time consuming. It’s not worth letting untested code wreak havoc in your production environments when simple Change Management Solutions can be implemented. We will help formalize and streamline your process from Development, Test and Production environments by focusing on essential people, processes and technology to successfully implement a SQL Server Change Management solution.
Wednesday Mar 3, 2004 7:00pm   Resources	SQL Server Auditing and Security Best Practices Jeremy Kadlec, Edgewood Solutions Complex auditing requirements are rapidly being imposed to regulate organizations across all industries. These regulations ultimately have significant impacts to DBAs, Developers and IT Management that manage SQL Server. Audits such as HIPAA, 21 CFR Part 11, SAS 70, GLBA, etc. become highly publicized projects that are difficult to complete under stringent deadlines. Unfortunately, organizations must prove compliance by prescribed dates in order to adhere to the regulations and prevent stiff fines and litigation. An organization’s ultimate compliance goal is to ensure ‘data access accountability’ in order to answer the question - ‘who is doing what, to which data, and when?’ This presentation will provide assistance for IT staff to achieve this goal for any organization subject to audits, especially HIPAA. Further, beneficial SQL Server Security best practices will be provided as well as recommendations for an auditing team to address critical requirements based on the auditing options available in the market place.
Wednesday Feb 4, 2004 7:00pm UDF book Resources	User-defined Functions Andrew Novick, Novick Software Learn about SQL Server User Defined Functions and how they can enhance your database environment. Performance analysis of a UDF What you can't do in a UDF fn_get_sql and what you can do with it. Query Analyzer Templates for UDFs. Gathering performance statistics with fn_virtualfilestats
Wednesday Jan 7, 2004 7:00pm	Performance Analysis with Profiler Joe Chang SQL Server’s Profiler is a powerful tool for collection event information. Among the most useful events are the CPU and IO resources consumed by stored procedures and SQL statements. While it is easy to collect a great deal of information, the individual events by themselves do not convey the big picture. To determine the overall situation, it is necessary to aggregate the resources consumed by each stored procedure and distinct SQL statement. Learn how to use scripts to parse profiler traces for key resource utilization by stored procedure and distinct SQL statements.
Wednesday Dec 3, 2003 7:00pm Resources	Business Intelligence AJ Mee , ProClarity Corporation How can I provide to my users a technology that empowers them to answer their most pressing questions without constant hand-holding from IT? How can I propagate best analytical practices across the entire organization? How can I streamline collaborative efforts and ensure "one version of the truth"? How can I tailor my existing BI investments to adjust to an environment of changing business requirements, markets, people, and legislation? During this presentation, we will demonstrate, in detail, how to pull information from relational databases (such as SQL Server) into Analysis Services cubes. From there, we will take a look at how ProClarity can help users to gain tremendous insight with the data assets stored in Analysis Services.
Wednesday Nov 5, 2003 7:00pm	Project Management for DBAs Jeremy Kadlec, Edgewood Solutions Database Administrators (DBA) are the perfect candidates for Managing SQL Server related projects because the DBA in most organizations is in the center of the project, interfacing with all of the necessary groups. Unfortunately, the DBA is typically not a Project Manager, nor do most Project Managers have the technical skills necessary to best manage SQL Server projects. As the DBA role is evolving, more work is becoming project based; therefore Project Management skills are needed to complete your job. We intend to provide recommendations not only for a standardized Project Management process to repeat on projects, but also provide the key points to successfully manage SQL Server projects.
Wednesday Oct 1, 2003 7:00pm	Database Auditing Mike Berrigan, Lumigent Technologies Auditing SQL Server databases has never been more critical for IT organizations who must support business requirements such as regulatory compliance (e.g. HIPAA), security and privacy concerns, and ongoing operational requirements. Successful database auditing must occur at the data level and requires the ability to monitor, audit and repair data. Traditional methods, including the use of triggers or application modification, can be costly and inadequate - leaving the organization with a false sense of security. Using a demonstration of Entegra, a continuous database auditing solution, Lumigent will demonstrate the auditing of data mods, DDL changes, and login activity without the performance overhead and cost of traditional approaches.
Wednesday Sept 10, 2003 7:00pm	SQL Server Backup and Recovery Methods Greg Robidoux, Edgewood Solutions We will look at the basic building blocks and options for backup and recovery procedures for your SQL Server environment.  Along with the built-in options for backup and restore functions we will take a look at third party tools that are available to assist in your backup and recovery processes.