Tales From The Field Weekly Wrap Up for the Week of 05-22-2023 Microsoft Fabric Launch & Moving Home Offices

 Hello Dear Reader!  Sorry this is so late, moving houses has gotten me a bit behind this week.  I will do better next week!

As you may have heard last week Microsoft Fabric was officially unveiled to the world.  As a part of this launch we had a few extra live videos as a part of the larger Digital Event that happened in conjunction with Microsoft Build!  We have a ton still to come on Microsoft Fabric and there will be LOTS of videos so stay Tuned!

Also as I previously mentioned, we are moving.  This weekend was a very seminal moment for me.  On Friday after 4 delayed installation attempts the internet was installed in the new house.  That can only mean one thing to me.  Time to move the office.  Once I move the office, I'm working there.  So this weekend I packed up everything, moved it, and set up the office.  From here on out I'm in the new house!

I'm really excited.  While it will not show up on the videos, the ceilings are really high.  I've had pictures, awards, mementos from over my career that have often been packed up in a closet. For the first time I have space to put it all out and it's really kinda awesome.

Lot's of feelings go into this move.  The house we are leaving has been very good to us.  This is where we all truly became the family we are today, went through some very difficult and painful moments, high school for both my boys, COVID, elementary school for my daughter, the kids started dating (something I'm still not sure I'm ready for), some brilliant wonderful happy moments, game nights, movies nights, movie premieres, and BBQ's.

Cheers to you old house, thanks for the memories.... and I hope we get some of our deposit back!

Ok Dear Reader, onto the content.

MONDAY 5-22-2023

On we released my latest video USE Azure Managed Identity to Backup Azure SQL Managed Instance to Blob Storage, NOT SAS Tokens!!

In this video I demo how easy it is and discuss why you should be using Managed Identity instead of SAS tokens to perform your Azure SQL Managed Instance COPY_ONLY backups.  This was a lot of fun to make and a great video

WEDNESDAY 5-24-2023

On Wednesday Neeraj Jhaveri (Twitter | @neeraj_jhaveri) and I presented an Introduction to Microsoft FABRIC!! How to Enroll, How to Opt in, How to build a Data Warehouse!! 

My love for Neeraj has never been a secret the man get's a big introduction on everyone of our Tuesday Azure Data Community Round Tables, and the fact that we got to break the news of Microsoft Fabric meant the fireworks were flying!  We covered how you enroll, towards the end we covered how Power BI Admins make sure to opt into the preview, and I showed how to create a Data warehouse and ingest data!

THE PRE-SHOW

As if that wasn't enough the Tales from the Field team was all together myself, Neeraj, Josh Luedeman (Twitter| @JoshLuedeman), Andres Padilla (Twitter | @Nodestreamio), & Daniel Taylor (Twitter | @DBABulldog) were joined by Adam Saxton (Twitter | @AwSaxton) one half of the dynamic duo of Guy in a Cube(Twitter | @GuyinaCube),  Kal Yella, and the wonderful Bradley Schacht (Twitter | @BradleySchacht) joined us to kick off the Microsoft Fabric Digital Event for Day 1, with the Microsoft Fabric Digital Event Pre-Show Day 1.

We started off by finding out that the Power BI CAT and Azure Synapse CSE Team were now the Fabric CAT Team!  We discussed Day 1, feedback from customers, questions we had seen, and much more.  You definitely want to check it out!

THURSDAY 5-25-2023

As if one extra live show was JUST NOT ENOUGH on Thursday we came back to do the Microsoft Fabric Digital Event Pre-Show Day 2. Adam Saxton, Kal Yella, and Bradley Schacht from the Microsoft Fabric CAT Team joined us.  

We discussed the content from Day 1 of the Digital Event, what you could expect to see on Day 2, and we did DEMO'S!!  Make sure to check this out!

TUESDAY 5-23-2023

On Tuesday we were eagerly awaiting the announcement of Microsoft Fabric on the Build Keynote during the pre-show.  This was our first opportunity to talk about it publicly.  

The star of these shows is, as always the content created by the Azure Data Community.  Without further ado, here it is:

Honorable Mentions

• Microsoft Digital Event Pre-Show: Azure FastTrack, Power BI CAT, & Azure Synapse Analytics PG    by  Bradley Ball, featuring Adam Saxton & Bradley Schacht & Guy in Cube Twitter @SQLBalls, @BradleySchacht, & @GuyInACube

• Microsoft Build 2023 Book of News 

Neeraj

• Using Azure DevOps with Synapse Workspaces to create hot fixes in production environments  by Vytas Suopys Twitter @Vytas Suopys

Bradley

• How to take secure, on-demand backups on SQL Managed Instance  by Zoran Rilak Twitter @zoranrilak

Andres

• Building Interactive Enterprise Grade Applications with Open AI and Microsoft Azure  by Andrei Zaichikov  

Josh

• Spreading your SQL Server wings with serverless SQL Pools  by Kevin Chant Twitter @kevchant

Neeraj

• What Is Responsible AI? | Built In  by Ellen Glover Twitter @BuiltIn

Bradley

• Junior Data Professionals The Key to Every Data Team's Success  by Abhinav Jayanty + Taylor George

Andres

• How to deploy your AI model on Edge devices with Azure  by René Bremer

Josh

• Azure SQL input binding for Azure Functions   by Anuraj Parameswaran Twitter @anuraj

Neeraj

• Generative AI defined: How it works, benefits and dangers Generative AI defined: How it works, benefits and dangers (techrepublic.com)  by Owen Hughes Twitter @owenrdhughes

Bradley

• Reflections on My First-Ever Presentation, Fifteen Years Later  by Tim Mitchell Twitter @Tim_Mitchell

Andres

• An Overview of Microsoft Azure NLP Solutions  by Lida Ghahremanlou  Twitter @lida_ghr

Josh

• Using Docker on Windows with Persistent SQL Server Settings and Databases  by Josephine Bush Twitter @hellosqlkitty

WRAP IT UP

No assignments this week Dear Reader as it is already Thursday.  I will attempt to resume our normal cadence next Monday!  My hope for you is take some time, rest, relax, and think of the fact that I'm moving the heavy stuff during the hot months in Florida.  Then take an extra deep sip of that ice cold <insert beer, mixed drink, or non-alcoholic beverage of choice />.

Until next time Dear Reader and as always, Thank You for stopping by.

Thanks,

Brad

Microsoft Digital Event Pre-Show: Azure FastTrack, Power BI CAT, & Azure Synapse Analytics PG

 Next week is Microsoft Build and there is a Microsoft Digital Event occurring on May 24 - 25 starting at 9 AM Pacific Time for a live simulcast with a lot of exciting announcements.  This is EXTENDING into a 2 day digital event!  This is a big event that will be emceed by everyone's favorite hosts Adam Saxton & Patrick LeBlanc the dynamic duo also known as Guy in a Cube. 

 

Now before we get to the BIG EVENT, we need a pre-show!  The pre-show will be happening as a lead in each day on Tales from the Field  one hour before the Digital Event kicks off.  The Digital Event will take place as a simulcast on the YouTube channels of Power BI, Azure Synapse Analytics, & Guy in a Cube.

 

Tales from the Field is a show hosted by four Microsoft data experts from the Azure FastTrack PG, all of the hosts are engineers on Azure FastTrack helping customers and working with Microsoft Product Groups to improve the customer experience.  The hosts of Tales from the field are Bradley Ball, Josh Luedeman, Andrés Padilla, Neeraj Jhaveri, & Daniel Taylor.  They produce technical content weekly and hold an Azure Data Community Round Table highlighting blogs, videos, or any other helpful information provided to the community by the creators within community!

 

Their guests for this pre-show will be Adam Saxton Principal PM for the Power BI CAT Team and one half of the dynamic duo that is Guy in a Cube and Bradley Schacht Principal PM from the Azure Synapse Analytics Product Group.

Read the rest of this blog over on the Microsoft Technet Blog here!

Tales From The Field Weekly Wrap Up for the Week of 05-08-2023 Mother's Day, Big News for MS Build, & the recap

 Hello Dear Reader!!  We also have some really, really, BIG NEWS for next week!  It also happens that next week is Microsoft Build, make sure to register for free!  But that news is coming a little later today.

What's that..?  I can't drop a teaser at the begining and then not give you a little more?  That's fair.

...OK Dear Reader here's a sneak peak.  

We have not one, but TWO one hour live shows that will be on Wednesday May 24th & May 25th.  We also have TWO big guests.  

Brad Schacht (Twitter |@BradleySchacht) from the Azure Synapse Product Group AND Adam Saxton ( Twitter | @AWSaxton) aka one half of @GuyInACube will be there.  But that's really all that I can say until a bit later.  Other than, this is going to be fun & this is going to be BIG.  Enough about the future let's talk about last week.

This past week was Mother's Day, happy belated Mother's Day to all the Mom's out there!  My parent's 50th wedding anniversary was this past year.  My siblings and I teamed up to buy them a cruise to Europe and they are out having a wonderful time!!  Because of this Mom was not here this Mother's Day but there are plenty of Mom's to be recognized in the family, more than just those that we get to see locally.  My niece had her first Mother's Day, congratulations Destiny!!  To celebrate we did what has become an annual tradition.  I make mimosa's, we take the ladies to the spa, and we all get pedicures.

Let's start with the mimosa recipe because it is a good one:

• 1/3 a champagne flute of Orange Juice
• 1/2 oz Don Julio Blanco tequila
• 1/2 oz Gand Marnier Cognac & Orange Liqueur
• fill remaining flute with good champagne like Veuve Clicquot

The pedicures started as a simple thing.  I took my wife and her Mom, my amazing mother-in-law Judith Gonzalez to get a pedicure and manicure.  The next year my Mom & youngest Sister came over and I included them.  Instead of just sitting there waiting I decided to join them for the pedicure and the tradition began. 

The next is that every year I get the kids to help me cook Mother's Day brunch.  The main course was by request.  Heart shaped chocolate chip pancakes.  I don't do anything simple.

In my house bananas are enjoyed by all.  So I made a banana's foster's syrup to go with the pancakes.  For this recipe you need banana's, butter, brown sugar, good dark rum (we used my Diplamatico), and maple syrup. 

You make banana's foster, flambe, then you add in the maple syrup and stir, finally ladling over finished pancakes.  Quick tip, the syrup is hot so if you cut fresh unsalted cream butter and put it on the pancake, then pour the syrup, the butter will be perfectly soft when the plate lands on the table.

Pedicures, pancakes, mimosas, all complete I set about fixing a toilet at the new house and installing a bidet.  All in all a very productive weekend.  Dear Reader, I hope you and your family had a great and Happy Mother's Day.  Ok, on to the recap.

MONDAY 05-08-2023

On Monday Andres Padilla (Twitter | @NodeStreamIO) & Neeraj Jhaveri (Twitter | @Neeraj_Jhaveri) presented Computer Vision using Azure ML Studio!!  

In this video Andres walk through the steps to connect to Azure machine Learning Studio, Importing the required libraries, downloading the data, all the way through training your model.  

WEDNESDAY 05-10-2023

On Wednesday I released No-Code PERFORMANCE GAINS with Intelligent Query Processing in Azure SQL & SQL Server!!  I walk through 2 different ways to restore the World Wide Importers database into Azure SQL Database. 

Then we review how to provision a Serverless Azure SQL Database and why you want to use Serverless.  Using demos from Bob Ward's ( Twitter | @bobwardms) demos from his amazing SQL Server 2022 class that is available for free here!!  I then show how self-healing Persisted memory grant feedback works in Azure SQL Database by dropping the performance of a query from over 1 minute to less than 2 seconds!

This is in place for Azure SQL Database, Azure SQL Managed Instance, and SQL Server 2022 we just need to have our database compatibility level at 150 or above.

TUESDAY 05-09-2023

On Tuesday it's my FAVORITE half-hour of the week! The Azure Data Community Round Table with Josh Luedeman (Twitter | @JoshLuedeman), Andres Padilla, Neeraj Jhaveri, and myself.  We recapped the fun that we had at SQL Saturday Jacksonville.

After a conversation that covered Guardians of the Galaxy 3, The Flash, and Andre's amazing drone demo at SQL Saturday Jax we got to the real star of the show.  The content.  Here is the content covered on the show in the order of appearance:

Neeraj

• Microsoft Digital Event  by Tyler Mays-Childers, Guy in Cube Twitter @sposit & @GuyInACube

Bradley

• Using the New Open Source SQLCMD to Create Containers by Steve Jones Twitter @Way0utWest via @SQLServerCentrl

Andres

• Everything You Want to Know About Onnx by Janakiram MSV Twitter @janakiramm

Josh

• Four Different Ways to Incorporate Azure Synapse and PowerBI by Ginger Grant Twitter @desertislesql

Neeraj

• Build real-time dashboard with Power BI dataset produced by Azure Stream Analytics no-code editor  by Xu Jiang Twitter @xujx

Bradley

• Automating Database Maintenance on Azure SQL by Josephine (Branch) Bush Twitter @hellosqlkitty

Andres

• Supercharge Archive Content Discovery with ChatGPT and Azure Video Indexer  by Fardau Van Neerden Twitter @thefmister

Josh

• Building, Deploying, and Sharing a Remote Jupyter Book in Azure Data Studio  by Steve Hughes Twitter @dataonwheels

Neeraj

• Analytics Vidhya's Top 10 Blogs on Computer Vision in 2022  by Sanjana Rajpal Twitter @AnalyticsVidhya

Bradley

• The Blooming of AI Spring  by Patrick LeBlanc & Buck Woody Twitter @PatrickDBA & @BuckWoodyMSFT via @Spotify

Andres

• Microsoft’s New Azure Storage Mover Makes Cloud Migrations Easier  by Rabia Noureen Twitter @RabiaNoureen11 

Josh

• Monitoring SQL Server on Linux Part 1: Installing sysstat (Surviving Without Perfmon)  by Rick Lowe Twitter @dataflowe

WRAP IT UP

A couple of reminders this week.  Don't forget Dear Reader we have our Azure Data Community Round Table Tuesday 5/16 at 1 pm EST. Today we have an MS Tech Bits where our very own Daniel Taylor (Twitter | @DBABulldog) walks us through how to use Ola Hallengren's scripts to set up Database Maintenance on Azure SQL Database using Azure Data Factory! 

Remember to stay tuned for that big news, and as always Dear Reader Thank You for stopping by.

Thanks,

Brad

Tales From The Field Weekly Wrap Up for the Week of 04-10-2023, Taylor Swift, & The Disney 10 Miler

 Hello Dear Reader!  Last week was a really busy week with an even busier weekend.  We will get to the show recap's in a moment but first let's dive into the weekend.

Months ago my wife & youngest son worked together to get Taylor Swift tickets for this past weekend.  I've enjoyed quite a few songs of Taylor's, but live music isn't really my thing.  My wife loves it.  She had a career working in radio and she was the planner & show runner for many many live music concerts.  She "makes" me go with her.  

To be honest I always have a great time, but it is not something I seek out for myself.  So when Sue & William were excitingly explaining to me over dinner how they were able to secure 3 tickets my first thought was they were taking my sister Julie or my youngest daughter Serenity (both of whom would have fought me..... and probably won... to get these tickets).  It was not Julie or Serenity.  It was me.

Don't get me wrong, I was happy to suggest they offer up the ticket to someone else.  Heck, I got us a really great hotel room at the Tampa Edition.  It had a Michelin star chef.  An amazing bar, a welcome cocktail with a lavender spritz and their gin brewed specifically for the hotel, not to mention a Rum bar, and to top it all off an in house spa.

My offer was that they could go to the show, I would go to the spa and get a massage, go to one of the restaurants and eat some food, go to the bar and get some drinks, then head to the pool where they had a pool side bar, take a nap, wake up, go grab some more drinks, and wait for them to get back so they could tell me all about it.

As you can tell from the pictures my offer was refused.  We had a great time.  There were songs we sang along to, that we danced to, and it was a spectacle.  It cannot be said that Ms. Swift puts on one helluva show.  She performed for 3 hours straight and sang 44 songs from 9 different albums and 2 surprisesongs.

On Saturday morning we woke up, had a really nice brunch at The Pearl and made our way back to Orlando so I could pick
up my race packet for the Run Disney 10 Miler.  I will be honest Dear Reader, I forgot I signed up for this race until the week before.

I have picked my running back up post injury, but had not been training on longer races.  Normally my long Disney Races are half marathon's, 13.1 miles or 21 K, this was a 10 mile run or roughly 16K.

Those 3.1 Miles or extra 5 K's make a difference.  Seriously.  That is normally the part of that race where I hit a wall.  Not literally.  In running when you hit a wall is a condition of sudden fatigue and loss of energy which is caused by the depletion of glycogen stores in the liver and muscles.  It makes that the most difficult portion of the race.

By not hitting that wall I was never truly fatigued during the race.  I was able to keep my run-walk-run-walk method going and averaged 8 minutes per kilometer and finished in 2 hours and 11 minutes. 

At home we my lovely wife was home busily preparing for my Mother-In-Law's 77th birthday!!  I love my Mother-In-Law Judy.  She is an incredible woman.  My brother's-In-Law, my nieces, and one of my nephews made it over.  However the star of the show was my baby grand-niece.  No pictures, but she is the most beautiful and adorable little girl.  She is six months old and in a very fun phase where she is not yet walking, but alert, attentive, and very opinionative.  You knew what she liked and didn't like!  The party was great and seeing family was the cherry on the cake.  

Like I said, busy weekend.  Now let's recap last week!!

WEDNESDAY 4-12-2023

On Wednesday we dropped the demo heavy companion to last weeks video SQL Server Internals: HEAPS VS. CLUSTERED INDEXES!. 

This was a really fun video to make, and I'm hard at work on this weeks content which will be a fun video about Azure SQL and how it utilizes space.

TUESDAY 4-11-2023

Tuesday was a great show.  We started off the Community Round Table with a side conversation about being a parent and giving the magic of wonder to our children.  Josh Luedeman (Twitter | @JoshLuedeman) reminisced about Castle Greyskull with me from our childhood.  Neeraj Jhaveri (Twitter | @Neeraj_Jhaveri) talked about when he gave his kids the gift of iPhones!  Andres Padilla (Twitter | @nodestreamio) talked about an AMAZING Christmas where his father hung his the Star Wars ships he received from the ceiling like they were flying!

We also covered AMAZING Azure Data Community content from the creators.  Here's the content in order of appearance:

Neeraj 

Unleashing the capabilities of Azure Synapse Analytics for a healthcare customer  by Prabhjot Kaur Twitter @PrabhKaur 

Bradley 

Using Azure Data Factory to read and process REST API datasets by Rayis Imayev Twitter  @RayisImayev 

Andres 

Announcing registries in Azure Machine Learning to operationalize models and pipelines at scale by Manoj Bableshw  Twitter @manojsb 

Josh 

Common Azure Synapse Link for SQL storage permission issues by Kevin Chant Twitter @kevchant 

Neeraj 

Create a Data Solution on Azure Synapse Analytics with Snapshot Serengeti - Part 1 -  by Josh Ndemenge Twitter @Jcardif254 

Bradley 

EightKB Topics  by Andrew Pruski Twitter  @dbafromthecold 

Andres 

Understanding Chaos Engineering by John Engel-Kemnetz Twitter @jkemnetz 

Josh 

Armchair Architects: Data Mesh Architecture by David Blank-Edelman Twitter @otterbook  

Neeraj 

Introducing Microsoft 365 Copilot – your copilot for work  by Jared Spataro Twitter @jared_spataro 

Bradley 

How to work with ChatGPT in Visual Studio Code  by Daniel Calbimonte via SQL Server Central Twitter  @dcalbimonte  @SQLServerCentrl 

Andres 

From YOLO to YOLOv8: Tracing the Evolution of Object Detection Algorithms by Abirami Vina  Twitter @abiramivina 

Josh 

Ultimate Guide to Citus Con: An Event for Postgres, 2023 edition Ultimate Guide to Citus Con: An Event for Postgres, 2023 edition  by Claire Giordano Twitter @clairegiordano 

WRAP IT UP

As we wrap things up a quick programming note.  We will be dropping an MS Tech Bits video TODAY on Cost Management by Neeraj & Andres!  Make sure to check that out when it goes live.

Tomorrow we have our Community Round Table show Live at 1 PM EST.  On Wednesday I will be with you for an MS Tech Bits on Azure SQL Database Shrinking Operations for Data & Log Files. 

We hope you have a wonderful week and make some time to hang out with us Dear Reader, if you did anything fun this weekend I'd love to hear from you!

As always Dear Reader, Thank you for stopping by.

Thanks,

Brad 

Tales From The Field Weekly Wrap Up for the Week of 03-27-2023 & MegaCON

Zach's 1st MegaCon 2011

 Hello Dear Reader!  This past week is a blur.  It was a tough week at work.  That sentence is an understatement, but its really all I can say at this point.  Monday sent me for a tail spin.  I was fresh off a weekend relaxing with my wife, planning events with my friends, and thinking things were pretty well set.  Life has a way of suprising you.

We powered through last week, had our Community Round Table, and dropped our new content.  Internally at Tales from the Field we did some Camtasia training, explored some new technology, and started some planning for the next 3 months.  I'm excited about those things.  Before I knew it the weekend was upon us.

12 Years Later MegaCon 2023

I'm really tough to shop for, I hear that a lot around Christmas time.  I don't mean to be difficult, but if I want something I tend to buy it.  Books, collectibles, comics, whiskey, gin, ....I digress.  This year my wife did something exceptionally cool for me.  She bought me things to give me experiences, one of those was ticket's to MegaCON in Orlando.  She bought me floor passes & and extra pass to share.  

I shared mine with my oldest son Zachary.  My first MegaCon ever was with Zachary when he was 7 years old.  When it comes to comic book conventions I've only ever been to two and he was with me at both of them.  He enjoyed this so much, I think this is a must do again next year!

One of the things I've always loved it the effort people put into their costumes, how generous they are with their time, and a willingness to celebrate with others.  That was as true when he was a little kiddo dressed in a Superman t-shirt as it was this year when he was dressed as Eren Yeager this year.

I hope you had a good weekend out there Dear Reader!  On to the wrap up.

WEDNESDAY 03-29-2023

On Wednesday we dropped our MS Tech Bits, Turn SQL to KQL IN SECONDS with Azure Data Explorer.  This video is based off the demo I did with Patrick LeBlanc (Twitter | @PatrickDBA) in our Session at SQLBits (Twitter | @SQLBits).

I love Azure Data Explorer, it is an incredibly powerful service for digesting log data and querying massive data sets and returning results in seconds.  It has so many capabilities and possibilities.  BUT... I don't know KQL and I don't know if I want to learn another language.  Fear not as I show in this video you can use the EXPLAIN statement to translate SQL to KQL that you can then run against your data sets.

I'm hoping this leads to peopel realizing that the bar for entry to this service is low, if you know SQL then you know KQL!

TUESDAY 03-28-2023

On Tuesday I once again teamed up with Josh Luedeman (Twitter | @JoshLuedeman), Andres Padilla (Twitter | @nodestreamio), & Neeraj Jhaveri (Twitter | @neeraj_jhaveri) to review the AMAZING community content that you all produced!  If you missed that make sure to check it out.

The true star of the show is the content produced by the Community.  Here is the content in order that it was covered on the show:

Neeraj

• Multi-Column Distribution for Dedicated SQL pools is now GA! by Mariya Ali Twitter @mariyaali

Bradley

• How to use an Annotation in Azure Data Factory or Azure Synapse Analytics Data Integration Pipeline?  by Alpa Buddhabhatti Twitter  @AlpaB7

Andres

• How to set up a Python virtual environment on Windows by Abhinav Saraswat 

Josh

• Announcing the Release of Azure Data Studio 1.4.2  by Erin Stellato Twitter @erinstellato

Neeraj

• Working with the GPT-4 and ChatGPT models on Azure by Derek Legenzoff Twitter @DerekLegenzoff

Bradley

• What is Visual ChatGPT?   by  Andy Sansom 

Andres

• Spark Monitoring  by Dustin Vannoy Twitter @dustinvannoy

Josh

• Turn your database into an API in minutes with Data API builder for Azure Databases  by Jasmine Greenway Twitter @paladique

Neeraj

• The Importance of SQL Saturdays  by Angela Tidwell Twitter @AngelaTidwell

Bradley

• KQL Series – ingesting data with Azure Data Factory by Hamish Watson Twitter   @TheHybridDBA

Andres

• Eliminate these 11 phrases that ‘make people question your credibility,’ says public speaking expert  by Christina Helena Twitter @christinahelena

Josh

• Azure Podcast - Episode 455 - Azure ML in the Real World  by Azure Podcast Twitter @AzurePodcast

WRAP IT UP

This week we have our Community Round Table on Tuesday where we will once again feature content from you the Azure Data Community!  We will be live at 1 pm EST, but you can always catch us after the broadcast on our YouTube Channel.

Wednesday we will have a video discussing the internals of Heaps, Clustererd Indexes, & Non-Clustered Indexes!

Time to say goodbye until next week.  Hope you have a great week and as always Dear Reader, Thank you for stopping by.

Thanks,

Brad

Tales From The Field Weekly Wrap Up for the Week of 03-20-2023 & Kiddos Growing Up

William, right, 11 years ago the morning of our college tour

 Hello Dear Reader! When I got off the plane from SQLBits I wasn't feeling great.  To be honest, I was a little concerned.  I'm a diabetic asthmatic.  Some people are generally unconcerned when they get a cold, some even feel that way about Covid.  Not I.  

For years when I get a cold they would linger, antibiotics would need to be perscribed, consumed, and then about a month later my voice would return to normal.  I've been very fortunate that my immue system seems to have recieved a kick start in the last few years.  No longer is the need for antibiotics absolute.  

 No longer is a cold a one month sentence of exercise purgatory.  Really, I feel lucky.  Despite feeling awful on Monday & Tuesday, by Friday morning I felt great and sounded like Barry White.  So with me feeling better, my wife very happy with my deep sexy voice, we packed up the car and drove my youngest son William to a campus tour of the University of North Florida. 

It was a really beautiful campus and the tour was fantastic.  William is going to be very happy up there.  I'm familar with UNF thanks to SQL Saturday Jacksonville.  It has been held on their campus since my first trip to the event all the way back in 2011 and SQL Saturday #74.

Seeing the campus from the eyes of a perspective student was amazing.  I'm used to the excitement of Friday morning pre-con's and the buzz in the air as you follow the SQL Saturday signs to the parking garage.

This time it was following the signs to the Campus Tour, taking in the campus, food venues, gym, and different  class rooms.  What an exciting time he is about to embark on!  As if it wasn't enough, father time gave me a solid kick to the feels.  The picture posted above of William and his younger sister finger painting was my Facebook memory.  My phone alerted me that I had a memory, and I clicked on it.  All I could think of was how time flies.  There's no way, when I snapped that picture 11 years ago, that I imagined him getting ready for college.

Alright Dear Reader, let's get to the re-cap.

MS TECH BITS - WEDNESDAY 3-22-2023

My deep voice was in full effect as we took a jump into the Transaction Log.  The Transaction Log is an essential part of SQL Server.  That's an understatement.  That's like saying your lungs are essential.  The Transaction Log is fundemental.  We look at what it stores, how it holds data, how Virtual Log Files work, and a little bit about recovery models.

If you are interested in replicating the demos, I'm keeping them over in my GitHub Repo for SQL Scripts.  The demo envrionment I used for this was a docker container running SQL Server 2022, if you want to know how to set up that environment check out this video.

COMMUNITY ROUND TABLE - TUESDAY 3-21-2023

The Community Round Table featured my sultry deep voice as well as Josh Luedeman (Twitter | @JoshLuedeman), Neeraj Jhaveri (Twitter | @Neeraj_Jhaveri), and Daniel Taylor (Twitter | @DBABulldog).

We did a quick recap of SQLBits talking about the wonderful event, and then we covered the content.  No more delays, let's get to it.  Content in order of appearence on the show:

Neeraj 

Performance Tuning Synapse Dedicated Pools - Understanding the Query Lifecycle by Sarath Sasidharan Twitter @sarathsasidharan2016 

Bradley 

Call to Action for Female Speakers to Submit to EightKB  by Tracy Boggiano Twitter  @TracyBoggiano 

Dan 

SQL: Setting local date and time for a session in Azure SQL Database  by Dr. Greg Low  Twitter @greglow 

Josh 

How To Convert Parquet Files into GeoJson Files and Save it in Data Lake using Synapse Notebooks by Sally Dabbah 

Neeraj 

Creating a custom disaster recovery plan for your Synapse workspace Part 1   by Freddie Santos Twitter @fredguis 

Bradley 

Building, Deploying, Sharing a Remote Jupyter Book in Azure Data Studio by  Steve Hughes  Twitter @DataOnWheels 

Dan 

How I evaluate personal safety at tech conferences  by Eugene Meidinger Twitter @SQLGene 

 

Josh 

Azure Data Factory Global Parameters and Azure Bicep Templates  by Tao Yang Twitter @MrTaoYang 

Neeraj 

My week at SQLBits 2023: Why You Should send your Employees to Conferences by Kay Sauter Twitter @KaySauter 

Bradley 

Connecting Power BI to Azure SQL Database using Private Endpoints  by Andy Cutler Twitter  @MrAndyCutler 

Dan 

Why read committed is the default isolation level, and what to do next  by Kendra Little Twitter @Kendra_Little 

Josh 

Azure Data Factory CI/CD with GitHub Actions  by Olga Molocenco   

 

WRAP IT UP

We did some experiements earlier this month and loved the reception we recieved.  We are working hard over here at Tales From The Field, TFTF, HQ to come up with some additional content for next month.

This week we have our Community Round Table on Tuesday & our MS Tech Bits on Wednesday.  We hope you will join us for them, and if there's anything you would like to see sound off in the comments!  We always love to hear from you Dear Reader.

And as always, Thank You for stopping by!

Thanks,

Brad

Tales From The Field Weekly Wrap Up for the Week of 03-06-2023 & Pineapple on Peperoni

 Hello Dear Reader!  Last week was an incredible week.  We dropped new content on Monday, Tuesday had the Community Round Table, Wednesday MS Tech Bits, and released YouTube Shorts all week long.

We also waded into controversy on Twitter.  It began with a seemingly innocent and funny post by Buck Woody (Twitter | @BuckWoodyMSFT) and well.... it just took off from there.

Needless to say, anyone who doesn't like Pineapple and Peperoni on their NY Style pizza clearly has never tried it and is therefore wrong.  End of discussion.

A quick note.  

*Hawiian pizza is disgusting.  Canadian Bacon is a lie.  Real Canadian Bacon should be maple coated real-bacon.  Not ham.  Ham should not be on a pizza, with the only exception being a supreme pizza.

End note.

My Mom & Dad were over for my youngest daughter's 13th birthday.  Happy Birthday Serenity!  During which my father, who ran a pizza restaurant, and spent over 25 years in the restaurant business. had never tried it.  He did, and he was surprised how good it was.  He even went for a second slice!

On to the recap!

MONDAY 3-6-2023

Andres Padilla (Twitter | @NodeStreamIO) & Neeraj Jhaveri (Twitter | @Neeraj_Jhaveri) kicked off Monday with an introduction to Azure OpenAI.  

This video has proven very popular, I'm not going to ruin it for you.  Head over and take a look.  Andres walks us through registering to gain access to & then shows us some of the Azure OpenAI playground.  

TUESDAY 3-7-2023

Tuesday is the new home to our Community Round Table.  It was a great show, but as always the star of the show is the content from the Azure Data Community.

List of content in order of appearance on the show:

Neeraj

• AWS Lambda Function to import CloudTrail Logs to Azure Sentinel by Sreedhar Ande Twitter @sreedharande

Bradley

• SQLBits Agenda and PowerShell, displaying and searching   By Rob Sewell  Twitter @SQLDBAWithBeard

Andres

• IoT Production Training Pack by Raul Alarcon  

Josh

• Farming from space: How orbital data is unlocking novel agriculture insights by Matt Jennings  Twitter @MattJenningsMS

Neeraj

• Power BI Paginated Reports - Subscriptions by Olivier Van Steenlandt Twitter @Oli_Vsteenlandt

Bradley

• Advancing Spark - Power BI Databricks Connector with Native SQL  by  Simon Whiteley  Twitter @MrSiWhiteley

Andres

• Automatic IoT Edge Certificate Management with GlobalSign EST   by John Lian 

Josh

• Using calculation groups or one to many relationships for time intelligence selection   by Alberto Ferrari Twitter @FerrariAlberto

Neeraj

• Azure Synapse Spark Notebook – Unit Testing   by Arun Sethia 

Bradley

• Provide data lake access with Azure Synapse Analytics  by Patrick LeBlanc, Adam Saxton, Guy In A Cube Twitter @PatrickDBA, @AdamSaxton, @GuyInACube

Andres

• Best Computer Vision projects With Source Code And Dataset by Naem Azam  Twitter @naemazamankon

Josh

• Announcing the retirement of Streaming Dataflows  by Jadelyn Ray Twitter @MSPowerBI

WEDNESDAY 3-8-2023

On Wednesday we released The SECRET Language of Azure SQL!!! WAIT STATS! That's right Dear Reader 3 exclamation marks. This is serious.  It's also not really a secret. Everyone wants you to know about this.  

In the comments I have links to a great script that Paul Randal (Twitter | @PaulRandal) wrote over a decade ago, to a book on the subject that Thomas LaRock (Twitter | @SQLRockstar) has written.  Check out the video then read Paul's article and order Tom's book.  This is a very critical topic for any SQL DBA or Developer to understand.

SHORTS

We release a whole host of Shorts related to the subject of interviewing for a job as a SQL DBA or for a SQL Developer.  There quality gets better as the week goes along.  I switched video editing tools and was able to improve the quality. 

Here's a list:

• SQL Interview Questions - Understand the Versions of SQL
• SQL Interview Questions - Follow Up After the Interview
• SQL Interview Questions - Understanding Wait Stats
• SQL Interview Questions - Understanding Execution Plans
• SQL Interview Questions - How do you pronounce 'SQL'?
• SQL Interview Questions- the Data Community
• SQL Interview Questions- The Worst Question Ever
• SQL Interview Questions- DON’T RELY ON 3rd Party Tools!
• SQL Interview Questions- Know the basics Clustered Indexes
• Next Week SQLBits 2023!!

 We will see how this goes, bit of an experiment on our part.  We had around 1000 cumulative views on this last week alone.  It's a difficult format because you have a max of 60 seconds to get a fairly technical point across.  If there is something you'd like to see we'd love to hear from you!

WRAP IT UP

Alright Dear Reader.  I've off to SQLBits this week.  Stay tuned to the channel.  We have a SPECIAL Monday content drop, our Tuesday Community Round table, Wednesday MS Tech Bits, Interview clips from previous interviews will be dropping, also maybe some shorts from SQLBits. 

As always Dear Reader, Thank you for stopping by.

Thanks,

Brad

Tales From The Field Weekly Wrap Up for the Week of 02-20-2023

Hello Dear Reader! We had a beautiful weekend here in Florida.  Spring is in the air, mainly because the temperature is ranging between 85 to 90 degrees Fahrenheit.  This has lead to some rather pronounced sneezing on my morning exercise routine.  The type of sneezing that has scared children and small animals.

It was a really nice weekend, enjoying the tale end of February before a busy March.

This was a good time to get some recordings done, have some outings with the Mrs., and meet the gentleman for a morning of golf.   I'm not good at golf, quite terrible actually. It is a good excuse to spend two hours with friends talking about life, family, and generally trading our perspectives on things.

As we say goodbye to Winter and begin to focus on Spring it seemed like last week was indeed the perfect way to send off February with a bang.

Off to the wrap up.

Tuesday 2-21-2023

On Tuesday we had a little bit of Christmas in February with out Elfster show.  Our good friend Lonnye Bower (Twitter | @ilovesql) had the brilliant idea to have a gift exchange!  Andrew Nathan (Twitter | @AndrewNathan05) & Daniel Taylor (Twitter | @DBABulldog) were quick to sound off their excitement and we planned our eventual holiday extravaganza!  

We all were super excited for this.  No technical topics in this show, just a bunch of friends joking around, playing Secret Santa, and opening presents.  If you are looking for some fun and a laugh, please tune in.  This was a really fun time!

Wednesday 2-22-2023

On Wednesday we dropped our latest MS Tech Bits.  These are videos that will cover different Azure technologies and how you can incorporate them.  Neeraj Jhaveri (Twitter | @Neeraj_Jhaveri) & Andrés Padilla (Twitter | @nodestreamio) walk us how to use BICEP templates from our GitHub repository to walk you through deploying Pattern 1 in order to deploy you Azure Synapse Analytics environment.       

This is a great video and it is just the start, personally I'm really looking forward to additions to this series.

Thursday 2-23-2023

On Thursday we had our Community Round Table featuring amazing content by you the Azure Data Community & sometimes great authors from our community at large!

Josh Luedeman (Twitter | @JoshLuedeman) wore his hat from the Tuesday show, and we kicked off reviewing the content our team had seleted for the week.  But you don't want to here me talk about it, here are the links!

Links in order of appearence on the show:

Neeraj

• A complete CI/CD experience for Azure Synapse Link for SQL Server 2022  by Kevin Chant Twitter @kevchant

Bradley

• SQL Transaction Processing and Analytic Performance Price-Performance Testing By William McKnight & Jake Dolezal via gigaom Twitter @gigaom

Andres

• Streamline your Edge AI development and operations with KAN  by Olivier Bloch Twitter @obloch

Josh

• Script to Install the Tools I Use on My Jumpbox by Tracy Boggiano Twitter @TracyBoggiano

Neeraj

• Securing your Synapse environment  by Liliam Leme Twitter @LemeLiliam

Bradley

• Synapse Espresso: Optimize Delta Table performance with Optimize & ZOrder Indexing by Stijn Wynants Twitter @SQLStijn

Andres

• Train your Model in AML, score it in ADX by Adi Eldar

Josh

• Sql-action v2 GitHub Action for Azure SQL Database deployments   by Kevin Chant Twitter @kevchant

Neeraj

• Deploying Azure Bicep Templates Using The Azure CLI  by Chris Pietschmann Twitter @Build5Nines

Bradley

• json_object and json_array Functions SQL Server 2022 Tutorial  By Daniel Calbimonte Twitter @MSSQLTips

Andres

• I Wanna Go Fast!)Performance Optimization Tips & Tricks for Azure Data and App Services  by Marcelo Silva & Victor Santana

Josh

• Using the Dedicated Administrator Connection with SQL Server in a Docker Container  by Joey D'Antoni Twitter @jdanton

WRAP IT UP

We've got a big week planned this week.  Vicky Harp (Twitter | @vickyharp ) Principal Product Group PM Manager will be on the Tuesday show!

On Wednesday I have some MS Tech Bits that will be posted, on Thursday we have the Community Round table featuring data from the Azure Data Community, and it maybe featuring your content!  Let us know if you are writing a blog, producing a video, or doing something noteworthy in the community! 

As always Dear Reader, Thank you for stopping by.

Thanks,

Brad

Tales From The Field Weekly Wrap Up for the Week of 02-13-2023

Josh & myself at Antman & the Wasp Quantumania

 Hello Dear Reader!  It's the Presidents Day holiday today in America. With it comes a 3 day weekend.  To celebrate Josh Luedeman (Twitter | @JoshLuedeman), myself, and our families went to see Antman & the Wasp: Quantumania over the holiday weekend.   

Despite the poor reviews on Rotten Tomatoes the movie was great.  Once again proving why I'm not a movie critic, and why I don't understand how movie critics have a job.  Have no fear, there are no spoilers here.  It was an exciting action-adventure with a really good family theme, and a surprisingly happy ending with a heavy bit of foreshadowing.  I enjoyed it so much I saw it the next day with my oldest son and it was just as enjoyable as it was the first time.

We headed over to visit family for dinner on Saturday, while Sunday was a nice lazy today I am using my
day off to learn a little more about video editing, pre-posting our next two MS Tech Bits , and learning about end screen YouTube pages.  My wife does not have the day off so I'm on dinner duty tonight!

"So Balls," you say "what's for dinner?".

Excellent question as always Dear Reader!  I have some ribeye steaks defrosting in the refrigerator.  I plan to make a homemade chimichurri, put half on the steaks, and vacuum seal them, then sous vide them, before finishing them off on the grill to get a nice char on the exterior.  But enough of us all getting hungry before lunch, let alone dinner, lets head off to the recap!

Tuesday 2-14-2023

Valentines Day kicked off with the Batman of Guy in a Cube (Twitter | @GuyInACube), Mr. Patrick LeBlanc (Twitter | @PatrickDBA) himself!  We had a great conversation about how to Manage Work Life Balance.  Part of that conversation has to involve admitting that we have not always done a good job of managing work life balance. 

Often it is times of trial and error, life, and loss that teach us that we have to do better.  On Thursday, our good friend Lonnye Bower (Twitter | @ilovesql) challenged us to call it a Life-Work balance, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Wednesday 2-15-2023

First off thank you Dear Reader for the reception of our MS Tech Bits!  This is quickly becoming some of our most viewed content.  This past week was no exception.  In less than a week this has become our 2nd most viewed MS Tech Bits!

I'm working with some friend on the Azure SQL MI PG and we have videos that we will be cross posting helping people to further understand one of my favorite products Azure SQL Managed Instance.  In this video we show how to backup and restore a SQL MI DB from a SQL MI Instance and restore it on a SQL Server 2022 instance.

We do this in an unencrypted manner, but it is completely possible to do this in an encrypted manner.  We will cover that in a future video.  

Thursday 2-16-2023

On Thursday we kicked off our Round Table with our good friend Daniel Taylor (Twitter | @DBABulldog) sitting in for Josh Luedeman.  Dan joined Andrés Padilla (Twitter | @Nodestreamio), Neeraj Jhaveri (Twitter | @Neeraj_Jhaveri) to review the AMAZING CONTENT created by you the ccommunity!  

As I mentioned earlier Lonnye challenged us to stop referring to Work-Life balance and instead say Life-Work balance.  Bravo to Lonnye for pushing us to be better!

Here is the content in the order of appearance on the show:

Neeraj

• 24 Work-Life Balance Ideas & Tips for Offices in 2023 by Grace He Twitter @teambuildingcom

Bradley

• Automatic compute scaling with serverless for Hyperscale in Azure SQL Database  By Morgan Oslake 

Andres

• Being ‘Too Busy’ Means Your Personal Strategy Sucks by Roger Martin Twitter @RogerLMartin

Dan

• T-SQL Tuesday #141: Work/Life balance by Jess Pomfret Twitter @jpomfret

Neeraj

• 12 Tips to Improve Your Work-Life Balance by Judy Wolf Twitter @BetterUp

Bradley

• Publish/Migrate your RDL files from Power BI Report Server to the service  by Patrick LeBlanc & Guy in a Cube Twitter @Patrickdba & @GuyInACube

Andres

• Automation: Integrate Azure Data Explorer as Long-Term Log Retention for Microsoft Sentinel  by Sreedhar Ande Twitter @sreedharande

Dan

• T-SQL Tuesday #141: Work/Life balance by Chris Yates Twitter @YatesSQL

Neeraj

• 63 Companies With The Best Work-Life Balance by Henry Oloughlin Twitter @buildremote

Bradley

• Quick Track: Beginner’s Guide to Azure SQL- Azure Defender and Threat Protection By Deepthi Goguri Twitter @dbanuggets

Andres

• Data Quality Testing in the Medallion Architecture with Pytest and PySpark by Carter Kilgour

Dan

• T-SQL Tuesday #141: Work/Life balance  by Dale Hirt Twitter @dalehirt

WRAP IT UP

This week is the week Dear Reader!  Christmas in February, our Elfster show is happening.  Who got who?  What gifts did we each get?  We will finally find out Tuesday 2/21/2023 at 1 pm EST.  This will be a packed show, and it looks to be a lot of fun.

On Wednesday we have another great MS Tech Bits that will drop.  This time Andés and Neeraj are back for the first of what will be a series of videos teaching you how to use BICEP to deploy Analytics Pattern 1 for Azure Synapse Analytics using our Analytics in a Box GitHub repo!

Thursday we will be back with the Community Round table, potentially featuring your content!

Ok, time to rest up while I can.

Oh, one other thing.  We broke a milestone and it is all thanks to you Dear Reader.  We offically hit over 100 subscribers on our YouTube channel!  Thank you so much for joining us on this ride.

And as always Dear Reader, Thank you for stopping by.

Thanks,

Brad