James works at Microsoft as a big data and data warehousing solution architect where he has been for most of the last ten years. Before that he was an independent consultant working as a Data Warehouse/Business Intelligence architect and developer. He is a prior SQL Server MVP with over 35 years of IT experience. Check out his book Deciphering Data Architectures: Choosing Between a Modern Data Warehouse, Data Fabric, Data Lakehouse, and Data Mesh.
This is my biggest gripe with SSIS: I have a data flow task, and within that I’m pulling data from multiple sources into multiple destinations, with a few performing data flow transformations. While testing, I want to disable some of … Continue reading →
Microsoft and HP have announced another appliance, called the Database Consolidation Appliance (DBC) (see my blog about the other two appliances). In short, this appliance consolidates databases into a single, virtual environment. In more detail: Many customers continue to struggle with … Continue reading →
Over the past few years I have developed a list of ways to improve performance in SSAS and in two of the tools that use it: ProClarity and PerformancePoint. Below are those performance tips along with other important items to be … Continue reading →
In SSAS, to improve query performance, it’s important to understand what happens inside analysis services when a query is run. Analysis Services is made up of two engines: Formula Engine (FE) – It is single-threaded. It processes the MDX queries, determines what data is needed … Continue reading →
Some announcements and notes from SQL PASS Summit 2011, going on this week: It was announced that the official name of the SQL Server “Denali” product is SQL Server 2012 and will be released in the first half of the year 2012. There … Continue reading →
In SSAS, there is an Error Configuration object that is central to the management of data integrity errors. The following picture shows the ErrorConfiguration properties for a cube: There are numerous objects where you can specify the error configuration via … Continue reading →
Here is a quick example of when using temporary tables will give you a big performance gain. I recently was given this query to improve, as it was taking over 15 hours to run: SELECT * FROM ( SELECT * … Continue reading →
When building a SSAS cube, you typically have a star schema containing dimension tables and fact tables. For dimension tables, you generally model these as one table per object. Building the dimension in the ETL system involves joining the various … Continue reading →
If you are the decision maker in your company and you are tasked with purchasing one or more servers to be used solely for SQL Server and solely as a data warehouse, be aware there are options outside of the usual … Continue reading →
In our day-to-day activities, browsing the web is one of the most important aspects of our job. Whether researching for an answer to a problem, reading our favorite blogs, checking LinkedIn, or using a web application, it’s used so much … Continue reading →
Microsoft has made available SQL Server appliances and reference architectures that allow customers to deploy data warehouse (DW), business intelligence (BI) and database consolidation solutions in a very short time, with all the components pre-configured and pre-optimized. These appliances include all the … Continue reading →
As a consultant or contractor, you can sometimes be faced with the decision when taking a new contract of whether to go 1099 or W-2. Essentially, the question is in what manner will you be paid by your client. Having faced that decision a … Continue reading →
First off, they don’t work for Microsoft. A Microsoft Regional Director (RD) is an unbiased third-party evangelist of Microsoft products and services. Regional Directors are members of an elite, worldwide group of technology thought-leaders known for their national and international speaking … Continue reading →
I’m sure in your travels in the field of IT, you have seen or heard of companies being called a “Microsoft Partner”. If you were like me, you had no idea what that really meant. Was it something a company … Continue reading →
All the videos for the sessions at 24 Hours of PASS are available for free. Check the session schedule for a complete list. Some great stuff!
Continue reading →Frequently I see a bit of confusion from business users when using an analytic grid on a dashboard in PerformancePoint. The confusion comes when you right-click on the analytic grid and see a context-sensitive menu. When you right-click on any … Continue reading →
Imagine you join a company, and there is an existing SSAS database that contains a few cubes that are working nicely. You are asked to add an enhancement to one of the cubes, so you poke around in source control for the … Continue reading →
If you are a developer and are on your own, or working for a company that does not have an MSDN subscription and you are looking at using a bunch of Microsoft tools, you can wind up spending a ton of … Continue reading →
With CTP3 for SQL Server 2012 (code name of “Denali”) available, a lot of us want to play with all the new cool features, as well as the new tools, such as Crescent and Juneau. The steps below are what I took to … Continue reading →
As a SQL Server DBA, usually the largest databases in size and in number of users that I had to manage was an ERP database, such as Microsoft Dynamics AX. And because these types of database typically have a lot of users, database blocking … Continue reading →