In my last blog post I walked through a way to grab the duration from the EnumHistory method of the JobServer/Job object. As I worked through getting a solution in place for a client I found that the duration calculation was only part of the problem. First, when EnumHistory() is invoked, it runs the sp_help_jobhistory stored procedure. You can ...

Lately I've been very busy with client work, and one of my projects is to capture the history for SQL Agent jobs across all their servers so they can evaluate when to schedule jobs. (Yes, I know SQL Sentry has an excellent product for this, but right now there are budget constraints.) Anyway, I can do this in PowerShell with SMO. Once you ...

I am honored to be presenting my first SQL Saturday session in Redmond on the 25th of this month. The session will be a PowerShell basics class, emphasis on helping people who might be starting out with PowerShell, or feel intimidated by PowerShell’s syntax or object-orientation. I have demos and material focused on PowerShell syntax in general, ...

This evening I'll be presenting a brand new session on installing and managing SQL Server 2012 with PowerShell. Here's the abstract: Windows Server 2008 introduced Server Core, the operating system without the Graphical User Interface. SQL Server 2012 is the first version of SQL Server to support Server Core. To gain the maximum efficiency from ...

I'll be presenting at the South East Michigan SQL Server User Group (SEMSSUG) tonight. The session will be Gather SQL Server Performance Data with PowerShell. We all know how important it is to keep a baseline of performance metrics that allow us to know when something is wrong and help us to track it down and fix the problem. We don't always ...

When I first learned to program, back in the fall of 1968, the first 'word' the computer I connected to said to me was 'READY'.  That summed it up neatly. The computer was ready to do work, it was just waiting for me to give it instruction. As I progressed through my knowledge of programming and my focus on providing businesses useful ...

After a week of data recovery (see my blog post here) and travel via train with no internet access, I've finally been able to get my presentation materials together from the Training Day and two regular sessions I did at SQL Bits #9 in Liverpool last week.  I've uploaded the materials here for the training day.  If you were in the room ...

As Adam Machanic said, Fall is the busy season for speaking, and it will be for me. Here's a brief list of what's coming up: On Saturday, September 17 I'll be in Kalamazoo, Michigan for SQL Saturday #84, where I'll be presenting my Automate Policy-Based Management using PowerShell. The lineup of presenters for this event is amazing and I'll ...

For the last year and a half or so I've been presenting a session on how to gather perfmon data with PowerShell. Here's a link to my blog after the 2010 Tech Ed conference that has the download scripts. These scripts include the database tables and stored procedures I use to store the data for reporting. Sometimes when I'm at client sites I'm ...

Security is an important consideration when designing a database application. Who can get access to what data? How much damage can someone do if they get at your data? In SQL Server 2005 Microsoft implemented column-based encryption, and in SQL Server 2008 they added Transparent Data Encryption. Both solutions work well for their intended use, ...