// Timeout Script in ADF

Synapse Data Factory 1 min.

featured image Timeout Script in ADF I’ve stumbled upon a brand new feature in Azure Data Factory. The new timeout setting under advanced when you implement a custom script task in your pipeline. The UI As with all other things from Data Factory, the UI is pretty straight forward. Under the advanced tab in your script task, you now the option to set the timeout for the execution of this specific script. The information modal when you hover the (i) is: [...]

// Certificate Errors in Synapse Serverless SQL

Synapse Security 2 min.

featured image Certificate Errors in Synapse Serverless SQL I’ve stumbled upon an error a few weeks ago when working with a client and trying to read some Parquet files from a new Blob container from the build-in Storage account in an existing Synapse Workspace. If you’ve only worked with CSV untill now, you should also try out the Parquet files - they know how to perform fast when done right - but that’s possibily another blogpost. The database has been setup months ago to read data from “old” Blob containers and things was working out pretty nice. [...]

// Business Intelligence With Databricks SQL

Synapse Book review 2 min.

featured image Business Intelligence With Databricks SQL Do you want to learn Databricks and do you want to read only one book about it? Then you should read the book by Vihag Gupta (Li/Tw) - Business Intelligence with Databricks SQL. The writer Vihag Gupta is Solutions Architect in Data & AI at the Databricks company. He shows a great knowledge in the book around Databricks and the way of working with SQL in the services. With a good match of text, downloadable demos and easy to understand illustrations, Vihag Gupta makes it an easy read. [...]

// Get rid of Helper Queries in Power Query - JSON edition

Power BI M (power query) 1 min.

featured image Get rid of Helper Queries in Power Query - JSON edition I recently wrote about an approach to dynamically load CSV files to Power BI through Power Query without the engine to clutter up the UI in Power BI with helper queries. You can read it here. The approach also had some functionallity for getting the first file and traversing the headers automatically. This has now been re-coded to fit a folder from your source containing JSON files. The JSON file structure is somewhat easier to handle, as it is using the Json. [...]

// Week 24: Database Maintenance

SQL Server t-sql 5 min.

featured image Week 24: Database Maintenance Wow, time goes by! Welcome back to the last and final installment of the SQL Server Performance Tuning series. Today I will talk in more details about database maintenance in SQL Server, especially about index maintenance operations, and how to perform database maintenance. Index Maintenance Database maintenance is a very crucial part for your job as a DBA to make sure that you get the best possible performance out of your database. [...]

// Week 23: TempDb

SQL Server t-sql 5 min.

featured image Week 23: TempDb In today’s installment of the SQL Server Performance Tuning series we talk about TempDb - the public toilet of SQL Server, as I describe that special database in SQL Server. Everyone of us uses TempDb regularly. Some people use it directly, some people use it indirectly. Today I want to give you an overview of TempDb usage in SQL Server, and I will give you some best practices on how to configure TempDb for better performance. [...]

// Week 22: Wait & I/O Latency Statistics

SQL Server t-sql 4 min.

featured image Week 22: Wait & I/O Latency Statistics Hello and welcome back to the 22th week of the SQL Server Performance Tuning series. Last week I have talked about baselining in SQL Server, and today I will continue by talking about Wait Statistics and I/O Latency Statistics in SQL Server. When I perform SQL Server Health Checks, I always use these two metrics to get the big picture about the health of SQL Server. Wait Statistics Every time you execute a query in SQL Server, the query will wait. [...]

// Week 21: Performance Monitoring

SQL Server t-sql 4 min.

featured image Week 21: Performance Monitoring Hello and welcome back to the last and final month of the SQL Server Performance Tuning series. Over the last 5 months we have covered various performance related topics about SQL Server, and we have covered specific performance tuning techniques and problems. But what are your options, when you have a SQL Server in front of you that doesn’t perform as expected? To help you with that situation, we will cover performance monitoring techniques today, and next week we will have a more detailed look at the so-called Wait Statistics in SQL Server. [...]

// Week 20: Deadlocking

SQL Server t-sql 4 min.

featured image Week 20: Deadlocking Hello and welcome back to the SQL Server Performance Tuning series. Today we will complete the 5th month by talking about Deadlocking in SQL Server. A deadlock occurs when 2 queries are waiting for each other, and no query can continue its work anymore. In the first step I want to give you an overview how SQL Server handles deadlocks. And finally I will show you some specific deadlock types in SQL Server, and how you can avoid and resolve them. [...]

// Week 19: Lock Escalations

SQL Server t-sql 4 min.

featured image Week 19: Lock Escalations Hello and welcome back to the SQL Server Performance Tuning seriesn. In the last 2 weeks we have talked about pessimistic and optimistic locking in SQL Server. Today I want to talk about one phenomenon in SQL Server that is specific to locking: so-called Lock Escalations. Before we go into the details of that problem, I want to talk a little bit more about the Lock Hierarchy that SQL Server uses internally. [...]