Articles by TONY DAVIS

IT Admin for Thrill Seekers

By Tony Davis

A developer suggested to me recently that the life of the DBA was, surely, a dull one. My first reaction was...

Going Metro

By Tony Davis

When it was announced, I confess was somewhat surprised by the striking new "Metro" User Interface for...

Concurrent Affairs

By Tony Davis

I once wrote an editorial, multi-core mania, on the conundrum of ever-increasing numbers of processor cores, but...

A Community Cure for a String Splitting Headache

By Tony Davis

A heartwarming tale of dogged perseverance and Community collaboration to solve some SQL Server string-related headaches.

Many developers have argued persuasively that each database developer in a team needs to work as sole user of a dedicated database-development environment whilst creating or updating databases. I'm not so sure. Are we in danger of trying to change database...

SQL Server's Big Red Buttons

By Tony Davis

One of the most reassuring aspects of watching a vintage James Bond film is the comfort of knowing that, just when there seems no further hope that the villain's plans for world domination will be thwarted, Bond will glance up at the wall and notice a big red...

A suitable present, whatever one's past

By Tony Davis

Even DBAs have devoted aunts. They are probably also oblivious to the mental anguish they cause to their relatives in the run-up to Christmas. What would be a suitable gift for someone so deeply in the grip of technophilia that they can tell you the difference...

Fair Comments

By Tony Davis

At the recent PASS summit, Jeremiah Peschka got a laugh out of a sleepy post-lunch audience with the following remark: 'Some developers say good code is self-documenting; I say, get off my team'

A temporary disagreement

By Tony Davis

Last month, Phil Factor caused a furore amongst some MVPs with an article that dared to suggest that for reasonably small-scale strategic uses, and with a bit of due care and testing, table variables are a "good thing". Not everyone shared his opinion.

Time for a rethink on SQL CLR?

By Tony Davis

It is almost seven years since Microsoft announced the sensational news that, with their new SQL Server 2005, you could do data manipulation in Visual Basic or C# as well as SQL. Unsurprisingly, the technology was misunderstood and many DBAs have never recovered...