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Introduction
Pick something in your life that you have mastered and can do with ease. Many people pick the topic of driving. You know how to turn
left while slowing down. You are tuning many controls at once and getting feedback from your vehicle to make it run and move toward your intended destination. An occasional glance at the fuel gauge tells you when to visit the fueling station. If you tried to be highly skilled at driving without knowing what all these gauges and levers did, it would be nearly impossible and you would have to rely heavily on the advice of others to make simple decisions.
So it’s true with SQL that knowing how a few gauges and levers work can prompt you to take simple actions or confidently know you have everything set for right now. Yet most SQL systems that we’ve encountered have simple problems. Imagine your car’s tire pressure gauge is way below tolerance levels and instead of a simple adjustment, the system keeps running until it breaks.
New knowledge also replaces the dangers of taking the wrong action or diagnosing the wrong cause of a problem. For example, when you see the fuel gauge in your car, you take action. That gauge is a tool for your benefit and not some evil thing that only bears bad news. A fuel gauge saying you are full is good news. Throwing away or painting over the gauge won’t make the bad juju go away.
You learn a lot when thrown into a crisis situation, where everyone is looking to you for answers. The system is down, the CEO is pleading to you for answers, as each minute of downtime further cuts into the company’s bottom line. You can almost hear the fiscal charts turning upside down. The simple fix you thought would work when you received the call will not fix the scenario you’ve just walked into. In a hurry, you need new ideas right away.
The seconds you spend scratching your head surrounded by six panicking people can seem like hours. Once you find the answers, you will remember them for a long time and be better equipped to help your next client group. The good news is you can learn some of these answers by reading. When you encounter the same situations, you will know exactly what to do.
Let this book be your helpful tool in your work. When used correctly, it can help you can determine solutions relating to these relatively simple (yet lesser known) areas of SQL Server. It has been polished and tuned for your use and benefit. In fact, this is the book I really wished was in my possession prior to some of those not-so-fun days I’ve just described.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Introduction to Wait Stats
Chapter 2. Querying Wait Stats
Chapter 3. Parallel Execution
Chapter 4. Multi-Tasking Waits
Chapter 5. IO Waits
Chapter 6. Backup and Restore Waits
Chapter 7. Locking Waits
Chapter 8. Database Log Waits
Chapter 9. Waits on External Resources
Chapter 10. DBCC SQLPERF
Chapter 11. Best References
