A non-technical post on how I balance SQL Server training and consultancy, plus the story of my last 30 days of sessions and travel.
SQL SERVER – Stored Procedure and Transactions
Is a stored procedure transactional by itself? No. A simple example with three tables shows why stored procedure and transactions are separate things.
SQL SERVER – Precision of SMALLDATETIME – A 1 Minute Precision
The precision of SMALLDATETIME is 1 minute. Seconds are rounded up or down to the nearest minute, and this simple example shows exactly how.
geometry STUnion: Merge the Shared Area Only Once
geometry STUnion merges geometry coverage. These exact-coordinate rectangles distinguish a combined area from the sum of two areas, including duplicate coverage.
REGEXP_INSTR: Locate a Match or a Capture Group
REGEXP_INSTR returns the position of a selected regular-expression match or capture group. I compare its positional arguments using one short string. This example needs SQL Server 2025 and database compatibility level 170.
SQL Error Riddles: Parent Keys Not Found and Other Classics
SQL error riddles have been passed around for years. Here are the classics, told kindly, with the real SQL Server error behind each punchline.
SQL SERVER – Disabled Index and Update Statistics
A reader asked how disabled indexes affect statistics. With the clustered index disabled, Update Statistics throws an error; see what happens once you enable it.