How to check for an update in SSMS depends on the installed generation. My fintech-customer walkthrough showed SSMS 18 settings.
SQL SERVER Management Studio 18 – Enable Dark Theme
We are all techies and we love to use a dark theme in our IDEs. I get quite often a question about how to enable dark theme in SQL Server Management Studio.
SQL SERVER Management Studio – Completion Time in Messages
When the queries end, we know how long the query ran from the duration of the query but we never know their completion time.
In-Memory OLTP Migration Checklist: Which Features Block You
An In-Memory OLTP migration checklist from SSMS lists the tables and procedures the engine will refuse. This post tests those refusals on SQL Server 2025, shows which old limits are gone, and adds a query that finds blockers in your own database.
Actual Execution Plan in SQL Server: Graphical, Text and XML
An actual execution plan shows how SQL Server really ran a query, with the true row counts beside the estimates. This post gets the plan three ways, as a graphical plan, as text with SET STATISTICS PROFILE and as XML, and uses a demo table to show how the estimate and the actual number can disagree.
SQL SERVER – Query Specific Wait Statistics and Performance Tuning
Query Specific Wait Statistics helped explain a sudden customer-query slowdown. The remaining workload ran normally, and recompilation had not helped.
Availability Group Restore Error When You Add a Database
The availability group restore error appears when automatic seeding and a manual restore both fill the same secondary. The post explains the cause, shows read-only checks for the seeding mode and the replica roles, and gives the fix with its undo.