This is a quick post to announce that we’ve designed a cool new SQL Server conference, where we control all aspects of the show (including the speakers, the sessions, the workshops, the format, the schedule, and everything else) to make sure you get the best possible conference experience and the best possible return on your [...]
Paul S. Randal
In Recovery...
SQLintersection: your new SQL Server conference
Posted on: February 5, 2013 10:31 am
New conference for developers in December
Posted on: November 6, 2012 2:09 pm
This isn't a SQL Server related post, but I wanted to let you know about a new conference that's starting in December. It's being run by our good friends at .NET Rocks!, SSWUG, and DevIntersection. It's called DevIntersection and will focus on Visual Studio, ASP.NET, and Windows Azure, with cross-over into a bunch of other [...]
SQLskills at SQL Connections in October
Posted on: August 10, 2012 9:12 am
The SQL Connections Fall show will be in Las Vegas again this year, October 28th through November 2nd. We’ve put together another great show (Kimberly and I are the Conference Co-Chairs), and Kimberly, Jonathan, and I will be there. Here’s the line-up of SQLskills workshops and sessions: Full-day workshops 10/28: SPR201: Leveraging SQL Server 2012 [...]
SQL Connections Fall 2012: Call for Abstracts
Posted on: March 13, 2012 5:46 am
Yes, it's that time again. We're just about to have the Spring show so its time to start planning for the Fall 2012 show. Once again Kimberly and I will be Co-Chairs of the Conference and we'd like to invite you to submit abstracts for the Fall 2012 SQL Connections conference, to be held in [...]
SQLskills at SQL Server Connections in March
Posted on: February 23, 2012 3:04 pm
In a month's time SQL Server 2012 will launch and one of the main events will be the annual SQL Server Connections – this year in Las Vegas, March 26-29. See here for registration details. We've put together another great show (Kimberly and I are the conference co-chairs) and Kimberly, Jonathan, and I will all [...]
SQLskills at PASS and Connections in October
Posted on: July 24, 2011 11:30 am
The Fall conferences are a little earlier this year – October rather than November – and we'll be at both PASS and SQL Connections. We hope to see you there! PASS Summit This year's PASS Summit is in Seattle again from October 11-14 – see here for registration details. Kimberly and I decided not to submit [...]
Connections conferences in Germany and UK in June
Posted on: May 14, 2011 8:41 am
If you didn’t get a chance to sign up for our Immersion Event in London before it sold out last week, there’s still a way to come learn from Kimberly and I in Europe in June: 8 – 10 June, Karlsruhe, Germany 13 – 15 June, London, UK We’re doing the same sessions and workshop [...]
PASS Performance VC recording and slides on index fragmentation available
Posted on: January 19, 2011 9:19 am
Yesterday I presented my lecture Index Fragmentation: The Hidden Menace for the PASS Performance Virtual Chapter. The recording of the session, plus a PDF of my slides, and the demo scripts are now available from the PASS website. Check it out here (look for January 18, 2011). Enjoy!
SQLskills.com takes 5 of the top-10 sessions at PASS 2010
Posted on: January 19, 2011 5:24 am
PASS 2010 was a resounding success – the best ever PASS according to most. We at SQLskills.com have even more reason to celebrate as it was the best ever PASS for us too! We're very proud of the fact that we had 5 sessions in the top-10, taking 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 7th, and 9th place. [...]
SQLskills crew at SQL Connections in March
Posted on: January 17, 2011 11:58 am
The spring conferences are creeping up on us and there will be four of us at SQL Connections in Orlando, March 27-30 (me, Kimberly, Bob, and Brent). Here's what we're doing: Workshops 3/27: Day of Scripting: Plumbing The Depths of SQL Server / PowerShell Integration (Bob Beauchemin) 3/27: The Building Blocks of a Healthy and Available [...]
Configuring SSMS for presenting
Posted on: November 11, 2010 5:43 pm
A few people have asked over the last few days how Kimberly and I have SSMS set up for presenting so I thought I'd do a quick blog post explaining what we do. The first thing is to go download ZoomIt so that you can zoom in the screen and people can see the details. [...]
SQL Connections Spring 2011: Call for Abstracts
Posted on: October 13, 2010 7:52 pm
Yes, it's that time again. We're just about to have the Fall show so its time to start planning for the Spring 2011 show. Once again Kimberly and I will be Co-Chairs of the Conference and we'd like to invite you to submit abstracts for the Spring 2011 SQL Connections conference, to be held in Orlando, March 27th [...]
We’ll be at PASS in November – will you?
Posted on: July 9, 2010 3:57 am
This November Brent, Kimberly and I will be at the PASS Summit in Seattle as usual doing workshops and Spotlight Sessions (90 minute sessions to dive deeply into a subject). The PASS Summit is an excellent learning, networking and socializing event – we always have a great fun! Here's what SQLskills will be doing and we really [...]
SQL Connections Fall 2010: Call for Abstracts
Posted on: April 19, 2010 7:21 am
Yes, it's that time again. We've just completed the Spring show so its time to start planning for the Fall 2010 show. Once again Kimberly and I will be Co-Chairs of the Conference and we'd like to invite you to submit abstracts for the Fall 2010 SQL Connections conference, to be held in Las Vegas, November 1st – [...]
Date changes for SQL Connections and Boston public class
Posted on: January 4, 2010 1:15 pm
Due to some Microsoft date changes, the Spring SQL Connections show had to move to the week of April 12th. As a knock-on effect – and believe me, there were a bunch for us! – the public class Immersion Event we're doing in Boston had to move out of that week, and is now two [...]
SQLskills crew at Spring conferences
Posted on: December 3, 2009 9:16 am
My goodness – no sooner are we done with one crazy conference season when planning starts for the next lot! We've just finalized the line-up for two conferences in the Spring: DevTeach in Toronto and SQL Connections in Las Vegas (changing it's name for this one event to Microsoft SQL Server Conference and Expo). This [...]
SQL PASS interview with Jen and Sean McCown
Posted on: November 16, 2009 5:08 pm
(Reposting from Kimberly's blog) At PASS we hung out with Sean McCown and Jen McCown (of MidnightDBA) and chatted… and, despite our better judgement, agreed to do an interview. These aren't overly technical but they are fun! Part 1 of 2: http://midnightdba.itbookworm.com/VidPages/DBAsAtMidnightTripps1of2/DBAsAtMidnightTripps1of2.aspx Part 2 of 2: http://midnightdba.itbookworm.com/VidPages/DBAsAtMidnightTripps2of2/DBAsAtMidnightTripps2of2.aspx And, our favorite "travel tip" from the video is [...]
SQL Connections Fall resources uploaded
Posted on: November 14, 2009 1:42 pm
We're sitting here in the Las Vegas airport on the way home to Seattle for 3 whole weeks and I've just finished uploading the resources for the SQL Connections conference that ended yesterday. On our Past Events page I've uploaded zip files for: Our joint pre-con on database maintenance Kimberly's post-con on indexing My session [...]
Australia and PASS resources and wrapup
Posted on: November 10, 2009 4:33 pm
Today's our rest day here at SQL Connections and one of the things on my list is to post all the resources from our recent events. On our Past Events page I've uploaded zip files for: Kimberly's 4-day performance tuning class in Melbourne My 4-day maintenance/DR class in Melbourne Kimberly's pre-con at PASS on indexing [...]
Busy week coming up at the 2009 PASS Summit
Posted on: November 1, 2009 12:08 pm
It's PASS time again in Seattle and we've got a busy week lined up. It's going to be a cavalcade of meeting new people, and in the best tradition of conferences past, I'll do my best to remember most people's names who I met last year but please don't be offended if I don't, give me [...]
Australian classes start next week, and the Fall conferences
Posted on: October 7, 2009 11:33 am
We're part-way through the Fall conference season, and in the middle of teaching week 1 of the current Microsoft Certified Master – SQL class. At the weekend we head off to Australia to teach some public classes in Melbourne – last chance to sign up for them! Here's what we have coming up: October 15-16. [...]
Fall line-up of classes and conferences
Posted on: August 19, 2009 10:53 am
We've finally nailed down the dates for all our Fall classes and conferences around the world. Here's the plan: September 21-25. Kimberly and I will be teaching a week-long Immersion Event in Dublin, Ireland - combining internals, performance tuning, database maintenance and more. September 29-30. Kimberly and I will be presenting a full day of SQL Server sessions [...]
Paul and Kimberly will be at PASS in November
Posted on: May 28, 2009 2:55 pm
Cool news – the pre/post-con workshops and spotlight sessions acceptance emails came out this week and we're both going to be there. We've booked our hotel all week even though we live 15 miles away in Redmond so we can be party animals too :-) I could write a long post about why PASS is [...]
SQL Connections Fall 2009: Call for Abstracts
Posted on: March 15, 2009 1:24 pm
Yes, it's that time again (well a little bit earlier than usual). With the Spring SQL Server Connections show coming up next week, its time to start planning for the Fall 2009 show. Once again Kimberly and I will be Co-Chairs of the Conference and we'd like to invite you to submit abstracts for the [...]
Coming up fast: SQL Connections Spring 2009 – indexes!
Posted on: January 29, 2009 2:10 am
This year it looks like we’re not going to be involved in TechEd US in May so the SQL Connections show in Orlando in March (21-26) will be the best way to pick up some of our training in the first half of the year. We are planning to do some Immersion events in various locations [...]
TechEd demo: nonclustered index corruption
Posted on: December 17, 2008 11:03 am
This blog post describes the demo "2 – NC Indexes" from my Corruption Survival Techniques conference session from various conferences in 2008. The links to the scripts and databases to use are in this blog post. Edit 6/4/2012: Be aware that in versions of SQL Server from 2008 onwards, you may only be able to [...]
TechEd: 80 minute video of Corruption Survival Techniques presentation
Posted on: December 5, 2008 6:14 am
For those of you who couldn't make it to a conference this year where I presented my Corruption Survival Techniques session, the folks at TechEd EMEA have just posted an 80 minute long video of the presentation I did in Barcelona in early November. It walks through I/O errors, what CHECKDB does, how it works, [...]
TechEd demo: corruptions fatal to DBCC CHECKDB
Posted on: November 30, 2008 5:37 pm
This blog post describes the demo “1 – Fatal Errors” from my Corruption Survival Techniques conference session from various conferences in 2008. The links to the scripts and databases to use are in this blog post. The aim of this demo is to show that sometimes a database is so corrupt that DBCC CHECKDB just [...]
Paul and Kimberly TechNet Radio interview from PASS
Posted on: November 25, 2008 10:44 am
While we were at PASS we hooked up with Eric Ostrowski from TechNet Radio to do an interview. Eric's compiled a bunch of interviews from PASS into a 36 minute broadcast which is now live. Our section starts about 26 minutes in and runs to the end (but if you have time its worth listening [...]
Conference corruption demo scripts and example corrupt databases
Posted on: November 24, 2008 11:27 am
This blog post explains the demo scripts and databases I've posted to cover all the Corruption Survival Techniques and DBCC CHECKDB sessions I've presented at conferences this year. There are two zip files you need to download: the example corrupt databases (36-MB zip) (and this one if you're on 2008) and the demo scripts. These [...]
Conference season over and all the scripts are posted
Posted on: November 24, 2008 10:14 am
Wow – that was a bit of a wild ride! Another conference season is over and we're in the wind down to vacation time – woooo! This has been our best set of conferences yet – if you haven't been following the blog, in the last 5 weeks, starting out Monday 10/20, we: Delivered 5 [...]
Dev Connections newsletter
Posted on: September 10, 2008 7:29 am
At the last Connections conference in April, the conference organizers tapped a bunch of speakers for interviews, articles, and other content to put into a free “newsletter” called MyDevConnections, and now it’s finally available. It covers all the Connections conferences, so isn’t just limited to SQL Server. As far as SQL is concerned, Kimberly and [...]
SQL Connections Spring 2009: Call for Abstracts
Posted on: August 13, 2008 3:10 pm
Yes, it’s that time again (well a little bit earlier than usual). With the Fall SQL Server Connections show coming up soon, its time to start planning for the Spring 2009 show. Once again Kimberly and I will be Co-Chairs of the Conference and we’d like to invite you to submit abstracts for the Spring [...]
TechEd Online Panel Video: Building a Solid High-Availability Strategy
Posted on: July 21, 2008 6:00 pm
While we were at TechEd in June, Kimberly and I participated in an hour-long discussion panel (Leveraging SQL Server Technologies to Build a Solid High-Availability Strategy) that was video-taped by the TechEd Online folks. It’s now been edited and is available for download/viewing. We cover everything from requirements analysis to technology details in SQL Server [...]
2008 Conferences: TechEd EMEA, SQL Connections, PASS Community Summit
Posted on: July 10, 2008 9:49 pm
September, October, and November are going to be a whirlwind this year – after 3 weeks in the UK and Ireland in September, teaching and the San Francisco Power Workshop in October, we have three back-to-back conference weeks in Barcelona, Las Vegas, and back to Seattle! Hey – who booked that schedule?!?!?! Well, at least it helps us keep our [...]
Dev Connections SQL Power Workshop on SQL Server 2008, October, San Francisco
Posted on: July 10, 2008 7:07 pm
People have been complaining that I’ve stopped blogging so much – vacation folks, vacation! Today I’ve got a few class and conference posts to get through and then I’ll get back to the technical posts. We’re doing a 2.5 day public class based on the SQL Server 2008 material we developed earlier this year. This will [...]
Another year, another TechEd over…
Posted on: June 19, 2008 10:30 pm
TechEd US is done for another year! As I mentioned before, we did a lot of stuff but still found time to chill by the pool a few times in the Speaker Hotel. This was my first US TechEd since leaving Microsoft last year so it was quite interesting seeing the organizational side of things from [...]
Using the Dedicated Admin Connection to fix Msg 8992: corrupt system tables
Posted on: June 12, 2008 1:42 am
Today I presented my brand new session Surviving Corruption: From Detection to Recovery at TechEd. I had a lot of fun putting together the demos, presenting the session, and talking to people afterwards. During the session, I promised to blog each of the demos so that everyone can run through them – here's the first one. [...]
Off to TechEd US ITPro tomorrow!
Posted on: June 5, 2008 9:26 pm
That time has rolled around again and we’re flying down to Orlando for TechEd US tomorrow – my first US TechEd since I left Microsoft. We’re doing a lot of stuff this year – here’s our schedule if you’re going to be there: Monday Full day pre-con seminar: SQL Server 2008 Overview for DBAs Tuesday [...]
Feedback on SQL Connections?
Posted on: April 23, 2008 8:58 pm
Today’s the final day of SQL Connections proper (tomorrow is post-conference workshops). We’ve really enjoyed the conference (as usual!) and it’s been a blast answering everyone’s questions. We’ll be posting resources over the next week or so (most likely on Kimberly’s blog) and we did a video interview with our good friends Richard and Carl [...]
SQL Server Magazine Connections Fall 2008 Call For Abstracts
Posted on: March 10, 2008 9:29 pm
(Cross-posted on Paul and Kimberly’s blogs) With the Spring SQL Server Connections show coming up next month, its time to start planning for the Fall show. Once again Kimberly and I will be Co-Chairs of the Conference and we’d like to invite you to submit abstracts for the Fall 2008 SQL Connections conference, to be [...]
Conferences coming up: SQL Connections in April and TechEd US in June
Posted on: February 25, 2008 4:11 am
SQL Connections is in less than two months now and our pre-con and post-con workshops are filling up fast – checkout my previous blog post here for the full list of what we’re presenting. Now we’ve finalized our TechEd US sessions with Microsoft and can let you all know that we’re going to be there [...]
SQL Server 2008 JumpStart
Posted on: February 15, 2008 12:38 am
Phew – last week Kimberly and I spent 3 days teaching the ins-and-outs of SQL Server 2008 for DBAs/IT-Pros to about 130 Microsoft SQL Server experts and MVPs (like Kalen Delaney, Adam Machanic and Ron Talmage). This was the (95% complete) Beta delivery of a course we’ve been developing for the last six months for Microsoft [...]
Coming up soon: SQL Server Magazine Spring 2008 Conference
Posted on: January 3, 2008 10:58 pm
No sooner has Fall conference season finished then it’s New Year and we start everything all over again! SQLskills (Me, Kimberly, Bob, and Stacia) is doing a *ton* of stuff at SQL Connections this Spring. The conference is in Orlando as usual and runs from April 20th to 23rd, with pre-con workshops on the 20th. [...]
Paul and Kimberly interview on RunAs Radio – What’s New in SQL Server 2008?
Posted on: December 12, 2007 6:07 pm
While we were in Barcelona we sat down with Richard Campbell and Greg Hughes from RunAs Radio to record a 1/2 hour interview on SQL Server 2008. We touch on a ton of different features (look at the number of Categories I’ve tagged this with!) and have a bunch of laughs along the way – [...]
Downtime…
Posted on: November 20, 2007 6:36 am
With the class we taught yesterday in Zurich for Microsoft, Kimberly and I have just finished almost three weeks of continuous travelling and presenting at conferences. Now we’re taking some time off to relax and recharge. My blog will be silent until Monday 26th November, when I’ll start posting some cool articles with example scripts [...]
Conference season over again – phew!
Posted on: November 18, 2007 3:05 pm
It’s been a very tough couple of weeks for us with back-to-back conferences in Las Vegas and Barcelona. Now we’re in Zurich for a few days before heading back to Redmond for the rest of the year. TechEd IT Forum was probably the most tiring conference I’ve ever done – we did 12 sessions between [...]
Kimberly & Paul interview with SSWUG TV
Posted on: November 18, 2007 2:49 pm
On the last day of SQL Connections a couple of weeks back we did a 20 minute TV interview with Steve Wynkoop of SSWUG. Apart from the mandatory mention of our favorite game Blokus, we discussed a bunch of new features coming in SQL Server 2008 while I struggled not to say ‘we’ instead of ‘they’ [...]
Kimberly & Paul interview from TechEd IT Forum
Posted on: November 13, 2007 2:42 pm
(Oops – deleted this by accident – re-entering it.) Day 1 for us here in Barcelona was pretty tiring. After flying in from Seattle on Monday, and waking up with jet-lag on Tuesday at 2am, we did 4 sessions during the day, with 8 more to go by Friday. By the time we got back [...]
Conference Questions Pot-Pourri #1: Indexes, stats, corruption, and Enterprise-only features
Posted on: November 5, 2007 3:01 am
As promised, here’s the first of the grab-bag of questions we were asked during conferences. I’m blogging a selection of the stuff I noted down. These are some of the questions we were asked during our pre-con at SQL Connections on Database Maintenance: From Planning to Practice to Post-Mortem. It was cool that people came prepared [...]
And we’re off – Fall conference season begins!
Posted on: November 3, 2007 10:26 pm
After all the build-up over the last few weeks (putting finishing touches to decks and demos), we’re finally off to the last set of conferences for the year. First up is SQL Connections in Las Vegas, with over 5000 attendees!!. We flew down yesterday from Seattle to hang out for an extra few days before the conference, as [...]
Conferences: updated events page listing ALL the team’s sessions for November
Posted on: October 21, 2007 9:35 pm
Two weeks to go until the conferences start… I've revamped the main Upcoming Events page on SQLskills.com to list all the DBA/IT-Pro, Developer, and BI sessions we're collectively doing at SQL Connections Fall, Microsoft TechEd Developers, Microsoft TechEd IT Forum, and a Microsoft TechNet Deep-Dive in November. (Now that I've finished my Lego model, what [...]
SQL Server Magazine Connections Spring 2008 Call For Presentations
Posted on: October 5, 2007 1:27 am
With the November 5-9th SQL Connections conference in Las Vegas around the corner, Shirley Brothers, the Connections Conference Manager, would like to start planning the Spring show. From the Spring show onwards, Kimberly and I will be the co-chairs of the SQL Connections conference. We would like to invite you to submit abstracts for the [...]
Coming to Connections in November? Send us your questions and win a prize!
Posted on: October 4, 2007 9:19 pm
Are you coming to SQL Connections in November? If you are, and you’re coming to either of our interactive sessions, we invite you to send us questions in advance that we will pick from and answer during the sessions. The two sessions are: SDB351: Follow the Rabbit – Interactive Q&A on Availability In this session, Kimberly Tripp [...]
Coming up soon: TechEd IT Forum 2007
Posted on: October 3, 2007 3:58 pm
November’s going to be a busy month for Kimberly and I! Hot on the heels of SQL Connections in Las Vegas is the yearly pilgrimage to Barcelona for TechEd IT Forum and this year we’re packing in a ton of sessions in between us. Here’s what we’re doing: Sessions (DAT205) The [...]
Coming up soon: SQL Server Magazine Connections conference
Posted on: September 19, 2007 11:41 pm
The Fall conference season is on us again! Building on the great reaction to our co-presented Database Maintenance workshop at SQL Connections in Orlando, Kimberly and I are doing a *ton* of stuff at SQL Connections this Fall. The conference is in Las Vegas (where I’ve never been!) and runs from November 5th to [...]
