8 Weeks of Inexes: Intro

SQL Padre 8 Weeks of Indexes

This is the first post in a series of 8 posts about indexes. I hope to introduce you to the different types of indexes, different way to determine index effectiveness and overall hopefully learn something myself.

I have outlined the next few weeks of the topics of my posts:

  1. Introduction (this post)
  2. What is an Index?
  3. Types of Indexes?
  4. Structure of an Index
  5. Determining what indexes your database has right now!
  6. Are current index effective?  What makes effective indexes?
  7. Management of Indexes: They are not “set it and forget it!”
  8. What I’ve learned

Indexes are vital to SQL Engine efficency. Proper indexes are essential to SQL Engine efficiency. In posts 2-4 I will explain all I know about what an index is supposed to and how to create them.

Incorrect indexes or too many indexes can have a negative affect on performance as well. In posts 5 and 6 I hope to show you how to determined your database index needs to help your queries run as efficient as possible.

In the 7th post, I hope to show you quick and easy ways to manage your indexes, because proper index management is as essential as creating the correct indexes.

and of course, I will wrap the series up with the 8th posts. If I stay true to my word, the 2nd post of this series will be in 2 weeks. I am alternating one post a week with my “Back-2-Basics” series as well.

Revisiting and Restarting

SQL Padre SQL

Today is a new day. I now have a domain (http://sqlpadre.com) and I now have an email address Robert@sqlpadre.com and I hope this is a new beginning. This morning I revisited my old blog posts and discovered that I am not very consistent at blogging. In fact I was pretty terrible. I hope to change that.

Many years ago, I tried to begin two different blogging series called “B2B: Back to Basics” and “8 Weeks of Indexes”. These series were stared over 6 years ago and completely lost steam…translation I dropped the ball. Couple that with the fact two new versions of SQL have been released plus SQL Database in Azure, my blog is way behind the time.

I hope this is truly the beginning of a new chapter for me. I hope to restart both these series, producing one post a week alternating the topics. I have even set reminders.

The first post will be an introduction to both topics and provide an outline of the up coming posts (hey, I’m trying to stay organized).

Quarantining is HARD!

SQL Padre SQL

For the last year (almost to the date), I have been working from home. At first I thought it would be temporary. I thought it would be “neat”. I thought I could be more productive since I would not be driving 2+ hours a day. Boy was I wrong!

Let me set the record straight, quarantining is HARD! Harder than going to the office. I do enjoy not being on the road for 2+ hours a day and I do enjoy not spending $150 in gas week (I drive a truck). Staying focused is not easy when you have 4 cats vying for your attention.

In November, I started a job with a new company that hired me as 100% remote. So, it seems I will be “quarantining” even after the quarantine period is over.

But, I am also going to do my best to get back on the preverible horse and ride! I do enjoy blogging and I have a tremendous amount of learning to do when it comes to PowerShell and Azure Cloud technologies.

In the coming week, I hope to outline a blogging goal for the next 3 months (baby steps). Hopefully, I can stick with this since I have 2 extra hours a week, right?

I hope to also get back involved in presenting topics to virtual groups, in person groups and conferences. Keep a loog out, you might find me here soon Data Architecture Virtual Group (davg.org). But, first comes baby step #1: time table/outline for blogging!

stay tuned.

Don’t forget me when I’m gone!

SQL Padre SQL

It has been almost exactly one year since my last post and quite frankly, I am embarassed, ashamed and down right just feeling close to failure.

But I hope to change that!

My last post announced that I was going to document my learning with PowerShell. Since then, SQL 2019 has been released and there are so many new “toys” with SQL! But before I go into that, I really must finish what I started.

Today, I not only downloaded SQL 2019 Developer Edition to install, but I also actually installed DB Tools for PowerShell!!!

Let’s get this Party Started!!!