Webcast – Register Now and Send In Your Questions…
Learn about managing your SQL Server data recovery vulnerabilities
In this session we’ll look into the different options you have available to protect your SQL Server investment. Learn about backup and restore, log shipping, replication and other tools you can use to help reduce risk. Find out what is involved, the pros and cons and where you can go to learn more about each option.
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> Live date: 2/25/2009
Featured Article(s)
How to avoid reading opened .CSV files
This Article is for those SSIS people who have worked with .CSV files and had faced a similar situation as me. This will describe how to avoid reading and moving, opened .CSV files.
PowerPoint Slides Directly from Reporting Services?
Did you know you can now export PowerPoint presentations directly from SQL Server Reporting Services? Aspose.Slides for SSRS is a third party rendering extension which provides the functionality. The product was built around the Microsoft RDL standard so there is no extra customization or work to be done. You can literally install the product and within minutes export PowerPoint reports; it provides instant return on your purchase cost. You can download a free evaluation version from their website.
Interviewing? Some Tips…
Not the "these are the answers to the questions" type tips – just rational, "be aware" type tips. I was reading Brent Ozar’s blog (here) about his quick experience with interviews – got a kick out of the response for some of the interviewees. I’ve actually seen some of these too.
Some other things to keep in mind:
– Don’t apply for every job that comes along. Especially don’t apply for every job at a given employer. Believe me, there are systems in place that point out the multiple applications. While you may think it’s persistence, it can come across as "I don’t care what I do, just please hire me!" to the potential employer, which lowers your stock with that employer right off the bat. They want specific, applicable experience.
– Not qualified? Don’t apply. You’re working with databases – don’t apply for that accounting job. Wait for the right position – if you’re having trouble finding positions to apply for, cast a bigger net – look into more companies, more locations, more related but still applicable professions. You’ve worked with databases in the administration area? Great! How about not just admin, but also optimization, best practices/compliance work, design, etc. Each of these are components of a position, or even a specific position in some companies. If you apply for positions you’re not qualified for, you just annoy the company and can end up on the "oh no, not J. Smith applying again!" list.
– Polish your skills. Stay up on technologies. Up on SQL Server 2000 and 2005? Excellent. Get the eval version of 2008 and polish your knowledge of the UI, the new approaches, new terminology or even just simply look and feel so you can be sure to be able to work with it at a new position. Look for the differences in versions, you can focus on the changes, keep up on the constant things between versions and save a lot of time not re-learning things that have not changed.
– Read. A lot. Learn about things that are going on – from issues encountered (injection, encryption, disaster recovery, etc.) and what was done that was right, wrong and so-on. Learn from articles so you can apply those lessons-learned and talk about them with an interviewer.
– Customize your application on a case-by-case basis. Your objective is not "find a job where I can contribute" – it should be much more specific to what you like and what you’ll contribute to the position you’re applying for.
– Learning about the company ahead of time and especially prior to an interview is no longer a nicety, it’s a requirement. Show you care, find out about the company, as much as you can, ahead of time so you can ask questions. Don’t be shy about what you understand about the company. Ask questions, it shows you’re paying attention.
There are more – if you’re interested, or have your own suggestions, please let me know and we’ll keep this information coming.
Featured White Paper(s)
Protecting Microsoft SQL in Physical and Virtual Environments
If you are involved with managing Microsoft SQL Server applications, you’ll want to download this paper to learn: – The pri… (read more)