T-SQL Tuesday #83: Roundup

For this month’s T-SQL Tuesday, I asked people to blog about the same old problems we’ve been dealing with for years. There were some great posts, including a batch of first-time contributors. You’ll notice some overlapping themes as you read through these responses–I think those themes represent some of the biggest, most important problems we have (like being able to restore backups). Thanks for everyone who contributed this month!

A warm welcome to the first-time contributors

• Marek Maśko shares that in the 8 years he have been using SQL Server, we’re still dealing with a lack of cooperation. This is so true. All too often, people work against each other instead of working with each other. Marek has some interesting examples from his work, and some thoughts on making it better.
• Mike Kane writes about the lack of documentation. I used to work with Mike, so I hope he’s not talking about my code. He reminds us to document code, architecture, and requirements not just for others, but also for our future selves.
• Alex Yates talks about how we’re terrible at delivering databases. If you’ve ever had to deploy someone else’s database, you probably agree. If you’ve had to upgrade someone else’s database, you definitely agree.

Thanks for coming back, veteran blog partiers

• Malathi Mahadevan writes about that recurring problem when someone comes to you with the problem “This query just stopped working,“
• Rob Farley‘s post is all about secrets. Specifically, he writes about Passwords – A secret you have no right to share.
• Ken Fisher embarks down a philosophical thought experiment when he asks If backups are taken in silence, can recovery still take place?
• Steve Jones also writes about backups when he reminds us that many of us still don’t restore. Backups are great and all, but if you don’t test restoring them, you are setting yourself up for problems.
• Dave Mason offers his own thought experiment for us, when he tackles the chicken-and-egg issue of systems monitoring systems.
• Kevin Hill urges us to pause before clicking “next, next, next, next” on that installation wizard in his post about blindly clicking OK and accepting the defaults
• Chris Yates has a laundry list of problems that he runs through, looking at this from all different angles. My favorite Jeopardy category is “Potpourri,” so I’m in love with this approach to the challenge.
• Matt Gordon blogs about communication, with the age-old question: Can’t We All Just Get Along?
• Björn Peters discusses the challenges of supporting many databases with many different requirements, including the third-party apps that insist on installing old SQL Server versions.
• Riley Major stands on his soapbox to bring us together so we can get the SSMS grid out of the stone age.
• Robert Davis gives a blow-by-blow on how capping CPU in Resource Governor doesn’t quite work, even after three attempts to get it right.
• Chris Sommer doesn’t focus on what we’re doing wrong, but why we’re still having the same problems. He urges us to double-tap our problems to fix them long term.
• Anders Pedersen writes about what he calls spec fixation. Closely following specs is great, but blindly following specs is a huge problem.
• Andy Levy must have been a boy scout, because he urges us to leave the database better than we found it. Why leave well enough alone?
• David Alcock is one of the bloggers who brought up a people problem, rather than a tech problem in discussing people who make very important SQL Server decisions without knowing much about SQL Server.