We had 241 attendees, an increase over last year. It’s been exciting to watch the Wisconsin SQL Server community grow over the past five years. Once upon a time we had one user group; now we have four, and have held two of these events. Many people have thanked us for bringing the community to this area!

We delivered 44 hours of free training throughout the day. To me, that's incredible. The primary objective of a SQL Saturday is to bring free training to a large group of people. If you’re planning a SQL Saturday, remember this – every goal should tie back to that objective. It’s hard for a DBA or developer to get approval and money to go to a week-long training class or conference. But there are many people who realize the value of investing in their career, and they are coming to these events. Those people are the reason I do this, year after year.

We couldn’t have training without people to deliver it. 34 speakers traveled from all over Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Ohio, Texas, Washington, Winnipeg, and even the UK- quite a diverse group!

But for me, the most exciting and fulfilling part of the day was having six of these speakers be first-time SQL Saturday speakers. SIX! These are people that had started with presentations to co-workers and user groups, and were ready to jump into a bigger pond. That can be a scary experience. I’m so glad that we were able to provide the environment for them to do it, and have it be warm, encouraging, supportive. I’m glad they all had excellent audiences who paid attention, asked questions, and gave them feedback.

I can’t wait to do this again in 2014!

Here's a peek at our first-time speakers! (My deepest apologies to Jennifer Salvo, whose session I missed while cleaning up for the day.)

Frank Gill kicks off the day talking about the transaction log

Leonard Murphy had the crowd learning and laughing at the end of the day

Ken Stuber rounded out the day with a talk about SSDT

Gill Rowley presented to a packed room

Jim Dorame talks PowerShell and PSX - his first presentation ever!

Standing up in front of a room of people and talking, especially on a technical topic, can induce nightmares. Think about everything that could go wrong. Your laptop could stop working. Your demos could fail. You could forget everything you were going to say. You could fall off the stage. (Oh, no, that’s just me.)

But once you get past the fear, you’ll realize that presenting is pure joy. You get to teach other people. You get to share your knowledge. You get to see people’s eyes light up when they “get it”. It’s very rewarding.

The best way to deal with the nerves and the fears is to follow the Boy Scout motto: Be Prepared. Presenting is about more than the 60 or 75 minutes you are on stage. It takes preparation.

We’ll take a look at some of the important steps that I take to help me be successful in speaking.  Some tips, if you will, on the pure joy of speaking.

Craft the Presentation

Take time to carefully craft your presentation. You will have a better end product, and will be less frustrated, if you sit down and write out the goals of the presentation – before you write the first slide or demo. You’ll know what you want to talk about, and can refer back to them.  After writing a few of these, you’ll find how much easier it makes writing the presentation altogether.

Build your slides and demos thoroughly and test them every way you can imagine. Be aware of how to create good presentations, and make sure your demos are technically accurate.  Imagine your demos are running in production.  Make them as stable and solid as possible.

Make sure you have a good opening and closing. An opening will draw the audience in and encourage them to stay for the entire presentation. A good closing will wrap up everything you talked about and give the audience a call to action.

Practice, Practice, Practice

I am not saying you have to know every word. If your presentation sounds canned or rote, it won’t interest people either. But you need to know how your presentation will flow.  There is nothing worse than a presenter reading the next slide word for word before saying anything, because she doesn’t know what she’s talking about. (I’ve seen it happen.)

I try to have the first five minutes of every presentation down flat. That helps with nerves. (Yes, I still get nervous every time I present. I consider that a good thing.) But if I can get through the first few minutes, where I introduce myself and my topic, and find out more about the audience, I am calm enough to get through the rest.

You need to know your demos, and know them well. Have them prepared, and tested. As both a presenter and an attendee, I can’t stand unexpected errors. As a presenter, if a demo fails, you have to be able to let go. Don’t hang on to that thought, trying to fix what’s wrong. Move on. For the sanity of your audience, don’t try to fix it then and there.

How I Practice

When I’m preparing a presentation, after I’ve written the slides and demos, I run through it, start to finish. I have a text document open on my computer and I note what I think was rough, where I might need to adjust a script, what needs to be thrown out, and what can be added in. I time myself. Then I go through, make the adjustments, and practice again. I’ll do this until I’m satisfied it’s a good presentation. The day before or day of, I open the slides and demos and take a quick peek at them so they are fresh in my mind.

The more technical a topic is, the more time I’ll spend on those tasks. However, I give the same attention to every presentation, because every one is important. People come to learn from me. I want to teach them, and I want to present myself well. It takes practice and there is an acquired amount of skill to it.  But that skill can be achieved with work.

Deliver

If you’ve prepared your presentation by giving careful thought to the flow, practicing and timing, and writing good demos, you’ll be successful. Simply, be prepared.

Now get your ass out there, write a session, and deliver it at a user group, SQL Saturday or go for the mountain peak and submit to PASS Summit!

What are you waiting for?

One of my goals with the chapter is to try out new, exciting ideas. One of my favorite community projects is to grow the pool of speakers. I thought, “How can I combine these two?” I decided to try an Open Mic night – anyone could sign up to talk about any SQL-related topic for 5-10 minutes. I encouraged our members to talk about anything they enjoyed, their favorite tool or T-SQL command, or a real-life scenario they learned from.

I didn’t know how well this would go over. Getting up in front of a room full of people and presenting - especially on a technical topic – can be terrifying, and I didn’t know if people would be up for it. I was delighted when five people signed up!

The FoxPASS crew showing off their Red Gate swag

Last night we kicked off the meeting with a demo from our great sponsor, Red Gate. Then we heard from our members!

Josh gave us an overview of Microsoft Data Quality Services. I didn’t know there was an Excel plug-in, so I learned something new there!

Ken talked about error handling in PowerShell. I love PowerShell. I want more presentations on SQL and PowerShell.

Adam and Jeremy talked about how they handled a very large database (over 5 TB today) with partitioning and storage. This real-world example was top-notch.

Jeff gave us a demo of SQL Prompt, which was great. Every time he mentioned a feature, I nodded and thought, “Yep, that’s my favorite feature.” Then I realized, they can’t all be my favorite. But they are.

As a user group leader, this was one of the best things I’ve done yet. It was inspiring to hear from members of the community that hadn’t spoken before. It was fun to hear about multiple topics in one night, too.

I would encourage every user group to try this. Give your users three to four months’ notice. Mention it repeatedly. Send emails asking for volunteers. Let everyone know that any topic is fair game – administration, development, BI, professional development. Let them know it’s a low pressure environment. You can decide if there will be feedback given – or not.

It’s a great way to grow our pool of speakers – and what user group doesn’t want that? It’s also a great way to grow the people – public speaking skills are so important! I’ll be making this an annual FoxPASS event, and I can’t wait for next year’s!

What's a SQL Saturday? It's a free, one-day training event all about SQL Server. It is for the community and by the community - all the organizers, speakers, and helpers are volunteers. Sessions will be held for developers and DBAs, analysts and programmers; from novice users to experts in the field. Everyone that attends is sure to learn something new!

The event is being held at Microsoft Executive Briefing Center Fargo, 4550 42nd Street South, Fargo, ND 58104, on Saturday, April 27, 2013. Attendance is free! Please register, and do us a favor: invite someone you know to come along with you! We want to see SQL Server professionals in the area connect not just on this one day, but long-term. The more people that attend, the more networking there will be. We'd love to see a user group develop out of this weekend, too!

Do you want to share your SQL knowledge with others? We're looking for speakers, too! Any SQL related topic is welcome. The call for speakers closes Tuesday, February 26, 2013, so hurry!

I look forward to seeing you in Fargo!

What is a SQL Saturday? It's a day of free SQL Server training! It is for the community and by the community - all the organizers, speakers, and helpers are volunteers. Sessions will be held for developers and DBAs, analysts and programmers; from novice users to experts in the field. Everyone that attends is sure to learn something new! The networking is also top-notch. You'll have the chance to meet and interact with over 200 other professionals from the area, as well as SQL Server MCMs and MVPs!

What you need to know: the event will be held at MATC - Truax Campus, 3550 Anderson St, Madison, WI 53704. It will be held on Saturday, April 6, 2013. While the final schedule hasn't been determined yet, the event will run from roughly 8:00 am - 5:00 pm.

If you're interested in attending: please register! There is no cost to attend, but if you'd like a delicious on-site lunch of brats and burgers (we'll have vegetarian and gluten-free meals, too!), that's $10. Register soon, as there can be a wait list closer to the event.

Do you want to share your knowledge with other people? We're looking for presenters! Sessions will be 75 minutes in length and can be about any SQL Server-related topic. Submit your session here, and hurry: call for speakers ends Wednesday, February 5, 2013!

Do you work for a company that loves to support the SQL Server community? We're looking for sponsors, and have very affordable options that will give them great exposure. Please pass the information along!

I look forward to seeing you at SQL Saturday #206 Madison in April - it's going to be awesome!

(A list of all the blog reviews can be found here.)

When performance tuning, specifically when adding indexes, it can be very easy to get caught up in the one query or one process that you are working with. This tunnel vision can lead the best of us to forget that there is more happening within the system. There are other queries, other processes, and other users to be aware of. Jason shows us how to step outside of the bubble we are working in to focus on the full environment and the business needs.

He covers two main components in the full environment: finding missing indexes throughout the database and tuning for a specific workload. Missing indexes can be found through DMOs and the plan cache. A workload can be captured through a trace or extended events, and tuned with the Database Tuning Advisor.

Jason shows examples of each of these tools. The scripts he uses are clear and concise. He mentions the GUI tools, and shows a few examples, but focuses primarily on scripts. I like this approach (and usually use scripts myself) because, as he points out in the chapter, it is much easier to port a script from server to server than it is to fire up a GUI on each instance you want to run the task on.

When it comes to the business, Jason covers two important points. An index may not be used frequently, but can be part of a very important process. Removing it could cause a weekly or even monthly task to decrease in performance drastically. This is why it is important to know why your indexes exist. Indexing on foreign keys is also very important, because those relationships will be used frequently in queries – how often do you query data from only one table? Here, another excellent script – to find foreign keys that are not indexed – is provided.

All of these approaches are things I deal with weekly as a consultant. Indexing a database is something that can be easily overlooked, or considered a set-it-and-forget-it strategy. It should not be. A constant cycle of reviewing current index usage and adding new indexes is integral to having a well-performing database and application. This chapter gives you a set of tools to start that cycle.

This chapter is an excellent segue into the book Jason and Ted Krueger wrote about indexes – Expert Performance Indexing for SQL Server 2012. I’ve been reading this for the last couple of months and it’s proved invaluable in my day-to-day work.

Make sure you check out Pro SQL Server 2012 Practices today!

The progression of the book is very logical, from index fundamentals to special types of indexes, index maintenance to a method to analyze and implement changes. The examples and queries that are included are thorough yet understandable. You are given a solid foundation as to why you should do something, and the tools with which to do it. Another outstanding benefit to this book is that Jason and Ted have taken the knowledge gained in their years of working with business users and distilled that. This book goes beyond the purely technical reasons for doing something and encourages you to think about the impact to the business, the applications, and the users behind the databases.

The topics that are covered include:

Index Fundamentals

The foundation is covered here – heaps, clustered, and nonclustered indexes. Variations such as primary keys, included columns, and filtered indexes are discussed. The CREATE, ALTER, and DROP INDEX statements are broken down.

Index Storage Fundamentals

Understanding how SQL Server stores data and index pages will help you understand other concepts. Viewing information on pages by using DBCC IND and DBCC PAGE is covered. Then, the problem of fragmentation and how it occurs is discussed.

Index Statistics

This chapter thoroughly covers how to view the statistics associated with an index. DBCC SHOW_STATISTICS, sys.dm_db_index_usage_stats, sys.dm_db_index_operational_stats, and sys.dm_db_index_physical_stats are broken down.

XML, Spatial, and Full-Text Indexing

There is an overview of three not-as-common index types here – XML, spatial, and full text. The chapter discusses how each is created, and the effect on queries against that type of data.

Index Myths and Best Practices

There are a lot of misconceptions about how to use indexes in SQL Server. Myths such as “primary keys are always clustered” and “fill factor is applied to indexes during inserts” are broken down in this chapter. It’s a great look at how these things actually work. Best practices for indexes are also covered in this chapter.

Index Maintenance

How fragmentation occurs, and how to fix it, is covered in detail. Defragmentation can occur through several methods – index rebuild, index reorganization, drop and rebuild - and each of them is broken down.

Indexing Tools

Taking care of the existing indexes in your database isn’t enough. You’ll need to add new indexes over time, as your data and applications change. SQL Server offers two main tools to help you determine what indexes to add – the missing index DMOs and the Database Tuning Advisor (DTA). I admit that I’ve been skeptical of DTA up to this point, but I think I’ll give it another try soon, now that I have more information on the best way to use it.

Index Strategies

This chapter covers how to spot patterns in your data to help identify potential indexes. For example, there are valid reasons to keep a table a heap – those are discussed here. Using multiple column or GUID clustered indexes are two more topics. Various nonclustered index strategies such as building it with multiple columns or adding a filter are discussed. The best part of this chapter is that a query is run, the statistics are shown, an index is applied, and statistics are shown again – showing the differences in the execution plan. This is incredibly helpful.

Query Strategies

Adding or removing indexes isn’t the only way to improve performance in the database. Sometimes, modifying your queries to take advantage of indexes can do just as much good. Strategies such as using LIKE, concatenation, and computed columns – and how they use or don’t use indexes – are broken down in this chapter. This is a chapter I wish everyone that writes T-SQL would read!

Index Analysis

The final chapter is about putting it all together. A three-step process of monitoring, analyzing, and implementing is discussed in detail, with more examples.

5 of 5 Stars

This book is already one of the most valuable resources in my library. I know it will be referenced frequently (it already has been, and it’s littered with Post-It flags). I recommend anyone that works with SQL Server – whether as a developer, a DBA, or any combination thereof – pick up this book and read it. You don’t have to be a SQL Server expert to pick up this book and learn from it, and even experienced users will learn something new and interesting. You won’t find a more comprehensive index resource anywhere.

The Successful Consulting Series is a set of articles that are being written to both, help decisions on joining the consulting field and also, help existing consultants in their professional development initiatives. Please visit, “Successful Consulting Series” for a full listing of each part in this series.

Perhaps you’re thinking, “I’m bored in my full-time job, managing the same 250 SQL Servers” and are considering a move to consulting. Perhaps you received a job offer from a consulting firm yesterday, and are wondering if you really should accept it. Working fulltime for a single company and being a consultant are two very different jobs. Here are a few things to consider before accepting the job – or declining it because it isn’t the perfect job for you and you don’t want to settle.

Money and Benefits

We all work to support ourselves and our families. There are several monetary factors you want to take into account when considering a job. Is your salary going to be high enough to support you and your family? Will it be a steady income? If not, how will you manage the unsteadiness? This is especially important if you are considering going independent.

In addition to the money that will be deposited into your account every payday, consider other benefits such as insurance, paid time off, and other extras. Will they compare to what you are used to as a fulltime employee? What is the company’s stance on vacation? Do the people that you have talked to in the interview process take time off? How do they handle that with clients? Again, these are even more important questions if you are considering opening your own consulting company.

Life Outside of Work

Outside of work, we all have obligations and interests. Whether you have a partner, kids, or are caring for an aging parent, family must come first. Involvement in sports, volunteer organizations, and regular hobbies is normal and healthy, and you must work time for those into your schedule to reduce stress.

How will the consulting company, and the clients you are working with, respond to this? Is the company family-first? Will you have flexibility in your schedule? Understand that, as a consultant, there will be deadlines and project dates to meet, and at times those will need to come first. This is not much different than fulltime employment, when a project needs to be completed or you are on call. However, balance must be part of the job.

Travel

When you switch to consulting, you may have to travel no further than you normally would commute to a fulltime job. Some consultants are very lucky and get to work locally for the duration of an SOW. However, you may find the opposite is true. You may have a requirement of traveling 25%, 50%, or more time per week or month.

There are many facets of travel where you have to ask, “Will I gain enough from this job to accept these conditions?” First and foremost, there is time away from your home and family. This may mean missing a school concert or having to do all chores on the weekend instead of a weeknight. What compromises will you need to make in this regard? If you’re required to travel to clients that are a good distance away, you may need to fly. If this is the case, you’ll need to be aware of who is responsible for booking airfare, hotel, and rental car. If you work for a consulting firm that has a person to make these arrangements for you, you’re lucky. If not, you will have to spend (non-billable!) time making these arrangements. You’ll also need to find out if you’ll get a company credit card to use, or if you’ll have to use your own. What expenses will be covered, down to things like parking your car at an airport? After that’s determined, you’ll have to save receipts and submit expenses in a timely manner. Take all of these points into consideration when weighing a consulting position.

If there are days or weeks you can’t or won’t travel, you will have to make that known right away. This may be a point of negotiation during talks to join a consulting firm. How will you handle the need to travel for work if it falls on a family birthday or the date of a race you’ve wanted to run? These are discussions you need to have beforehand, not afterwards.

The Environment

Fulltime work can be routine. You have a handle on your environment’s servers, naming conventions, and idiosyncrasies. You may have the same set of tasks to work on each day, week, or month, with a few varying projects thrown in. You get very comfortable with your coworkers (even if you don’t enjoy all of them – at least you know their habits and personalities).

Consulting is the opposite. You are going to be looking at different problems in different environments with every client. Each client will have their naming conventions and documentation and routines – or complete lack thereof. Some clients have teams that work great together; others are outright hostile. Some of the client’s employees will be happy to work with you; others will think you are intruding on their territory and telling them how to do their job, or change their code, and, again, can be outright hostile. Even with a long-term SOW at a client, you are still an outsider. This is where you will need to be aware of how you present yourself, as Ted has written about.

You need to consider if you are willing to take on constant change, and are willing to learn new things constantly and relentlessly. The learning curve in consulting is very sharp – as my first consulting company called it, the learning precipice.

Risk

There is an element of risk in fulltime employment. You will probably be aware if the company is slowing down, if business is not coming in as it used to, or if people are being let go. Consulting can be much more short-sighted. You don’t have access to your client’s finances and may not know if your client is in trouble. This can happen whether you are independent or working for a consulting firm. You must be comfortable facing this risk every day, week, and month. You need to look at this from the perspective of skills and finances.

Keep your skill set up to date. In consulting, you will be exposed to many environments, situations, and technologies and that will help you stay up-to-date and marketable. Make sure you are taking advantage of this!

Financially, having a safety net built up is almost a necessity before going into consulting. This is even more important if you are going independent. You will want to make sure that you can pay your bills and be covered in case of emergencies.

Are You Ready to Take the Fork in the Road?

Hopefully you are now looking at the fork in the road of fulltime employment and consulting with a much more thoughtful eye. Consider all aspects of this career change very carefully. Consulting can be very rewarding, but you need to aware of the risks. Choose what is best for you, and your family, at the time. If now is not the time, it may be in the future!

To me, writing is an art form. I can only get better at it, but it will take time, and practice. I was discussing writing with Jeremiah (blog | twitter) one day, and he recommended I read William Zinsser’s On Writing Well The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction for inspiration.

I loved this book, and I’d recommend it to anyone who wants to make their writing better. It’s easy to read, entertaining, and really helpful.

This book is not about punctuation and grammar, but about themes and ideas. Zinsser stresses over and over that there is still an I in writing – especially in nonfiction. My biggest take-away is that it is OK for me to express my opinion – as long as I do it simply, clearly, and with conviction.

Writing well is not about putting words on a piece of paper (or typing them into Word) and publishing them. It is a painstaking process to craft careful sentences, rearrange them, put in a compelling introduction and successful end, rewrite, rewrite, and rewrite. Sometimes, I worry that I am a slow writer. I like to write multiple drafts of pieces. I worry about how sentences flow. I still have – and use – the paper thesaurus I bought in high school. After reading this book, I realize that’s OK.

I think the only way to do justice to this book is list my favorite quotes – and there are many.

On principles: “I often find myself reading with interest about a topic I never thought would interest me – some scientific quest, perhaps. What holds me is the enthusiasm of the writer for his field.”

On simplicity: “Clutter is the disease of American writing.”

“Simplify, simplify.”

On writing style: “Therefore I urge people to write in the first person: to use “I” and “me” and “we” and “us.” They put up a fight.

“Who am I to say what I think?” they ask, “Or what I feel?”

“Who are you not to say what you think?” I tell them. “There’s only one you. Nobody else thinks or feels in exactly the same way.”

“We have become a society fearful of revealing who we are.”

“Writing is an act of ego, and you might as well admit it. Use its energy to keep yourself going.”

On the audience: “You are writing for yourself.”

On words: “Remember that words are the only tools you’ve got.”

On methods: “You learn to write by writing.”

On unity: “Every successful piece of nonfiction should leave the reader with one provocative thought that he or she didn’t have before. Not two thoughts, or five – just one.”

On the lead and the ending: “The most important sentence in any article is the first one.” (Yes, this was the first sentence of the chapter.)

“Knowing when to end an article is far more important than most writers realize.”

On bits & pieces: “Use active verbs unless there is no comfortable way to get around using a passive verb.”

“Most adverbs are unnecessary.”

“Most adjectives are also unnecessary.”

“Don’t say you were a bit confused and sort of tired and a little depressed and somewhat annoyed. Be confused. Be tired. Be depressed. Be annoyed. Don’t hedge your prose with little timidities. Good writing is lean and confident.”

“There’s not much to be said about the period except that most writers don’t reach it soon enough.”

“Keep your paragraphs short.”

"Rewriting is the essence of writing well: it's where the game is won or lost."

“There’s no subject you don’t have permission to write about.”

On writing about people: “Get people talking. Learn to ask question that will elicit answers about what is most interesting or vivid in their lives.”

On humor: “Humor is the secret weapon of the nonfiction writer.”

On enjoyment, fear, and confidence: “Living is the trick. Writers who write interestingly tend to be men and women who keep themselves interested.”

I Will Write Better

This book made me more deliberate and conscientious writer. It also gave me the confidence to write for me. Anyone who wants to write, whether it be a book or a blog, will learn from this book!

PowerShell

The focus of this event was PowerShell. What is it? How can I use it? What do I need to know to get started? We got an overview of Powershell from Brian Lewis of Microsoft. Then Steve Murawski, PowerShell MVP, gave us practical everyday examples and scripts. Adam Driscoll from Quest showed off Powershell 3.0, which has some really neat enhancements.

We Do It For the Attendees

This event is held for the attendees. We want to increase their knowledge, we want to give them the opportunity to ask questions, and we want them to network with other IT professionals in the area. It was heartening to see people that were in attendance for the third event in a row, many attending for the second time, and even a few new faces! The event has attracted people from Green Bay to Milwaukee and Madison to Sheboygan.

The best part of this event continues to be the range of people that attend. There are programmers, administrators, managers, Linux, Windows, SQL, and more represented and talked about. This cross-discipline audience was exactly our goal, and leads to many interesting viewpoints and discussions. It is one of the results I am proudest of.

Stone Cellar Brewpub

Stone Cellar continues to be an outstanding host for the event. The staff is friendly and goes above and beyond to serve us. The food is delicious and the beer is even better. This time, we had Vanishing Vanilla Stout, Pie Eyed India Pale Ale, and Stonetoberfest. That was my favorite beer of the day until tasting time, when the Pumpkin Spice Ale was brought out. YUM. Some of that now resides in my fridge.

Thank You

Thank you to my fellow brewmasters, Derek and Mark. We are a team, and we make a great team. This event wouldn’t happen without you. Thank you to the many people who helped spread the word through email, blogging, and Twitter. Thank you for supporting and believing in us. And thank you to everyone that attended – we do this for you, and hope you gain many things from it!

Tech on Tap v2.1

We’re ready to roll for our second year! Our first event in 2013 will be on Saturday, February 2 – please plan to join us!