SQL Server Events

Title: SQL Cruise

Location: Miami and Eastern Caribbean
Link out: Click here
Description:

“SQL Cruise provides you with some of the best SQL Server training possible from some of the most knowledgeable SQL Server practitioners available. But more than that, SQLCruise is a fun way to learn! The great after-hours gatherings and activities make it easy to make new friends. And the unique setting will provide you with one of the most memorable experiences of your IT career.”

- Kevin Kline

SQLCruise is a brilliant training event idea organized by Brent Ozar PLF.

Tentative agenda:

(Subject to change by organizers)

Scaling SQL with Solid State

Brent Ozar

SSD prices are coming down and adoption is going up.  My clients have used them to solve all kinds of performance problems, and we’ve found some surprising results.  In this session, I’ll explain the internals of these fast drives and show the pros and cons of the various connection methods (SATA, PCI Express, SAN).  Then we’ll switch over to the SQL Server world to see how to tell when and where you need SSDs.  You’ll even get real-world before-and-after metrics to help make the case to management.

Procedure Cache BI

Brent Ozar

SQL Server stores tons of data about SQL statements and execution plans in memory, but unfortunately a lot of it is hard-to-query XML.  I’ve got the fix: we’ll treat it like a BI project.  We’ll build an ETL process to get the data out, normalize it into a reporting structure, and then make smart tuning decisions based on the aggregated findings.  You’ll step off the boat armed with ready-to-go scripts to do consultant-style analysis right away.

SAN Features for Senior DBAs

Brent Ozar

SAN snapshots and SAN replication can be the DBA’s best friend.  They bring one-click disaster recovery options to antiquated SQL Server 2000 instances, and one-minute backup options to even the largest data warehouses.  In this session, we’ll cover how my clients have saved time, money, and manpower with these features.  We’ll briefly dig into the “how” using NetApp as an example SAN, and then cover the SQL Server management techniques that work regardless of the SAN vendor.

Making You Look Smarter: One Dynamic Management Object at a Time

Tim Ford

Dynamic Management Objects are a great tool for learning about your SQL instances, resolving perfomance issues, and identifying problems (sometimes) before they happen.  Tim takes you through some of the most important DMOs that you have at your disposal for identifying issues before users realize they have a problem and fixing issues when they do catch you by surprise.

The Lazy DBA

Tim Ford

Have more things to do than you have hours in the day?  This has been Tim’s life since he started down the path to being a DBA over 12 years ago.  Join him as he discusses how to automate the repeatable and what tools are available to simplify all the things rob you of valuable time.  Templates, dynamic T/SQL, SSIS, Dynamic Management Objects, and Reporting Services are all tools in the Lazy DBA’s arsenal and they will all be covered here.

SQL Server in Amazon’s Cloud

Jeremiah Peschka
The lure of cloud computing is growing stronger for many businesses. While it’s possible to push your existing infrastructure up into the cloud, is that really the right move? Our clients have successfully, and not so successfully, used Amazon’s cloud to solve business needs. In this session we will discuss several business scenarios, define objectives for each one, talk about potential pitfalls, and cover the steps you’ll need to undertake to ensure that you can successfully move your SQL Servers to the cloud. We’ll cover gathering real world metrics, building a matrix to determine which servers can move, and cover several critical differences to managing SQL Server in Amazon’s cloud.

SQL Server Internals

Jeremiah Peschka
There’s a lot of information about SQL Server’s inner workings. Much of the material is highly focused and highly specialized. Before diving deep into the secrets of a particular feature, it’s important to understand how all of the pieces of SQL Server work together. During this session we’ll journey from the query parser to the storage engine and talk about how the different parts of SQL Server interact. Along the way we’ll will cover theoretical and practical knowledge about databases and SQL Server in specific. Although there is a lot of theoretical and esoteric knowledge available, this presentation will focus on the practical and immediate – wherever possible knowledge of SQL Server’s internals will be related improving to real world performance.

Faking Big Data

Kendra Little

How do you develop and test changes for terabytes of data when you’re in a gigabyte world? I’ll give you techniques for faking scale in a development database and how to know where issues may creep up that you can’t test in a small world. Whether you’re already working with big data or want to learn how without buying a SAN, this boat ride won’t be a small world after all.

Everyone Wants a Piece of This

Kendra Little

Highly concurrent OLTP applications have unique problems: everyone wants something, right now. Several of my clients have to code new features quickly to serve high volume web applications. But how do they deliver new code quickly and keep the system performing well? Here’s a look at the biggest challenges of hundreds of connections, thousands of batches, and one database.

Details and registration, here.

Title: SQLRally – Nordic

Location: Sweden
Link out: Click here
Description:

Unleash your inner viking for the SQL Server conference of the year!

Sharpen your SQL Server and BI skills and join the vikings at PASS SQLRally Nordic 2011, November 8-9, at the Aronsborg Conference Center outside Stockholm, Sweden.

Meet Mark Souza, Thomas Kejser, Lubor Kollar, Itzik Ben-Gan, and other top international speakers!

Connect with peers and world-renowned experts, participate in competitions, and learn the latest from the ultimate SQL Server battlefront!

• Two full days of technical training sessions
• Subject tracks focused on three areas:
  • BI
  • DBA
  • Developer

• Great social networking with your SQL Server peers in a fun, casual environment

Register by 7 October to save 50 EURO!

What Is PASS SQLRally?

PASS’s new regional event fills the gap between our free PASS SQLSaturday 1-day training events and PASS Summit, the world’s largest conference for the SQL Server community. At SQLRally you’ll meet with industry experts, authors, Microsoft MVPs, and other people just like you to learn about best practices, effective troubleshooting, and how to prevent issues, save money, and build a better SQL Server environment for your company or clients.

Who Should Attend?

SQLRally is for professionals of all levels of expertise who work with Microsoft SQL Server, including:

• BI architects, data analysts, developers, and administrators
• Database administrators
• Developers
• IT professionals and managers responsible for SQL Server in your company

To register, click here.

Title: SQL Server Days

Location: Belgium
Link out: Click here
Description:

The Belgian SQL Server User Group (SQLUG.be) in collaboration with Microsoft Belux will host this two-days SQL Server event in Schelle, Belgium.

Agenda:

List of speakers, here.

Click here to register.

Title: SQLU Summit 2011

Location: Budapest, Hungary
Link out: Click here
Description:

The SQLU Summit, the SQL Server Conference for Central Europe takes place this year in Budapest. Enjoy the lovely capital of Hungary in the heart of Europe! From September 21^st to 23^rd a selected group of top-speakers from the SQL Server Community is heading in to give you deep insight into SQL Server “Denali”, Azure, PowerPivot and much more . Exchange with experts and colleagues about the possible deployments of these new technologies in practice!.

These topics will be covered:

• Azure in theory und practice
• For developers: T-SQL News, SQLCLR & Service Broker and other best practices
• For DBAs: High Availability, Replication and Security in SQL Server “Denali”
• What’s new in SQL Server “Denali” Integration Services, Analysis Services and Reporting Services?
• All the details about the sessions

The Workshops:

• PowerPivot in SQL Server „Denali“ – Grega Jerkic
• Advanced T-SQL for SQL Server “Denali” – Itzik Ben-Gan
• Performance Tuning – Herbert Albert
• All the details about the workshops

The Speakers:

• Itzik Ben-Gan – globally reknown T-SQL guru, author and trainer
• Davide Mauri – Speaker at all the important SQL conferences, awards for best-rated session, BI and development specialist
• Dejan Sarka – one of the world-wide leading experts for Data Mining, Data Modelling and Data Quality
• Klaus Aschenbrenner – expert for Tuning, Internals, Service Broker… to be found on the speaker-lists of all the important SQL conferences
• Herbert Albert – internationally trusted expertise in the relational area
• All the details about the speakers

Prices

Full Summit Regular
EUR 950.00

Full Summit until 15 June
EUR 690.00

Full Summit until 15 Aug
EUR 834.00

Slim Summit (2days)
EUR 594.00

One day workshop
EUR 400.00

Registration

Summit Organizer

The organizer of the SQLU Summit is SolidQ

Title: PASS SQLRally

Location: Orlando, FL
Link out: Click here
Description:

Ladies and Gentlemen, Start Your Database Engines!

Be a part of the inaugural PASS SQLRally event, May 11-13, 2011 at the Marriot World Center in Orlando, FL. Join hundreds of database professionals who are passionate about Microsoft SQL Server. Get the training and connections you need to max your SQL Server and BI skills!

• Two full days of technical training sessions
• An optional day of pre-conference seminars
• Subject tracks focused on four areas: BI, DBA, Developer, and Professional Development
• Great networking with fellow SQL Server professionals in a fun, casual environment

Need some ROI ammunition for approval to attend?

• Get ROI justification, objection handling tips, and a draft email to your manager
• Download the event schedule
• Find out who is speaking

Title: Sell Yourself Into An Interview

Location: Online
Link out: Click here
Description:

How to sell yourself into an interview? Michael Coles provides tips in this presentation

The session will be in English (with a 5 minutes preview in Hebrew).

January 16, 8:00 EST.

Title: SQL Server Myths Debunked… Or Are They?

Location: Online
Link out: Click here
Description:

Numerous SQL Server experts have done a great job of debunking many of the common myths that crop up around SQL Server best practices and usage. However in some cases, the debunking of those myths creates unintended consequences – we ignore the underlying truth which started the myth in the first place.
Join independent SQL Server expert Michael K. Campbell for a survey of misperceptions that have arisen from commonly debunked SQL Server myths. By attending this free webcast you’ll learn how shrinking and using multiple files can be a best practice, what AWE and locking files in memory really means, along with other best practices that you may be missing out on because of misconceptions.

About the Speaker

Michael K. Campbell is a contributing editor for SQL Server Magazine, a regular columnist on DevProConnections.com, and an ASPInsider. Michael is the president of OverAchiever Productions, a consultancy dedicated to technical evangelism, mentoring, and quality solutions. He specializes in SQL Server, ASP.NET, and related technologies. Michael has been a professional developer, web-master, and production DBA for several well-known companies. He enjoys learning, problem solving, teaching, and creating videos for his site www.sqlservervideos.com.

Sponsored By: Idera

www.idera.com

Title: Webinar – Delivering Information with Reporting Services

Location: Online
Link out: Click here
Description:

Whether your data source is an operations database, a data mart, or an Analysis Services cube, you can use Reporting Services to deliver information on demand or on a scheduled basis in a variety of formats. With Reporting Services in place, report developers can quickly produce static or interactive reports, system administrators can effectively manage security and performance, and decision makers can easily find, use, and share information.  If you’re never used Reporting Services, join us for this webcast to learn about the report controls available to satisfy a variety of reporting requirements, the reporting features that create an interactive user experience, and the steps to publish, secure, and manage content on the report server.  

Stacia Misner is a consultant, educator, mentor, and author specializing in business intelligence solutions since 1999 with more than 25 years of experience in information technology. She is the author and co-author of eight books about business intelligence, with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services Step by Step and Introducing SQL Server 2008 R2 as her most recent books. Stacia has taught all aspects of Microsoft BI around the world, enlivening the course materials with insights, tips, best practices, and plenty of interaction to help students connect theory to actual practice. Stacia provides consulting and custom education services through Data Inspirations, writes about her experiences with BI at blog.datainspirations.com, and tweets as @StaciaMisner.

Title: SSWUG Free Expo Event: SQL Server Performance Monitoring, Tuning & Troubleshooting

Location: Online
Link out: Click here
Description:

Focus: SQL Server Performance Monitoring, Tuning & Troubleshooting

Working with SQL Server to provide for excellent performance means understanding your options. This expo will focus on items you’ll want to know for monitoring your SQL Servers, then what you can do with that information to have systems that work well.
In the sessions at this free expo, you’ll learn about query plans and the types of information and tuning help they can provide, numerous monitoring and performance management options and much more. We’ll also be presenting sessions that include information about key setup and operations items for your SQL Servers.
You’ll learn from some of the best presenters in the industry as we present the next in our in series of expos designed to bring you information you can put to use immediately in your own environment.

Sessions will cover the following topics:

• Operational Excellence for DBAs: Automation
• Monitor Your Business with PerformancePoint Services Monitoring and Analytics
• Using XML to Query Execution Plans
• End-to-End Troubleshooting for SQL Server 2008

Title: SSWUG.org Free Expo Event

Focus: Maximizing SQL Server Uptime

Location: Online
Link out: Click here
Description:

SQL Server uptime is a key component of managing your SQL Server(s). Knowing what’s important, what options you have for building out solutions to help when things go wrong, is at the core of the responsibilities for those working with databases. This expo will feature information moving to SQL Server 2008 to get you started. You’ll learn about new features and important things that you’ll want to know about as you work with SQL Server 2008. We’ll also have segments on Transactional Replication for High Availability, Database Mirroring and even log shipping basics. Join us to learn about the key elements to making sure your systems are able to provide excellent uptime options for your business, clients and end-users.

Sessions

• SQL Server 2008 Migration – Are you ready? – Josh Jones
  SQL Server 2008 is out in the wild, and companies looking to take advantage of new features such as Policy Based Management, spatial data types, and more are taking their first steps towards implementing Microsoft’s newest data platform. In this session, we’ll look at preparing for and executing migrations from both SQL Server 2000 and SQL Server 2005 to SQL Server 2008. Everything from checking code compatibility to feature comparisons will be touched upon, as well as covering topics such as hardware requirements, high-availability upgrades, and contingency planning.
• Using Transactional Replication as a High Availability Solution – Eric Johnson
  In this session, we will cover using transactional replication for high availability. Even if you have set up replication before, there are some differences when using it in HA situations. We will look at the recovery of logins, restoring identity columns, managing related tables, maintaining triggers on the subscriber, and several other key concepts that you must know in order to implement transactional replication as an HA solution. This session is for intermediate to advanced SQL Server DBAs with an understanding of replication concepts.
• Using Database Mirroring for High Availability – Eric Johnson
  Database Mirroring is one of the latest failover technologies available natively in SQL Server. In the session, we will cover using database mirroring for high availability. We will look at set up, maintenance, monitoring, and failover. In addition, we will look at the role of the witness server and how it is used to facilitate automatic failover. We will also look at other SQL Server objects that you need to account for when using Database Mirroring for HA and techniques you can implement in order to read the data on the mirror database. This session is for beginning to advanced SQL Server DBAs with little or no Database Mirroring experience.
• Log Shipping Basics – Brent Ozar
  The boss wants you to plan for disaster, and wants to know the business will be protected if the production SQL Server goes down. Be armed with answers about log shipping with this presentation, which will cover the basic concepts and how to implement it.

About the Speakers

Eric Johnson – Eric has worked with SSIS since its release with SQL Server 2005 and before that he spent a lot of time wading around in DTS packages. He is bringing his experiences and frustrations to you so that you can learn SSIS quickly and correctly.
Eric (Microsoft SQL MVP) is the co-founder of Consortio Services, and the primary Database Technologies Consultant. His background in Information Technology is diverse, ranging from operating systems and hardware to specialized applications and development. He has even done his fair share of work on networks. Since IT is really just a way to support business processes, he has also acquired his MBA. All in all, he has 10 years of experience with IT, a great amount of which has been working with Microsoft SQL Server. Eric has managed and designed databases of all shapes and sizes. He has delivered numerous SQL Server training classes and webcasts as well as presentations at national technology conferences. Most recently, he presented at TechMentor on SQL Server 2005 Replication, Reporting Services, and Integration Services. In addition, he is active in the local SQL Server Community, serving as the President of the Colorado Springs SQL Server Users Group.

Josh Jones – Josh Jones is co-owner and Database\Operating Systems Consultant with Consortio Services in Colorado Springs, CO. There he provides training, administration, analysis, and design support for customers utilizing SQL Server 2000 and 2005. In his 8 years as an IT professional, he has worked in multiple areas of Information Technology including Windows desktop support, Windows 2000 and 2003 server infrastructure design and support (AD, DNS, MS Exchange), telephony switch support, and network support. Josh has spoken at various PASS sponsored events about SQL Server topics such as 64-bit SQL Server Implementation, Reporting Services Administration, and Performance Tuning. He’s also a regular speaker for the SQL Server Worldwise Users Group Virtual Conference (www.vconferenceonline.com) on SQL Server topics. He’s been published in Redmond Magazine, Redmond Developer News, and Visual Studio magazine. He is the co-author of a data modeling book (“A Developers Guide to Data Modeling for SQL Server”) with SQL MVP Eric Johnson, now available from Addison-Wesley.

Brent Ozar – Brent was the fifth Microsoft Certified Master of SQL Server 2008 in the US outside of Microsoft. He’s a consultant and trainer with SQLskills.com and a Microsoft SQL Server MVP. Brent has a decade of broad IT experience, performing SQL Server database administration, systems administration, SAN administration, virtualization administration, and project management. In his current role, Brent specializes in performance tuning, virtual and cloud-based database servers, and disaster recovery. Previously, Brent spent 2 years at Southern Wine & Spirits, a Miami-based wine & spirits distributor. Brent has experience conducting training sessions, has written several technical articles, and blogs prolifically at http://www.BrentOzar.com.