Have you ever called Microsoft Customer Support for help with a SQL Server performance issue? The engineer will typically send you a self-extracting exe file with instructions to unzip the file on the server and run the pssdiag.cmd file to collect data while you reproduce your issue. Afterwards, you’re supposed to zip up the contents of the output folder and send it back to the engineer. How did the engineer compile that collection code so quickly? The answer is PSSDiag Configuration Manager, or simply DiagManager. DiagManager is just a tool that you use to configure which performance items are to...
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Use Trace Flag 902 to Recover from a Cumulative Update Failure
Recently, I ran into a critical error while I was helping a customer troubleshoot an issue in SQL Server. That may not sound like a big deal, but we were installing Cumulative Update 6 for SQL Server 2012 SP2 to fix our initial problem when we encountered the following error. What gives SQL Server? We just upgraded several other instances on this same server. Why does this one have to fail right now? Well, a quick peak in the errorlog sure points me in the right direction. Starting execution of SSIS_HOTFIX_INSTALL.SQL : : Error: 9002, Severity: 17, State: 4. The...
Continue reading...Exams 70-457 & 70-458 – Transition Your MCTS on SQL Server 2008 to MCSA: SQL Server 2012
This past week I finally completed the 70-458 exam to upgrade my certification to MSCA: SQL Server 2012. I never thought it would take me over a year to pass two upgrade exams, but sometimes life just gets in the way. I will say this is probably the hardest SQL Server exam I’ve taken so far. The format of the upgrade exam is to combine questions from the three standard MCSA SQL Server 2012 exams, 70-461, 70-462, and 70-463. My hardest problem was dealing with the data warehouse questions; mainly the ones around Data Quality Services, Master Data Services, and...
Continue reading...Use PsPing When Working in Azure IaaS
Recently I’ve been learning more about how Azure functions and how it can help my customers. One of the best ways for me to learn about Azure was to build out my own environment using VMs, or Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS). All of that was easy; however, once the VMs were built I soon learned that Azure functions differently than an On-Premise solution. The most basic network connectivity test that administrator use is the PING command. It is part of the ICMP protocol, but it’s disabled by default on each VM that I deployed. While it was easy enough...
Continue reading...SQL Nexus Might Just Save Your Bacon
The year is 2015, and I’m still surprised by how many people have never heard of SQL Nexus; although it has been available since approximately 2008. SQL Nexus is a tool that that is designed to collect and analyze data to help you troubleshoot SQL Server performance issues. There are plenty of tools on the market that can easily do this, but this one is free and it can be used to monitor SQL Server 2005 through SQL Server 2014. The tool was originally created by the SQL Server product support team, and is still used today as the primary...
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