The Wisdom of SQL Mag Readers

New Comments on an Old Article
I’ve mentioned in previous Sqlmag.com Community Dialog columns how the reader comments sections on some articles take on a life of their own, sometimes for long after the original article was published. This tells me a couple of things. First, it highlights the staying power and long-term usefulness of much of the SQL Server Magazine content. Sqlmag.com is a source of up-to-date information about SQL Server technology, and it’s also an archive of thousands of articles, many of which contain information that readers find useful for years. In an industry where so much information becomes obsolete in weeks, months, or even days, it’s reassuring that Sqlmag.com is a repository for content with a long shelf life.

Here are a couple of cases in point. In “Bulk User Create,” June 1999, InstantDoc ID 5350, reader savindrasingh posted an alternative method for creating user accounts in bulk. savindrasingh suggests storing the required user information in a text file as comma-separated values (CSVs), then provides a batch-file For /F command that create the user accounts from the data in the text file. You can read savindrasingh’s complete comment with the command in the comments below the article.

More Shared Wisdom
Tyler Chessman’s “Using Reporting Services in an Internet/Extranet Environment,” November 2006, InstantDoc ID 93830, is another example of an article containing helpful reader comments. The latest reader to comment online, fsterry, posted his solution to a problem he thought other readers might face when using Tyler’s solution with Business Intelligence Development Studio (BIDS). “Great article… With the Forms Authentication Sample implemented, including Tyler’s fixed VB file, BIDS could not deploy my work to the server. While SSMS seemed fine with the forms authenticated user, BIDS did not seem to work with the new extension at all…. Solution for me was to develop, and run Deploy, of my Report Model from BIDS on a SQL Server 2008 CTP installation on a different server. Worked on the first try.” Keep an eye on the reader comments: You might find some nuggets of wisdom from your peers in them!

DBAs: Whaddya Know?

The topic of Kalen Delaney’s September 18, 2008, SQL Server Magazine UPDATE column, “What Do DBAs Need to Know to Do Their Jobs?” is begging for answers from readers. Kalen lists a starter set of five questions all DBAs should be able to answer, and these questions delineate some basic categories of essential knowledge for DBAs: database sizing; backing up, recovering, and ensuring high-availability of databases; and database configuration. Kalen also talks about DBA jobs sometimes overlapping into other job descriptions (development, for example). Should SQL Server DBAs “do Windows”—that is, have a basic knowledge of Windows server administration? Post an answer to Kalen’s question in the reader comments on her article, and see how your peers responded.

Featured Article: SQL Server 2008 Review
SQL Server Magazine has published many articles in recent months about SQL Server 2008. What we haven’t published is a review of the SQL Server 2008 release; our sister publication, Windows IT Pro, beat us to it. Fortunately, SQL Mag subscribers can read the entire article, “SQL Server 2008,” by Michael Otey at InstantDoc ID 100315. (The article is available free of charge to everyone, as are all Windows IT Pro and SQL Server Magazine product reviews.) Read the article and tell us whether or not you agree with Michael’s recommendation.