Improving Performance for Some LIKE “%string%” Searches (SQL Spackle)
If you've ever wondered if you can do better than an INDEX SCAN when you do a LIKE "%string%" search, read on...
2024-11-29 (first published: 2014-04-07)
51,221 reads
Dwain Camps
The Right and Wrong of T-SQL DML TRIGGERs (SQL Spackle)
Triggers in T-SQL have many uses. There are right and wrong ways to write triggers. To learn the difference, read on...
2024-11-15 (first published: 2015-03-17)
9,130 reads
Calculating Elapsed Times (SQL Spackle)
Calculating elapsed time between time values can be an interesting problem that is easily solved even when data anomalies are present.
2024-09-20 (first published: 2013-09-26)
18,947 reads
An Alternative (Better?) Method to UNPIVOT (SQL Spackle)
Normalizing or UNPIVOTing data may be improved by using this lesser known approach in SQL Server 2008 or later.
2024-07-26 (first published: 2012-08-02)
46,251 reads
Performance of the SQL MERGE vs. INSERT/UPDATE
The SQL MERGE statement offers convenience, safety and elegance, but how does it perform compared to other methods?
2017-02-03 (first published: 2013-10-28)
170,706 reads
Logging and Error Handling for SQL Stored Procedures
Learn how to develop and test a template for logging and error handling in a multi-step SQL stored procedure
2015-09-18 (first published: 2014-01-20)
40,019 reads
The Fastest Way to Combine DATE and TIME Data Types to a DATETIME
Recently while working with a table where there were two columns, one a DATE datatype and a second TIME datatype,...
2015-09-08 (first published: 2015-08-28)
82,046 reads
High Performance T-SQL using Code Patterns
What exactly does this mean? We’ve heard of “code patterns” in other programming languages, but what does it mean to...
2015-06-04 (first published: 2015-05-27)
9,354 reads
The Best Tool for Comparing Whether Two T-SQL Queries Produce Identical Results
There is one software tool that should be in every software developer’s tool chest. That is knowledge of the platform...
2015-05-26 (first published: 2015-05-21)
7,658 reads
Excel in T-SQL Part 2 – The Normal Distribution (NORM.DIST) Density Functions
Today’s blog will be the second in a multi-part series on replicating Excel functions in T-SQL, continuing with Excel’s NORM.DIST...
2015-05-14
10,821 reads
Blogs
Announcements from the Microsoft Fabric Community Conference — Barcelona 2026
By James Serra
Microsoft shared a broad set of Fabric, Power BI, and SQL updates at FabCon...
Au Revoir for now
By Steve Jones
No, I’m not quitting or retiring. Just going on vacation, but I leave tonight...
Forums
Let's Talk Certifications
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Let's Talk Certifications, which is...
Force join by longest possible choice
Title pretty much says it. I want to join to a table that has...
Building a SQL Server Fleet Audit That Leadership Actually Reads
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Building a SQL Server Fleet...
Question of the Day
The Empty Aggregate
I have this table in a SQL Server 2025 database:
CREATE TABLE [dbo].[CustomerOrder] ( [OrderID] [int] NULL, [CustomerID] [int] NULL, [total] [money] NULL ) ON [PRIMARY] GOWhat is returned from this code? (answers are for the sum and then the count)
SELECT SUM(total) AS sum,
COUNT(total) AS count
FROM dbo.CustomerOrder;
See possible answers