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Curated SQL Posts

Choosing Compute Options for Databricks

Published 2024-08-16 by Kevin Feasel

Matt Collins shares some recommendations:

You can use Databricks for a vast range of applications these days. From handling streaming datasets, running Deep Learning models to populating data model fact tables with complex transformations, choosing the correct compute option can seem a lot like a stab in the dark followed by (potentially expensive) trial end error.

You can choose from an incredible range of configurations in the Databricks Compute User Interface.

This variety is comprised of the Virtual Machine (VM) category, size, availability and access mode (also referred to as family).

Determining the right compute choice for you could be answered by the classic answer “it depends”, but this guide aim to inform the decision-making process — both in terms of cost and performance.

Read on for more information.

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Creating a SQL Server Data Tools Project Template from a Database Project

Published 2024-08-16 by Kevin Feasel

Olivier Van Steenlandt builds a template:

Since I was introducing Unit Testing for databases at work, and we have multiple Database Projects, I wanted to do the initial work once and reuse it in my different Database Unit Testing Projects.

To create an SSDT template based on an existing Database Project, you first open the Database Project in Visual Studio. As soon as your Database Project is loaded, navigate to the Project section in the menu bar at the top left. Choose Export Template to continue.

Click through to see how you can put together a database project template that you could re-use in future projects.

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Azure Data Explorer Web UI Updates for July 2023

Published 2024-08-16 by Kevin Feasel

Michal Bar has an update for us:

Welcome to the July 2024 update. We are excited to announce new features and improvements in ADX web UI.

Continue reading to learn more about:

  1. Copy query with syntax coloring and KQL IntelliSense improvements
  2. Ad-hoc visual data exploration
  3. Dashboards real time refresh rate
  4. Enhanced data interaction for dashboard tiles
  5. Resize and move dashboard tiles using keyboard only

Click through to continue reading.

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Changing the Data Type of a PostgreSQL Column Used in a View

Published 2024-08-16 by Kevin Feasel

Andrea Gnemmi makes a change:

We have all encountered the need to change a column data type in a table. Unfortunately, in PostgreSQL, you cannot change it in a single step if the column is used in a view. In this article, we cover the steps to change the data type for a column in a PostgreSQL table.

Read on for those steps. This is a bit more complex than SQL Server, at least for non-materialized views. In that case, the view is little more than a saved T-SQL query, so you would want to run sp_refresh [view_schema].[view_name] to ensure that the view has the latest metadata and doesn’t fail when you run the query.

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Microsoft Fabric Capacity Limits

Published 2024-08-16 by Kevin Feasel

Teo Lachev builds a pair of tables:

Here is table that is getting more and more difficult to find as searching for Fabric capacity limits returns results about CU compute units (for the most part meaningless in my opinion). I embed in a searchable format below before it vanishes on Internet. The most important column for semantic modeling is the max memory which denotes the upper limit of memory Fabric will grant a semantic model.

Click through for that table, followed by a table comparing Fabric SKUs to Power BI SKUs.

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String Concatenation of Vectors in R

Published 2024-08-15 by Kevin Feasel

Steven Sanderson glues together some vectors:

Welcome to another exciting R programming tutorial! Today, we will explore how to concatenate vectors of strings using different methods in R: base R, stringr, stringi, and glue. We’ll use a practical example involving a data frame with names, job titles, and salaries. By the end of this post, you’ll feel confident using these tools to manipulate and combine strings in your own projects. Let’s get started!

Read on to see how to do this in several ways.

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Comparing Transaction State and Transaction Count Functions

Published 2024-08-15 by Kevin Feasel

Sergey Gigoyan talks transactions:

When working with transactions, identifying active transactions often becomes quite important. In SQL Server, there are XACT_STATE and @@TRANCOUNT system functions that allow one to get information about active user transactions. However, the question about the differences between these functions is one of the most common questions among database development. Understanding the details of each function and their differences will help developers make the correct choice between these functions to solve a specific problem related to transactions.

Read on to learn more about each.

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Transferring CLR Binaries from SQL Server to Azure SQL Managed Instance

Published 2024-08-15 by Kevin Feasel

Mihailo Joksimovic shows a use case for Azure SQL Managed Instance link:

Azure SQL Managed Instance link is a new feature enabling you to create a distributed availability group between your SQL Server and Azure SQL Managed Instance. It makes it super simple to connect on-prem. and cloud, providing near real-time replication speeds. Benefits are many and if you aren’t familiar, I’d strongly suggest you read our official blog post about it.

One great benefit for our use-case is that MI Link takes care of transferring the CLR assemblies for you! You can import your assemblies on your SQL Server instance, using all too familiar syntax (i.e. CREATE ASSEMBLY FROM ‘C:\path\to\assembly.dll’), and MI link will ensure that those same assemblies get transferred to cloud. Easy peasy and no need to deal with hex literals anymore.

Read on to learn more about this capability.

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A Reference Architecture for Microsoft Fabric

Published 2024-08-15 by Kevin Feasel

James Serra draws boxes:

Microsoft Fabric uses a data lakehouse architecture, which means it does not use a relational data warehouse (with its relational engine and relational storage) and instead uses only a data lake to store data. Data is stored in Delta lake format so that the data lake acquires relational data warehouse-like features (check out my book that goes into much detail on this, or my video). Here is what a typical architecture looks like when using Fabric (click here for the .vsd):

Click through for the image as well as James’s explanation of the components.

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Request: State of the Database Landscape Survey 2024

Published 2024-08-15 by Kevin Feasel

Grant Fritchey needs you:

Hello all! This post is nothing but a simple request. Please, if you have a few spare minutes, meander on over to this link and fill out the State of the Database Landscape Survey for 2024. Yeah, it’s for Redgate Software, my employer. But, really, it’s for everyone. Why is it for everyone? Because, every time we do one of these surveys, we don’t sit on the data, we share it. Here are the results from the 2023 survey, published earlier this year.

Yeah, but, I hear you opining, what does this really do for me? Well, let’s talk about it.

Check out the benefits and also fill out the survey.

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