By Riley Major, 2018-09-14
So you’ve wisely decided to put your business logic in your database, but for whatever reason you can’t use inline user defined functions, even though they encapsulate logic without hurting performance. That’s ok, because you can build functions on the fly in a single statement. Continue reading
By Riley Major, 2018-09-12
Clark Sell opened That Conference up this year with a video about community, reminding us that they didn’t set out to be event organizers but rather to help bring us together. For them, these three days at a water park are just the spark to ignite year-round engagement with our fellow technologists. That’s what sets this event apart for me– its inspirational and encouraging vibe. Continue reading
By Riley Major, 2018-08-21
Success is a funny thing. Everybody has their own idea of what it means, and often they’re wrong. Continue reading
By Riley Major, 2018-08-08 | Tic-Tac-Toe Series Part 1 / Part 2 (this article)
If a pile of matchboxes can learn to play Tic-Tac-Toe, then certainly I should be able to code a solution. With my predilection for databases, T-SQL was my tool of choice. But first, I needed to model the game with some sort of data structure. Unfortunately, as I learned, it’s not as simple as mapping some X and O values to a grid.
You might have heard that SQL Server user-defined functions are the devil. That’s because someone got burned. They put a scalar function in a WHERE clause on a big table and fed it a column name. And bad things happened. Continue reading
By Riley Major, 2018-06-29
One of the many uses of tally tables is to blow up some rows. Normally, you make your database reduce rows by joining tables to others and applying criteria. But sometimes you want it to make more rows. Continue reading
By Riley Major, 2018-05-31.
When talking about bitwise math, I needed to show the inverse of a string of ones and zeros. Instead of doing it manually, I wanted to get a computer assist. Since I always have SQL Server Management Studio open, T-SQL is usually the fastest way for me to use some CPU cycles.
By Riley Major, 2018-05-18 | Tic-Tac-Toe Series Part 1 (this article) / Part 2
Known as Noughts and Crosses across the pond, Tic-Tac-Toe is considered a “solved game“– meaning we can predict the outcome of the game assuming perfect play. In fact, Wikipedia says “it is straightforward to write a computer program to play tic-tac-toe perfectly“. Well then as a programmer, I ought to be able to do it.
By Riley Major, 2018-05-15.
Last week I asked the Microsoft data professional community to give back… and you did. We generated 29 blog articles with inspiring stories of past contributions, advice to those beginning their journey, and plans to do more. A recurring theme was how helping others ultimately helps you– with both personal growth and professional recognition. My overarching goal was to get more people doing more things for the community. I hope the tales and goals shared this month provide the motivation for more action and continued growth of our community. Continue reading
By Riley Major, 2018-05-09.
This month I asked the #tsql2sday crowd to make a plan to give back to the Microsoft data platform community. For those who already give so much, I suggested describing how they got started in hopes they would inspire others. I hereby submit my plan.