I enjoy getting viewpoints by others in the community, the other day I sat down and started to ponder on some of the articles I’ve read that have either helped me along my way and career or have sparked me to think about how I would apply what I read to an issue I was having.

Below are 5 articles written by others in the community that I’ve read over time that have helped me; they are in no particular order and I’ll do my best to give a brief synopsis of what each represent are:

Chris Shaw – Utility Databases –  this topic is geared toward having a utility database at your disposal as a DBA. The link is for Chris’ demo; I first heard this topic at PASS 2011, made so much sense to me to have a database at your disposal to keep as a repository to report off of and trend. This idea sparked other ideas which has lead to a full blown monitoring solution for me.

Adam Machanic – sp_WhoIsActive – I am going to take the blurb directly from Adam’s site. If you don’t have this tool I recommend getting it. “Who is Active? is a comprehensive server activity stored procedure based on the SQL Server 2005 and 2008 dynamic management views (DMVs). Think of it as sp_who2 on a hefty dose of anabolic steroids.~ Adam Machanic”. I highly recommend checking this one out

Glenn Berry – Diagnostic Query – The link will take you to different SQL versions of his diagnostic queries. These have helped me tremendously throughout my time as a DBA.

Brent Ozar – sp_Blitz – I enjoy reading from Brent’s outfit. If you have never been to his blog you should check it out. Jeremiah Peschka, Kendra Little, and Jes Borland have some great stuff they blog about. When I switched jobs I used Brent’s “free” utility to help with me learning what the servers were and what I was dealing with. For me this was a life saver. I give Brent and his team credit on this one.

John Sansom – How To Become A DBA – in this awesome article I liked John’s “How to become an outstanding DBA section”

I have many more articles that I will share periodically but these are just some to start with that I think from my standpoint have helped me. Hope you can get as much out of them as I have……….I’m tempted to just go ahead and start doing something like this monthly or weekly haven’t decided yet.

Have a good one!