Keeping up with the SQL Server (things)

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I've been a member of PASS for so long that I'm no longer sure when I actually joined. I attended PASS Summit 2004, which was in Orlando, FL. I must have been a member before then. I started with SQL Server in 1998. I feel like someone from the old, long-dead Swynk.com SQL Server email list suggested that I join.

(For the uninitiated, membership in PASS is free and you get access to talks from past PASS Summit events. Even though the talks are two or three years old, many subjects are still relevant and many people are still dealing with older versions of SQL Server. In short, you can get good information from some of the best-educated SQL Server experts in the world.)

I don't go to as many of the monthly meetings in Malvern, PA as I used to. The main reason for this is that there are many good online venues that provide good talks on SQL Server. My three favorite venues are:
  • PASS
  • YouTube (many PASS 'Virtual Groups' will publish monthly talks here.)
  • SQLBITS (look towards the right side of page, under "Conference").
Both PASS and SQLBITS post recordings of old sessions on their web sites.

Over the last several weeks, I have been going through the backlog of old PASS Summit 2015 videos. Here are a few stand-outs, with links to the Twitter feeds of the speakers, that I've watched over the last few weeks, in no particular order:
  • Kicking and Screaming: Replacing Profiler with Extended Events with Erin Stellato
  • Run Your DBA Morning Checklist with Policy-Based Management with Pieter Vanhove
  • PowerShell and the Art of SQL Server Deployment with Michael Fal
  • Testing SSIS Packages with Tim Mitchel
  • A Few Of My Favourite Plan Operators with Rob Farley
  • What's New in SQL Server 2016 Reporting Services with Riccardo Muti
The nature of the PASS site does not allow direct links so I can't point you directly at the talks, but it is easy enough to search for a talk after you log in.

It seems that the PASS Summit 2016 talks are already online. I've got another 25 talks from PASS Summit 2015 that I'd like to go through, then I'll be talking on the talks from 2016.

Lastly, but not least, I also watched a talk public by the PASS Business Analytics Virtual Group:


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