SQL Server Newsletters, Forums, Blogs, and Training



Newsletters

SQL Server newsletters are stuffed with useful information that helps both DBA's and programmers. Many of the articles written are based on real work experiences. These newsletters provide the opportunity to learn valuable lessons from other IT professionals. Training opportunities such as free webcasts and virtual labs are often mentioned. Many include announcements of new patches and releases. Listed below are newsletters that I have found helpful.


SQL Server Central - provides two excellent newsletters.

SQL Server Central Daily - this daily emailed newsletter provides links to SQL Server articles, active forum topics, featured script, question of the day, and an editorial. The newsletter includes articles published by its site and links to articles from other sites. These articles cover a variety of topics about SQL Server written by DBA's and programmers.

Database Weekly - is a database professional's dream. This weekly newsletter lists everything published on the Internet during the previous week that is relevant to the database profession. Each link includes a short description to help you quickly decide if the link is worth further investigation. Items included are articles, blogs, webcasts, and announcements. Let this newsletter scour the web for you for latest news that affects databases.

Simple-Talk - this newsletter provided by Red-Gate is delivered every two weeks or so. It provides excellent articles on SQL Server. The workbench articles are especially useful in how they address specific challenges.

SQL Team - this site provides a weekly newsletter that includes SQL Server articles and blogs. Each newsletter includes a SQL Server article published by this site.

SearchSQLServer.com - this site sends you emails consisting of articles relevant to topics you select. There are also two free newsletters on SQL Server and Windows news.

KBAlerts - informs you of new or updated Microsoft Knowledge Base articles by e-mail. The KB articles are limited to the Microsoft Technologies you select. Every DBA must be informed of any announced SQL Server problems and fixes. Subscribing to this newsletter will keep, a DBA apprized of these announcements.


MSSQLTips - is run by Edgewood Solutions. It publishes a variety of tips for SQL Server. There are over 350 published tips most of them from Edgewood Solution Engineers. Many of the articles follow the format of stating a problem and followed by the solution. They also provide an extensive directory of vendor product links for SQL Server. A newsletter subscription and a RSS feed option are available.


SQL Server Forums

Forums provide an opportunity to get answers to your questions about SQL Server. Many participants share scripts, stored procedures, functions etc... If you are looking for some help with SQL Server, then forums are the place to ask. For help with forum etiquette see Jeff Moden's article.

SQL Server Central provides a SQL Server only forum. It is very active. The active topics are included in its newsletter to assist with getting answers to any questions. Many subscribers use the forum to share scripts and techniques. Each article published by the newsletter has a dedicated topic opened to allow readers to ask questions and discuss the article.

MSDN Forum - Microsoft provides a collection of forums that cover SQL Server and other Microsoft Technologies. It is a good place to report problems with SQL Server because Microsoft employees do read them and respond. You may not get the answer you want or when you want it but it is a least a start.

MSDN SQL Server Forum - Microsoft's SQL Server forum.


Technology questions and answers - IT Knowledge Exchange - You can ask IT questions that are answered by your peers. This includes questions about SQL Server. This site also has 50 blogs as of 04/22/08. That covers all aspects of IT including several dedicated to Database software such as SQL Server.


SQL Server Blogs

SQL Server blogs consist of articles, scripts, how to instructions, ideas, or anything else the blogger thinks is relevant to SQL Server. After reading a post, the reader can leave comments that appear below the post. This feature provides feedback to the author and let other readers see what others thought of the article. Sometimes the comments are more useful than the post.

I have started subscribing to Blogs using an RSS feed to My Yahoo web portal. There are other ways to subscribe to RSS feeds. I just used my yahoo portal because I was already had one.

  • SQLServerPedia - blog with many SQL Server experts. Many nice posts on SQL Server Performance
  • SQL Cat Whitepapers - is an excellent collection of whitepapers for SQL Server.
  • SQL blog.com - The SQL Server Blog Spot on the Web
  • PSS SQL Server Engineers - This is the official team Web Log for Microsoft PSS SQL Support. Posts are mostly provided by the PSS SQL Escalation Services team.
  • SQLTeam.COM - active set of SQL Server bloggers with a newsletter 
  • sqldbatips.com blog - Hints, tips, tricks and associated thoughts on SQL Server related topics from Jasper Smith
  • Grumpy OLD DBA - provides some excellent advice and tips for DBA's supporting SQL Server
  • SQL Server Knowledge Sharing Network (SqlServer-qa.net) - provides the latest announcemenst for SQL Server
  • Top 10 SQL Server Blogs at Microsoft provides a nice list of SQL Server blogs.
  • March Omnibus by Kevin Kline provides a nice list of SQL Blogs
  • SQL Server with Mr. Denny by Denny Cherry provdoes posts on all areas of SQL Server plus info on other technologies used as a DBA. 
  • Carpe Datum by Bucky Wood provides posts on the latest happenings of SQL Server. He does more than just repeat announcements he provides tips, reviews, instructions, and insights into latest in releases of Microsoft's SQL Server DBMS.


Training


Webcast

I am a big fan of webcasts. Viewing them live allows you to ask the presenter questions. If you miss it, you can view its recording through on demand. Much of my initial training for SQL Server 2005 was from webcasts.

SQL Server 2008 Webcasts:

SQL Server 2005 Webcasts:

Webcasts:


Tutorials

Exforsys Inc - has a large collection of short training articles for SQL Server.


Virtual Labs

Microsoft provides virtual labs, which provides step-by-step instructions for using installing and using the various features of SQL Server 2005. The lab uses a virtual server that is initialized whenever you start a new lab. The lab server provides a safe environment to learn this technology without affecting anyone else. Therefore, if you mess up big time no worries just initialize the lab server and start again.

Print out the lab instructions if you do not have dual screens. Swapping between the lab and the instructions gave me a headache so printing them does help.



WhitePapers




Additional Resources


Last Updated:Friday, 05-Sep-2008 19:39:07 CEST