Category Presentations

Let the SQLSaturdays for 2014 Begin!

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After my normal holiday hiatus from speaking, nice to get out to some early SQLSaturdays to begin this year.  First up was Nashville.  The Nashville event is great for so many reasons but it holds an ooey gooey sentimental spot in my heart.  Nashville was where I gave my first presentation at a SQLSaturday.  It was also being led by my dear friend/sqlfamily, Tamera Clark (twitter|blog) so I just HAD to go.  It was about 5 hours from me so I drove down on Wednesday.  Went down little early to do some work on a project.  My BlueGranite colleague, Josh Fennessy, (twitter|blog) was also speaking so took opportunity to work with real live person, in person!

Speaker dinner in Nashville

Speaker dinner in Nashville

SQLSaturday events began with the speaker dinner was at a very funky place called Saffire.  It was in an interesting old factory.  Good food, good beer, and plenty of catch up time.

More speaker party in Nashville

More speaker party in Nashville

Event day comes early to setup the booth for BlueGranite.  So extremely proud that my company helps to support these events!  We meet great people all over for both opportunities but especially for recruiting.  I know the last 4+ people hired at least seem to have been plucked from the SQL Server community.  Just a fantastic thing!

We just have no fun at these events.

We just have no fun at these events.

After time chatting up folks at the BlueGranite booth I head to the WIT panel discussion.  Wendy Pastrick (twitter|blog) was the moderator.  The super lovely panel included Arlene Gray (twitter|LinkedIn), Rie Irish (twitter), Julie Smith (twitter|blog), and myself.  It was a nice refreshing discussion that had very little to do with gender.  The topic was just in general how to keep the young whipper snappers going into IT positions.  One of my favorite points was made by David Maxwell (twitter|blog).  He expressed that folks in IT like to complain and rant.  It’s how we bond and let off steam which is fine.  We should also be aware though if we always are stressing the negative.  We like our jobs and it drives a lot of passion in us.  We need to make sure, especially with young ones, not to let the complaints always take over the conversation.

***

After that was my session on SQL Server server performance.  It went pretty well.  I got some great ideas to tweak that presentation from Rob (twitter|blog) and Julie.  Thanks guys!

***

After my session I was able to catch Denny Cherry’s (twitter|blog) presentation on indexing internals.  He’s on the west coast so not very often outside of Summit that I am able to catch him speak so was excited about that.  Excellent stuff!

Denny going over index internals

Denny going over index internals

People streaming in for the prize drawings to wrap up Nashville.

People streaming in for the prize drawings to wrap up Nashville.

Up next was Cleveland this past weekend.  I missed Cleveland last year and pretty much made up my mind then and there that I would not miss it this year.  As I was submitting, started looking at the schedule and then began to have a bit of organizer envy.  It was really a phenomenal line up and was honored to be a part of it.  So Friday I get some work done in the morning and then drive over in time to make it to the speaker dinner.  The dinner was at an Italian restaurant and they had a nice sit down meal.

Speaker dinner in Cleveland.

Blurry but here is speaker dinner in Cleveland.

Saturday began again very early to setup the BlueGranite booth.  Again very proud for being a sponsor for this event and for such a strong presence of speakers.  Cory Stephenson (twitter|LinkedIn) also helped organize the event.  I spent most of the day at the booth having great conversations.  The booth had a nice spot right next to the curly slide.  Yes I said slide, no typo there.  Hyland Software’s building had a couple slides…how cool is that?!

Opening remarks by Tom LaRock

Opening remarks by Tom LaRock

View from the booth next to the slide.

View from the booth next to the slide.

My presentation was in the afternoon and it went pretty well.  I gave my most favorite session…spatial data.  The conversation during that session gave me a lot of great ideas for making some tweaks to it.  Thank you very much to those who came and gave feedback.  Check out my favorite feedback from David Maxwell’s 11 year old daughter below.

***

What could the speaker do differently to improve? – I saw some confused faces in the crowd.  Check to make sure everybody is on the same page before you move on to the next bit of your presentation. 

***

11 years old!  And excellent advice!  David make sure when she enters the workforce that she sends me her resume!  Also really wonderful you took her to a SQLSaturday as well.  I hope she enjoyed it!  I am hoping to take my daughter to one this summer as well.  Love seeing the little ladies being exposed to great people in the technical field.

Grant goes uni-bomber

Grant goes uni-bomber

The after party was at Dave and Busters.  It was nice to sit and relax after a long day.  Had some very interesting conversation with sqlfamily that included zombies and tilapia (don’t ask).  After that was some Cards Against Humanity.

CAH time!

CAH time!

The next morning catch some breakfast with some SQL Family before heading back home.  The snow overnight made the journey back a little stressful.  The roads were really horrendous through most of Ohio.  Just another hit from the winter without end.  I still would do it again.  Both events were top notch and thank you for having me.  Will be taking some ideas back for the next SQLSaturday in Indy (shameless plug pointer to website here).

SQLSaturday 256 – Kalamazoo

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Last weekend was SQLSaturday Kalamazoo.  This lovely little SQLSaturday has worked it’s way onto my regular yearly list.  It’s a short little drive from me in Indy and the people involved are wonderful!  Didn’t need more reasons but is also now home base for my company, BlueGranite.  Stormy weather ended up delaying my departure up there on Friday.  Trick or treating was postponed on Thursday to Friday for the first time that I can remember.  My kids are 8 and 5 so there is no way I was going to miss trick or treating so I missed the speaker dinner.  It was at a brewery that I’ve never been to so was sad to miss it.  I had a good time running around the neighborhood with Wolverine and a ninja though.  So we get to Kalamazoo around 11:00 pm.  My husband, Rod, went with me again in further efforts to get him hooked on SQLFamily (insert evil mwa-haha laugh).

Thank you sponsors!

Thank you sponsors!

Gareth helping out at the PASS booth

Gareth helping out at the PASS booth

Get up and get a quick workout before heading over to the venue.  My session wasn’t until after lunch which is a pretty nice slot to have, late enough to get settled and time to run through demos but not super late.  I am normally distracted with my own session until it’s over so stinks a bit as I don’t normally attend sessions before mine.  They had an amazing lineup so was a little bummed to miss so many great presentations.  It gave me time to chat with many of the folks from BlueGranite though.  We had 4 speakers represented and then Josh (twitter|blog) and Amy (twitter) organizing!  We were also a sponsor so got to meet Mike Depoian (linkedin), VP of sales as he assisted at our booth.  Being a completely remote company, was a great opportunity to put faces to Lync avatars.

Ok demo, you are working now. Please work later!

Ok demo, you are working now. Please work later!

Amy at the BlueGranite booth

Amy at the BlueGranite booth

My session came after a nice taco bar lunch.  I am so jealous of those who have venues that allow outside caterers.  I just love the taco setup for a big group like that and is nice change of pace.  So nice and stuffed in a super hot room….zzzz!  No it turned out well even though I was a little nervous with this one as I hadn’t done it for several months.  I was more worried that I was on a new laptop.  I had only had the new machine for a few days and had installed the latest bits for everything I could.  Little nerve wracking but it gave me an opportunity to get folks info on some new performance counters for SQL Server 2014 which was great.  Everything seemed to go well and I got wonderful feedback.  Thank you for everyone who came to my session and especially those who gave feedback!

Talking about performance counters or describing a cheeseburger.

Talking about performance counters or describing a cheeseburger?

Then gave big sigh and decompressed a bit.  Ended up only in the last session of the day for Michael Swart’s (twitter|blog) session “5 Easy Pieces”.  I love hearing of people’s experiences, soaking up others wisdom.  He is another one of those lovely polite Canadians and had some great stories to tell.  I especially loved the one on indexed views.  He had a situation where the difference of edition to standard threw off performance in relation to an indexed view.  He had to use WITH (NOEXPAND) to resolve it.  Great session Michael!  I enjoyed it very much.

Michael sharing lessons learned

Michael sharing lessons learned

After giveaways most of the speakers went over to The Mix.  I was a little nervous as it was a bit of a young pup bar on college campus but it turned out really fun.  Josh and team had setup a KJ to perform, yes karaoke.  The KJ was a good one and won me over with a rendition of Run DMC’s “Tricky”.  I think I am going to go with the angle that I didn’t karaoke that night.  I don’t think that which may be construed as me doing karaoke counts.  Can I keep my record?  After The Mix we head back to one of the hotels for hanging out and some Cards Against Humanity.

An experts panel session

An experts panel session

The end to a really great weekend was made even better due to the graciousness of those fine Ford folks.  Tim (twitter|blog) and Amy hosted a really nice brunch for everyone at their house.  Thank you both so much for that!  It really ended the weekend perfectly!  The event was flawless from my point of view and got a nicely timed post Summit SQLFamily fix!  Oh and we got great jackets!  I didn’t think they could top the nice jackets from last year but they did!  Check those pictures…they look great!  Thanks for having me up to speak and for the super nice jacket!  Josh, you guys did a great job!  Congrats on a wonderful SQLSaturday!  Also thank you to my hubby Rod for taking all the great pictures.  If you want to see the full set of them they are uploaded to link below.

Prize giveaways at the end of SQLSaturday Kalamazoo

Prize giveaways at the end of SQLSaturday Kalamazoo

http://www.flickr.com/photos/hope_foley/sets/72157637308193364/.

PASS Summit 2013 – Part 3

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Friday

The beginning of the end day at Summit began and doesn’t take long to start running into people leaving and the good byes begin.  It’s so nice catching up with people that you may only see once a year, definitely sad when it’s over.  I made it in time to catch Lenny Lobel’s (blog) session on spatial data.  He was such a vital role in my learning of spatial data, was very excited to see his session.  He concentrates more on the development side so nice seeing some applications involving spatial data.  And also one of his queries helped to trigger a potential method to help me with an interesting question I got while in Orlando.  After his session I went to the Birds of a Feather luncheon.  It’s a lunch where they have tables that contain topics and assign some expert resources to sit at them.  It’s a great one and I always have good conversation.  I ended up sitting with folks at the replication table.  Interesting hearing some experiences with it and some large applications using it.

PASS Board Q&A

PASS Board Q&A

After lunch I made it over for the PASS Board Q&A.  It is an opportunity to ask the entire panel of board members questions.  If you have any issues or concerns, it’s the one opportunity I know of to get them answered directly.  I didn’t have any grievances to air but it normally is good conversation and nice to hear the thinking behind decisions made.  It was very interesting to hear outcomes of the BA Conferences since it was a new endeavor.  Next I went to a session on Always On that was done by a customer panel.  I love hearing people and their experiences!  This panel contained people who have some very challenging environments.  Enjoyed hearing what they had implemented to assist in those challenges.  After that was the last session of the day and Summit.  I went to see my friend and colleague at BlueGranite, Josh Fennessy (blog|twitter) and his session on Excel 2013 for analytics.  It was an excellent session and I’ve already used some of the material I learned there.  Josh always seems so very relaxed in his sessions.  I knew he was a little nervous and it was almost sickening how it didn’t show AT ALL.

Always On Customer Panel session

Always On Customer Panel session

Josh in his session on analytics in Excel 2013

Josh in his session on analytics in Excel 2013

And then it was over!  I went over to the community zone again to make sure to say goodbye to as many as I could.  I then went with a large group of SQLfamily to a nice dinner at Fleming’s.  It was very relaxing to sit down to a great meal where they brought the food to me.  After that went to Dillinger’s for one last drink and called it an early night since my flight was fairly early next morning.

Warning: Mushy Content to Follow

<mush>

It was so great seeing so many wonderful SQL family members!  I have said several times that getting involved in this community has forever changed my life and career!  I couldn’t help reflecting on things at Summit since I got to speak this year after trying for so long.  I am honored to be considered caliber to speak at this wonderful event!  I am so grateful to the extremely long list of people in the community who helped encourage me to get out there and helped stop some of the negative voices in my head.  You know the ones saying things like “who wants to hear what you have to say when they have <insert super smart other speaker> out there giving sessions”.  I am still just amazed at the good nature of this community and I will keep making sure I do my part to make sure it stays that way.

</mush>

PASS Summit 2013 – Part 2

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Wednesday

It may have been the nerves at work again but it seemed as soon I opened my eyes I was wide awake.  I got up in time to catch a super quick breakfast and get to the opening keynote.  It was a fairly tame and without incident keynote.  Watching Twitter it seemed the only large flair up was when “ask” was used as a noun.  The demos were good but I missed seeing Amir Netz (twitter).  I just love his demos!  After the keynote I spent the rest of the day chatting with folks and preparing for my session in the afternoon.  Had some great conversations at the chapter lunch.  For those unfamiliar with this, they have maps and tables setup for the local user groups so you can find groups in your area.  I met several people in Indiana that are a bit too far south to make it to IndyPASS.  There is some interest in potentially setting up a new user group in Bloomington.  If there are any others interested in this please let me know.  I would love to help this effort but need to make sure I have enough dedicated people to lead the group.

Great pic that Melissa got of us BlueGranite ladies

Great pic that Melissa got of us BlueGranite ladies

GO TIME!  Then comes time for my presentation and my room is very well filled.  I am always worried I will be presenting to an empty room but elevated a bit at Summit, especially when I know Bob Ward’s (twitter) is on at the same time.  It was true what others kept reminding me, different audiences want different things and a 500 level session isn’t for everyone.  I get started and think I did pretty well at hiding my nervousness.  I remember at BA Con I could feel/hear the nerves in my voice.  I didn’t notice that in this time.  It’s one of my favorite sessions with absolutely my favorite demo dataset, a database of microbreweries!  I know I can always tell when someone is passionate about the topic they are presenting, I hope that came through with my attendees.  I felt it went pretty well and had several stay and chat and ask questions after my session.  I had some very positive feedback afterward which some comments were just so good it just about floored me.  It felt so good to be done and it go well!  Could just feel the weight come off my shoulders.

Picture Rob Kerr captured of people staying for questions after my session

Picture Rob Kerr captured of people staying for questions after my session

After floating around on cloud 9 for a bit, went to the Exhibitor Reception.  This is where they get folks in to talk with sponsors with the enticement of free food and drinks.  I made several rounds to make a meal out of the appetizer stations but little easier with hearty items like shrimp and grits.  Ended up leaving fairly early to head to Prohibition to get a table for the Pragmatic Works karaoke party.  Oh the SQL people and their karaoke!  It was a really nice party and some very memorable displays like Colin (twitter|blog) and Patrick (twitter|blog) yearly performance of “Forgot About Dre” and chicken appearances from Jorge/SQLChicken (twitter|blog).  From there went to SQLSentry’s party at the Ale House.  It also was a very great party and was honored to be invited.  The highlight was meeting and talking with Paul White (twitter|blog).  I was shocked at how nice, humble, and gracious he was in person.

Patrick and Colin and the tradition of "Forgot About Dre"

Patrick and Colin and the tradition of “Forgot About Dre”

Who doesn't love that chicken?!

Who doesn’t love that chicken?!

Thursday

I again surprised myself by waking up in time to catch some breakfast, I mean bread before keynote.  My list of complaints is small from this year’s Summit, but breakfast this year was disappointing (I know, I know…I like food).  Every day was the same very bread laden meal.  The only other options to pastries/bagels was oatmeal or yogurt.  I know logistics of feeding that many people is tricky but would have been nice for some other options like there has been in previous years.  The keynote was Dr. David DeWitt which is always a great one.  I was super distracted during it though since was planning to try to take a certification test.  They had half price certification testing going on at Summit.  Knowing the keynote was going to get deep I ended up leaving early to go try to take 70-465.  I was planning on doing the normal course and starting at 70-461 and go on up from there.  I’m not sure what possessed me to take this particular test.  I had been solely focused on my presentation so went in completely cold, and came out with….a better understanding what I will get into next time.  Can’t win them all and I felt better keeping focus on presentation and getting my win there.

***

I made it back just in time to make it to the WIT luncheon.  I am involved with the PASS WIT VC program so would have been very upset to miss it.  The panel consisted of Erin Stellato (twitter|blog), Rob Farley (twitter|blog), Cindy Gross (twitter|blog), Kevin Kline (twitter|blog), and Gail Shaw (twitter|blog).  There was good conversation there but it ended up being initially very lop sided in who was speaking.  That worked out better in the second half.  And honestly it seemed to be missing some of the fire in belly moments that drove me to be involved in WIT.  Erin ended up saving me from missing out totally on that with her exchange with a member of the audience.  A woman mentioned a comment being made to her that she had all the traits stacked against her success in IT in that she was an athlete, foreign, and a woman.  Erin’s response was that she should have responded with “How am I not going to succeed?”.  Thank you Erin for that highlight of WIT luncheon in my opinion!

The WIT Luncheon

The WIT Luncheon

From there I was excited to finally go to my first technical session.  I took too long to get to a session over PDW and was denied entry as it was full.  Doh!  The next session I decided to head over for morale support to Colin’s session on policy based management.  He was a first time Summit speaker and was very nervous as well.  I hated seeing when I got there that he was having some technical issues with the projector.  It was something I had run into before too where you couldn’t see on the laptop and only on the projector.  It’s a workable situation but makes it VERY difficult during demos.  They ended up getting him a second monitor and it worked out fine.  He handled it much better than I would.  My face started to flush a bit with speaker sympathy symptoms.  Was a great session and I learned about EPM Framework from Lara Rubbelke’s (twitter|blog) team that extends capability of policy based management to SQL Servers across environment that is available on Codeplex.

Colin presenting like a boss while tech guy works out issues.

Colin presenting like a boss while tech guy works out issues.

Next I made sure to get to the BI Power Hour session.  I caught it last year and was one I definitely didn’t want to miss.  When I’m figuring out sessions at Summit I always try to think about which sessions will lack full impact on recordings.  This is very high in that category.  They aren’t moving mountains admittedly with technical content but have a damn good time with the BI tools and is just fun.  Did learn that Power Pivot was “just so metal that it caused the split in the name” from Matthew Roche (twitter|blog).  Also Matt Masson (twitter|blog) showed how he impressed his kids with business intelligence and how vast his knowledge is of My Little Pony.

The wonder that is the BI Power Hour

The wonder that is the BI Power Hour

After catching up with my youngins back home I made it over to the Nascar Hall of Fame for the Community Appreciation Party.  This party was good but I am little biased to the party last year at the EMP.  I’m not exactly a Nascar fan so the material around at the hall of fame wasn’t getting the oohs and ahhs but that’s just a personal preference thing.  Only complaint that I had was the space was a bit smaller so was cramped in some areas.

A view of the masses at the Community Appreciation Party

A view of the masses at the Community Appreciation Party

PASS Summit 2013 – Part 1

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Monday – travel day

Ah Summit time!  The biggest and best time to meet up with SQLfamily.  You always get pockets of SQLfamily at SQLSaturdays throughout the year but this is the time when EVERYONE is there for an all out SQLfamily reunion.  This year was a little special too…it was my first year going as a speaker!  Even on the way to the airport I could feel the difference, I had never left for Summit with presentation anxiety.  I had a one hour delay on the way to Charlotte but even then was much less time to get there than Seattle.  It was a nice change of pace too to be on the same time zone as home.  I get to hotel, drop my stuff in room, and immediately head out to try find people.  I was excited to start having those “heey, long time no see” moments.  I went over to Buffalo Wild Wings for the very end of the networking party hosted by Andy Warren (blog|twitter) and Steve Jones (blog|twitter).  I definitely found plenty of “hey” moments there.  You have to give yourself extra time to get anywhere at Summit due to those moments.  From there folks decided they wanted to try to do some sqlkaraoke and we walked a few blocks to try to find a place called Dixie’s.  We walk up to it and find it was closed, permanently closed so decided to head back go to Carolina Ale House.  We had amassed a fairly large group by that time and the folks at the Ale House were not prepared, staff-wise.  Maybe it was just coincidence in the locations we chose but for being in close proximity to the convention center, places seemed unprepared for such a large conference.  Next time the conference moves from Seattle it may help to make some calls into the local establishments for warnings if that wasn’t already done.  From there we just ended up having drinks at the hotel bars and hanging out there.

Room full of crazy/dedicated SQLSaturday organizers

Room full of crazy/dedicated SQLSaturday organizers

Tuesday

Wake up fairly early and head over to grab a crepe with my good friend, Colin Stasiuk (blog|twitter).  I then get registered and spend a little more time preparing for presentation.  After that I went over for the SQLSaturday organizers meeting.  It was a good meeting but it’s always hard to move mountains in meetings that large.  There was mention of some changes coming to the website.  If anyone has recommendations for changes they are collecting them now.  I was also intrigued by a mentoring program that was mentioned for organizers.  I have a circle of people I know who organize and I reach out to with questions so have created my own organic circle/support group.  I would be afraid there are folks out there floundering without one so seems like a great idea to me.  That and I always hated to be constantly bugging Karla (blog|twitter).

Quiz Bowl prep

Quiz Bowl prep

Amazes me every year the number of First Timers at Summit.

Amazes me every year the number of First Timers at Summit.

After the meeting I went through more prep for my presentation.  At this point I was EXTREMELY nervous!  Trying for so long to be accepted as a speaker at the Summit, the idea of it not going well just about make me sick to my stomach.  Going back and doing a run through and saying the words out loud in my room helped calm the nerves.  I did that until it was time to head over to convention center to prepare for the Quiz Bowl at the welcome reception.  I was very honored to be asked to participate in it this year by Tim (blog|twitter).  So we do some preparation and then head over to get ready to welcome the first timers.  Had some good conversations with my group even though I looked ridiculous donning a spinning beany hat.  They always try to help folks locate the volunteers and I’m sure someone somewhere had fun with the decision for those hats.  Then it was Quiz Bowl time and we had fun even though we didn’t win for our contestant.  Next I went to the volunteer party at Strike City, a bowling alley.  After catching up with folks there and a terrible display of bowling I went over to see how things were going at Fox and Hound.  Mr. Denny Cherry (blog|twitter) was hosting a party there sponsored by SQL Sentry and SIOS.  It was packed and had a good time watching folks do karaoke.  I set a decent curfew for myself that night so headed back fairly early.  No way I wanted to be super tired for my presentation the next day.

My view from Quiz Bowl

My view from Quiz Bowl

The very busy Fox and Hound SQLKaraoke party

The very busy Fox and Hound SQLKaraoke party

SQLSaturday 200 Philly

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The other weekend I had the great pleasure of heading over to Philadelphia again this year to speak for the 200th SQLSaturday.  200?!  Just amazing!  This event was great!  So great it got me very amped up about my local SQLSaturday.  So much so that I’m a little later than normal getting this post out due to kicking my planning of SQLSaturday 242 into high gear.  But wanted to make sure to get this post out to document another really great event.
***
Travels over to Philly were pretty uneventful.  My fellow Indy compadre, Eddie Wuerch (blog|twitter) was speaking as well and was on the same flight.  He was even kind enough to drive Miss Daisy Miss Hope to all the events!  Thanks again Eddie…many good SQLSaturday karma points to you!  The speaker dinner was really great!  The weather was good again this year so allowed us to sit out in a very nice patio area at the restaurant.  It was held at McKenzie Brew House which had excellent selection of beers which you know wins points in my book.  AND they had great food!  Excellent choice organizers and thank you again!
SQLfamily congregates at the speaker dinner

SQLfamily congregates at the speaker dinner

So the morning of the event I get up extra early to do one more run through of my presentation since I had added some new things and it had been awhile since I had done this session.  Then head over to the event and catch Brian Moran’s (twitter|blog) session, “Awesome coaching questions every geek, analyst, leader, and consultant must know”.  Being a consultant, I was interested and the title even told me I HAD to know these questions so I went.  It was a really good engaging conversational session.  One of my favorite questions was “What does success look like with this project?”.
"Can't ask good questions if you are not listening well."

“Can’t ask good questions if you are not listening well.”

My session, “My SQL Server is Not Slow for Pete’s Sake! – Server Side Performance Analysis”, went well and got some good constructive feedback.  I made a huge presenter mistake though and I’m still kicking myself!  I have in the past forgotten to plug my laptop in before getting started.  I’m normally very antsy to get hooked up to the overhead and make the words come up on the screen.  Normally I keep talking while I’m getting my power cord situated and it’s not a big deal.  Well remember how I did a run through that morning?  I forget to put my laptop power cord in my backpack!!  Thank the heavens Josh Lynn (twitter|blog) had a Dell as well and was even sitting in a prime location to where he took care of plugging it in while I kept talking!  Josh…my hero!  Thank you so much again!
***
After that was the WIT panel discussion.  The panel included myself, Melissa Demsak (twitter), Kevin Boles (twitter), and Kevin Goff (twitter|blog).  It was led by Sharon Dooley.  We had some great conversation.  I love it when we have someone speak up in the discussion and I feel myself wanting to say “Amen” at end of their statements.  It’s the whole reason I am involved in PASSWIT, for those moments.  I had one in there when one woman stated how she isn’t a “woman architect, she’s a professional”.
The audience at the WIT discussion

The audience at the WIT discussion

Next I caught the wonderful, Mike Hillwig’s (twitter|blog) session on VLFs.  He’s one of those great to talk to folks and his sessions are that way too.  He had some slight bumps in his demos due to last minute change of hardware.  The brave soul was until a few minutes before planning to present from his Surface Pro.  I love his section of disclaimers including “assume I am an idiot” in reference to not trusting content and slapping it into production.
Mike telling us what the VLF

Mike telling us what the VLF

After that session I went to Wayne Sheffield’s (twitter|blog) session, “Table Vars & Temp Tables – What you NEED to Know!”.  This was my absolute favorite session of the day!  Wayne is an MCM and eww buddy it shows! I was so into the content I forgot to get a picture and I don’t think I’ve ever done that.  Normally my ADD kicks in and distracts me enough to snap a picture.  There was so much great information on table variables and temp tables, I was really blown away!  He even cracked open a hex editor!  So with such good content I was able to forgive him when he bout gave me a heart attack when there was an unexpected “boom” sound effect in his slides.  Very well done Wayne!  If you have a chance to see this session, highly recommend it!
***
The last session of the day I caught a little bit of Dominic Falso’s “Introduction to Spatial Data in SQL Server”.  I couldn’t resist a session on spatial data since I have one as well.  The intrigue of seeing how someone else presents the material was too much.  He did a good job as many of the conceptual pieces can be a bit dry.
Dominic Falso going over spatial data

Dominic Falso going over spatial data

Then after the prize raffle headed to Joey’s house for the after party.  Bravo to your bravery again this year hosting the party at your house, Joey!  It was a very nice shindig again this year and thank you again!  Thanks to all the organizers and volunteers for well done event!  Appreciate you all having me out again this year!

Sidelines no more! Speaking at the PASS Summit!

hopefoley 6 Comments
This time last year I was partaking in a Twitter pity party for fellow folks who had gotten the thanks-but-no-thanks-better-luck-next year letters from PASS Summit selection committee.  I was used to it.  I have submitted to speak at the PASS Summit regularly for the last few years but was denied each time.  This year I am skipping the pity party because I got selected!!!  I will be presenting one of my favorites, spatial data, to the fine folks in Charlotte!  I am so excited but a bit out of sorts since I haven’t been in this spot yet but have wanted to be for so long.  Making me think of dogs who chase cars, they wouldn’t know what to do if they caught one.  This dog caught a car!  I have had this as a top one on my professional wish list, what next?  I will need to come up with some new goals and new cars to chase.
To my peeps having the pity party, keep your heads up and keep on kicking butt out there!  You’ll catch that car next year.  And until then I’ll tip my 40 IPA to my homies!  Well no I won’t tip beer since that’s wasteful but I will definitely drink this one in your honor!
Here's one for you!

Here’s one for you!

SQLSaturday 211 Chicago – Finally A SQLSaturday Fix

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Hard to believe but this was my first SQLSaturday of the year! Lately I have done a decent amount of user group presentations which are great, but there’s something special about a SQLSaturday.  Chicago’s was right after the PASS BA Conference so became an extension of some really great SQL goodness. I left straight from the last session to head over to Addison to get to the speaker dinner.  The dinner was at La Hacienda so caught up with friends over margaritas and good food.  We got a really nice, unique speaker gift: a solar powered phone charger.  The tree hugging hippie in me loves that!  Thank you again organizers!

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Morning comes and I get to the venue at the DeVry campus just a hair before the first sessions start.  I head over to the speaker room and chat for just a few minutes.  Just then an attendee comes in to let us know that they had no speaker show up!  Ross LoForte and Ted Krueger (blog|twitter) rush over to the room to save the day.  Luke Jian (blog|twitter) and myself quickly follow to assist them.  It turned into a really good discussion with the attendees over different aspects of being a DBA.  The session evals were all very good so it worked out and very nice of everyone to jump in and assist.

Ted and Ross stepping in for a surprise spontaneous discussion on being a DBA.

Ted and Ross stepping in for a surprise spontaneous discussion on being a DBA.

From there I head to Erin Stellato’s (blog|twitter) session “Making the Leap from Profiler to Extended Events”.  She is such a stellar speaker and this was a fantastic topic.  I was a bit jealous of the topic that I didn’t think of it since it is a super common issue.  Extended events is one of those features that are great but just is taking the masses a long time to come around to using.  She did a good job showing it’s not such a beast anymore and some great things from Jonathan Keyhayias (blog|twitter) to make it even more helpful like his script to take a trace and convert to extended events.  Bravo Erin!

Erin showing folks there's nothing to be afraid of with extended events.

Erin showing folks there’s nothing to be afraid of with extended events.

After that I caught some lunch with a unicorn!

Who doesn't love lunch with a unicorn.

Lunch with a unicorn is supposed to be magical…not disturbing right?

Next I caught Josh Fennessy’s (blog|twitter) “Demystifying BISM and Tabular Mode SSAS” session.  I was caught off guard right away when he started as he said he had no slides.  Say what now?!  He did full session just talking and writing things out on the whiteboard.  I was really surprised and impressed at how well it worked too.  He had some of the best interaction with the audience I have seen maybe ever.  I feel like I would flounder like a fish doing something like that unless I practiced it like a fiend.  You rebel you, Mr. Fennessy!

Slides?! Josh don't need no stinking slides!

Slides?! Josh don’t need no stinking slides!

For the next session I head to Neil Hambly’s (blog|twitter), “SQL Server 2012 Memory Management”.  I am always surprised at how little presentations there are on memory within SQL Server, at least that I have seen.  He did a good job though there were some quirks in demos.  I knew talking to him earlier he had laptop issues plague him.  Still was a great amount of info given and majority of demos went fine.

Neil going over memory management in SQL Server 2012.

Neil going over memory management in SQL Server 2012.

And last session of the day was when Ted and I gave our session on consulting.  It is always fun to do this one!  I was especially excited after hearing from someone who saw it in Minnesota a few months ago.  He immediately went from our session to a consulting booth who had sponsored the event and began talking to them.  They ended up hiring him and he’s enjoying the change.  How cool is that?!  Someone’s life was made better by a session I gave…there will never be better feedback than that!  Session went really well and we had a lot of interaction.  Always great too when other consultants come and participate.  Thank you Allan Hirt (blog|twitter) and Rick Krueger (blog|twitter) for adding the perspective and experiences of a independent consultant!  And thanks again Ted!

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Thank you to the SQLSaturday Chicago team for having me as a speaker again and putting on a fantastic event!  Thanks also to my friends and SQLfamily for just being splendiferously (make sure I get credit for that new word) wonderful!