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Virtual Chapter

PowerShell Grab Bag Code

Thanks to everyone who took the time to check out my PowerShell Grab Bag session today for the PowerShell Virtual Chapter of PASS.  Here’s a zip of all the code that I used and the two links I promised to include.

Today’s Code

Quest’s Free PowerShell Commands for Active Directory

Shay Levy’s ( blog | twitter ) WinRar blog post

Happy Scripting!

Presenting for the PowerShell Virtual Chapter of PASS

pass_logo_thumbSorry for the late notice folks but I will be Presenting for the PowerShell Virtual Chapter of PASS today at Noon Eastern.  Today’s session is just going to be a bunch of cool things that I’ve been working on lately but haven’t gotten a chance to present or blog about yet.  I’m still working on one last script but I’ll post the code before the session if I can.  Hope to see you there!

PowerShell Grab Bag

Wednesday December 15, 2010, 12 Noon Eastern Time (GMT -5)
Speaker:  Me
Live Meeting Information Join the meeting

In this short grab bag session we’ll go over a bunch of new scripts that I’ve built over the last few weeks.  Things like:

  • checking free space on mount points,
  • checking SQL agent for failed jobs,
  • polling instances to make sure they’re available,
  • checking the status of log shipping across multiple targets,
  • emailing result sets and
  • scheduling all these with SQL Agent. 
  • Checking remote registries (including why on earth you would ever want to do that?!).
  • Zipping files, even better, we’ll go over how to not zip files that have already been zipped. 
  • The final grab from this session:  for all the Summit attendees out there, I’ll share with you my script to download all the session videos from the 2010 Summit

Early December 2010 Free Training From PASS VCs

  • pass_logoUnderstanding Join Operators
  • How to Use Dynamic Management Views to Monitor and Diagnose Performance Issues With High Volume OLTP Workloads
  • Using OLAP to Optimize and Maintain Predictive Analytics Models


Understanding Join Operators
December 7, 2010 12 PM noon Eastern Time (GMT -5)
Ami Levin

SQL Server implements three different physical operators to perform joins. In this session, we will examine how each of these operators works, including its advantages and challenges. Using real life examples, we will better understand the logic behind the optimizer’s decisions on which operator to use for various joins. Finally, we will learn how to avoid some common join related pitfalls and how to get better performance from our queries.

Ami Levin
Ami is a Microsoft SQL Server MVP, with over 20 years of experience in the IT industry. For the past 12 years, he has been consulting, teaching and speaking on SQL Server worldwide. He manages the Israeli SQL Server user group, leads the local support forum, and is a regular speaker at Microsoft conferences. Ami is the CTO and co-founder of DBSophic, a company that develops workload tuning solutions for SQL Server applications.

How do I attend?  Live Meeting link


Dr. DMV: How to Use Dynamic Management Views to Monitor and Diagnose Performance Issues With High Volume OLTP Workloads
December 8, 2010 12 PM noon Mountain Time (GMT -7)
Glenn Berry

SQL Server 2005 introduced Dynamic Management Views (DMVs) that allow you to see exactly what is happening inside your SQL Server instances and databases with much more detail than ever before. SQL Server 2008 R2 adds even more capability in this area. You can discover your top wait types, most CPU intensive stored procedures, find missing indexes, and identify unused indexes, to name just a few examples. This session (which is applicable to both 2005, 2008 and 2008 R2), presents and explains over thirty DMV queries that you can quickly and easily use to detect and diagnose performance issues in your environment.

Glenn Berry

Glenn works as a Database Architect at NewsGator Technologies in Denver, CO. He is a SQL Server MVP, and he has a whole collection of Microsoft certifications, including MCITP, MCDBA, MCSE, MCSD, MCAD, and MCTS, which proves that he likes to take tests. His expertise includes DMVs, high availability, full text search, and SQL Azure.

How do I attend?  Live Meeting link


Using OLAP to Optimize and Maintain Predictive Analytics Models
December 10, 2010 12 PM noon Eastern Time (GMT -5)
Eugene Asahara

In complex Predictive Analytics (PA) scenarios where it is being applied to a complex system or the players involved are actually trying to undermine the predictions (ex: credit card fraud), the sophistication of the PA must be taken up a notch or two. In this Webcast I will describe techniques for building sophisticated PA systems on the Microsoft BI Stack by using OLAP to:
• Analyze, validate, and optimize PA models.
• Manage and Monitor the performance of the PA models in a Performance Management style.
• Surface PA results to end users in a manner that allows them to work through the ambiguity that remains around predictions.

Eugene Asahara
Eugene specializes in high-end Analysis Services implementation and performance tuning, predictive analytics, and overall BI architecture. He has thirteen years of experience on the Microsoft BI stack; including one year on the SSAS product team and seven years as a Lead DB/BI Architect at Microsoft Consulting Services. Aside from consulting on BI engagements by day Eugene develops bleeding-edge BI software by night. Many of his thoughts around BI and that bleeding-edge space can be found at www.softcodedlogic.com.

How do I attend?  Live Meeting link

Announcing the New PowerShell Virtual Chapter of PASS!

pass_logo_thumbWe are very excited to announce the new PowerShell Virtual Chapter of PASS!  What is a Virtual ChapterPASS Virtual Chapters are forums where SQL Server Professionals from around the world can communicate with others who have similar interests and face similar challenges.  Think of it this way, PASS Chapters unite the SQL Server Community from a geographical perspective, Virtual Chapters unite the community based on common interests in a specific discipline.

What will the new PowerShell Virtual Chapter do?  Our primary mission is holding Live Meetings every month featuring free training from around the world.  We plan to archive the presentations for you to watch on demand and highlight articles and blogs that will interest our members.  This Virtual Chapter is headed up by top professionals from around the US: Ben Miller ( blog | twitter ), Chad Miller [no relation that I’m aware of] ( blog | twitter ), Lars Rasmussen ( blog | twitter ), Peter Schott ( blog | twitter ), and Aaron Nelson ( blog | twitter ).

 We will start things off next Wednesday with our first presentation. Here is the schedule through the end of the year.  Smile We are currently looking for speakers for next year.

Wednesday October 20th 12 pm EDT (GMT-4) – Presenter Chad Miller
Wednesday November 17th 1 pm EST (GMT -5) – Presenter Aaron Nelson
Wednesday December 15th 1 pm EST (GMT -5) – Presenter Peter Schott

Chad Miller will get us started with an introduction to PowerShell as a command line for one-off tasks or automation in the DBA world. Basic PS principles and syntax will be covered. Get your proverbial DBA feet wet with a tool that can make your database and sysadmin life better than it was before! Bigger, stronger, faster. (Cue Bionic Man theme)

Chad Miller
Chad hails from the land of rocket launches, oranges, and alligators where he started the Tampa PowerShell User Group. Chad is the DBA for SQL Server and Manager of Database Administration for a shop supporting SQL Server, Oracle, and Informix, acts as coordinator for the SQL Server PowerShell Extensions CodePlex project, and maintains an active blog at http://sev17.com/author/chad-miller/ .

How do I attend? Registration for the event is now open.
*When you register you’ll get a calendar reminder for the event.