T-SQL Tuesday #68 is hosted by Andy Yun (@SQLBek). Many SQL Server defaults are not ideal, and most of us have a list of defaults we always change. Andy wants us to Just Say No to Defaults and blog about what, why or how we change defaults.

If you are an SSIS developer like me, there is a big chance that the ProtectionLevel in SSIS Packages is on top of your list of defaults to change. The default ProtectionLevel is EncryptSensitiveWithUserKey (ugh), but most of the time it is not the best option. Raise your hand if you have ever asked your favorite search engine for advice on issues like “SSIS package fails in SQL Server Agent job” or if you have ever heard someone exclaim “but it works on my machine!?” 😅

There are many great blog posts about the different ProtectionLevels, why you probably want to change to DontSaveSensitive as your default, and how to use configurations and parameters instead of encrypted SSIS packages. I will not go into details about any of that in this post, but I will use ProtectionLevel as an example default property you want to change in many SSIS packages at the same time.

How do you batch update properties in existing SSIS packages? You probably don’t want to open up every single package and change them manually?

One of the main tasks in Biml projects is to import source metadata. The recommended method is GetDatabaseSchema. This method returns an ImportResults object that contains SchemaNodes (schema metadata) and TableNodes (table and view metadata).

Happy SQLCruisers!

SQLCruise - Learn. Network. Relax. Grow… Just add water.

I recently attended my first SQLCruise, and trying to summarize a week full of experiences is difficult. Let me skip straight to the important part:

Did I learn anything?
Yes

Was it worth it?
Yes!

Would I attend again?
YES!

🤓😁🥳

Hello, my name is Cathrine, and I am a tab hoarder 🤓 I always have lots of tabs open in SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) connected to different environments. I have written about how Redgate SQL Prompt Tab Coloring makes it easy to find the right tab(s) based on the tab color, but that is not the only tab feature that saves me a lot of time.

Redgate SQL Prompt Tab History. is amazing! It allows you to view and reopen closed tabs, even those unnamed and unsaved tabs with ad-hoc queries that you thought you would never need again. It also allows you to quickly navigate and search through closed and open tabs.

T-SQL Tuesday #66 was hosted by me on May 12th. The topic of the month was Monitoring. We all monitor something while working with SQL Server, and this month’s blog posts covers all kinds of topics by DBAs, developers and BI professionals 🤓