Randy Walker

I have vastly been neglecting my blogging.  So as not to be outdone by Chris Koenig ....

I was able to meetup with the organizers of the event, Jason Pluenneke, Curt Wolfe, Boyd Evert, & Dennis Berk several weeks ago.  I am personally very excited about this new user group starting up.  Partly because of my small part in helping them (one of my roles as the INETA Membership Mentor), but mostly because of my passion for databases.  I'm really looking forward to what will be coming out of the group.

I will be donating several swag items, if you haven't already been enticed into attending.  There will be a free copy of the Heroes Happen Here bundle which includes licensed copies of SQL Server 2008, Visual Studio 2008 and Windows Server 2008.  I'm also bringing a copy of PC-Cillin Anti Virus, an MSDN t-shirt, and a Visual Studio t-shirt.  Chris Koenig is also sending some swag to be given away.

The first meeting of
The Northwest Arkansas SQL Users Group
will be held on Wednesday, May 14th!

Meeting Details

When:
Wednesday, May 14th, 11:30am - 1:00pm

Host:
Connolly Consulting

Address:
2703 SE Otis Corley Drive MAP

City:
Bentonville, AR 72712

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Agenda: This initial meeting will celebrate the launch of the group including pizza, presentations, ideas, networking opportunities, and hopefully some terriffic SWAG! An overview presentation of SQL Server 2008 will be included!

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For more information about this group, please email the organization at

info@nwasql.org

 

So if Mariah Carey is going to feature us Geeks on her videos, the least she could do is get her geekspeak right!  I mean sheezh, who uses 802.11a anyway?  (mentioned at the end of the video)  The geek in the video needs to upgrade her firmware to 802.11n!  Oh wait, I think her doctor already upgraded her "firmware". 

Well, we (us geeks) should all be happy at least.  We finally got the jocks off the music videos.  So does this finally lend legitimacy to the new Geek Era, or just make fun of us?  In either case, my Guitar Hero is going in the trash (as soon as I find a Mariah Carey expansion pack).

Ok, so my announcement is 6 days late.

I'm proud to announce that I received the coveted Microsoft MVP award for Visual Basic (currently the only MVP in Arkansas).  I'd first like to thank the Academy ... oh wait wrong speech again.  Actually I would like to thank the following people for their help and encouragement.  My apologies in advance if I neglected to mention you.

Northwest Arkansas .Net User Group - a great bunch that has been an exciting group to get to know and share with
Travis Doyle - for getting me interested and involved in starting the NWA DNUG
Caleb Jenkins - for being encouraging during his tenure of Tulsa DNUG President and Microsoft Developer Evangelist
Jay Smith - for bringing that spirit of friendly competition and taking over the building of the NWA DNUG and doing an awesome job
Jeremy Sharp - for being a terrific guy to hang out with
Chris Koenig - probably the number one person responsible in helping me get the MVP award
INETA - for being dumb enough to let me "mentor" other user group leaders
Zain Naboulsi - for being the crazy role playing geek
Phil Wheat - for hanging with me during some of my presentations
Omar Villareal - for letting me crash at his house
Dave McKinstry & Tim Rayburn - for always being willing to speak to our UG on their own dime
Peter DeBetta - for being the crazy SQL guy he is
.Net Rocks! - for allowing me to meet my hero from Carl & Gary's VB website
Josh Holmes - my golf partner
Cory Smith - for being my fellow VB'er and introducing me to the Microsoft VB team
Steve Walker - for being that totally awesome guy that we all know and love even if he disappears off the face of the earth every few months
Mark Leon Watson - for putting up with me on the We Are Microsoft Event
all my Twitterettes - for listening to me blather on about my boring life
all my Facebook friends - for accepting my friend invites
and lastly .... Ed Hickey for allowing me to be an MVP!

One of the most difficult things that many tech people have, are problems with relationships and communication.  I was recently forwarded a document that outlines two types of relationships.  I found it very appropriate to every type of relationship I have had.  Parent - child, significant other, boss - employee, employer - employee, co-workers, friends.  I hope you'll read over it and evaluate yourself and the relationships you have.  If you find that your boss or employer is selfish, perhaps it's time you move on to that job that cares more about you.

I had come across an article where you can use the following line to read custom section settings from your config file (where SectionName is the name of your section) in .Net.

NameValueCollection myData = (NameValueCollection)System.Configuration.ConfigurationManager.GetSection(SectionName);

The advantage of this is your setting doesn't have to be in the app.config file (web.config).  You can have a file named mywackyweirdfilename.config, and you use the exact same line.  The beauty of it is in the app.config (web.config) file where you point it to reference the mywackyweirdfilename.config.  e.g.

<configSections>
     <section name="SectionName" type="System.Configuration.NameValueFileSectionHandler, System, Version=1.0.3300.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089"/>
</configSections>
<SectionName file="mywackyweirdfilename.config" />

Why is this such a beautiful way to handle your config file?  Because if you distribute your application, the system administrator can decide where to put the mywackyweirdfilename.config file.  It could, in fact, reside on a public share (although not recommended in case of the network being unavailable) or thumb drive.

So what's the problem?  You can't write to the config file easily.  I'll do a later post on my solution for writing to the config file, in which the format of the mywackyweirdfilename.config does not match below .

The format of mywackyweirdfilename.config for the examples above:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<SectionName>
     <add key="myKey" value ="" />
</SectionName>

Excellent times ...

After presenting at the Tulsa SQL Server SIG I received the following question:

According to all the blogs if you install SSRS on a web server it still burns up another SQL server license even if you don’t install SQL.  Our production SQL server costs like $30,000 for the enterprise version because it’s on an 8 core box.  The SharePoint server where I am trying to install SSRS also has 8 cores.  For SharePoint you have to install SSRS on the web server or it will not work.  Is there a cheap version of SSRS that won’t cost 30k?

Below was my response:

Attached is a document I found detailed your licensing options.  Initially I thought you would not be able to get around buying an Enterprise license because it is the only version supporting 8 processors (http://www.microsoft.com/sql/prodinfo/features/compare-features.mspx).  However, it says “Processor licenses are available in Enterprise, Standard, and Workgroup Editions and offer more simplicity for certain scenarios.”  So, you should only have to purchase a workgroup license for 8 processors.

However, there are specific features of SSRS that are specific to the version licensed.  Such as the Enterprise version only supports Data Driven Subscriptions (you can have data trigger the running of a report), plus others.  I believe e-mail subscriptions are a Standard version feature, which is a must have IMHO.

The real question is going to be if you can talk to the person responsible for purchasing/licensing to figure out how to buy the standard workgroup or standard license, plus the additional licensing for the additional processors.  Don’t forget, I’m betting there isn’t 8 processors, because of the newer multi core processors.  So make sure you verify the number of hard processors.

Summary: This white paper presents general information, best practices, and tips for designing charts within Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services reports. It provides an overview of some Reporting Services features, answers common chart design and feature questions, and includes advanced examples of how to design better charts. (32 printed pages)

Click here to download the associated sample code, GetMoreChartsSamples.exe.

Click here to download the Word version of the article, MoreSSRSCharts.doc.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa964128.aspx

It's hard to believe that SQL injection is still an issue.  My friend Zain Naboulsi gave us a great overview of basic security hacks and how to defend against them at our last MSDN Express event.  I recall learning about SQL Injection issues over 12 years ago in my first job.

Here's a fairly decent article about some of the details of SQL Injection, in case you're not familiar with it's problems.

http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Security/updatedsqlinjection/2065/

If you're interested in joining Microsoft's beta program for games, you'll be interested in the following email I received.

We are gearing up for a year of great betas. To prepare for these upcoming betas we have a new survey on the beta website. Please follow this link to access the new survey: (link removed). We will be using this new survey to select participants for our betas. If you do not complete this new survey, you will not be able to participate! But don't worry, the survey is quick and painless.

Remember, we are always looking for all types of game players. Whether you play once a year or every day, whether you pre-order the latest consoles or wouldn't think of paying for a game - we want feedback from you! If you know of someone who would be interested in participating in the Microsoft Game Studios Beta program, please feel free to forward this mail or direct them to: http://connect.microsoft.com/mgsbetas.