SQLSaturday #513 - Albany 2016
Event Date: 07/30/2016 00:00:00
Event Location:
- SUNY Albany
- 1400 Washington Ave
- Albany, New York
This event has completed. All data shown below is from the historical XML public data available.
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Sessions
This is a list of sessions from the event, based on the schedule in the XML files.
Title: An introduction to Data Mining
Abstract: With the vast amount of changes that occur in our daily business environments, it becomes more and more difficult to achieve our corporate goals without some ‘lighthouse’ to guide our way. Data mining, (while not a panacea to resolve or ‘control’ the effects of these changes), can provide us with statistical trends by analyzing our data and highlighting probable outcomes.
In this hands on BEGINNERS presentation we shall be looking at Microsoft SQL Server’s Data Mining capabilities and we shall be discussing:
1) Defining what questions we want answered and how to go about this in an effective and efficient manner.
2) Creating the data model.
3) How to gather the necessary data, discussing the training and testing aspect.
4) Processing the model.
5) Extracting information from our finished model, discussing the implications of this information.
Speaker(s):
- Steve Simon
Track and Room: Enterprise BI - LC22
Title: Setting up your BI Infrastructure
Abstract: We know BI in bits and pieces. But imagine if you had to setup the BI infrastructure from scratch. What do we need to consider, which players do we consider, what are the components, the HA/DR scenario for the same, what technology to use? These are the questions we will answer along the way.
In this fast paced, information packed session; we will look at:
- Selection of RDBMS
- Selection/Setup of Reporting Infrastructure
- Selection/Setup of ETL Infrastructure
- Forming BI IT Team
- Forming Users Team
- Training
- Security of BI environment
- Managing Copy Data and Copy Data Virtualization
- Data Warehouse
- Utilizing Cloud
- Collaborative Computing
- Deciding what parts of BI to centralize and what to distribute.
- Scope Creep
- Success criteria
- Redundancy
- Maintenance We will look at the best practices involved in creating a BI infrastructure. Time permitting, we can discuss whether to outsource this project or rise above our DBA job a
Speaker(s):
- Paresh Motiwala
Track and Room: Enterprise BI - LC22
Title: Pragmatic Power BI: Working with Data Sources
Abstract:
Power BI (either Desktop or the service) supports a wide (and growing) range of data sources. From the sources with which most IT pros and data analysts are regularly involved (relational and OLAP databases, text and similar files, etc.) to sources that are a little more out of the ordinary for some of us (OData, MS Exchange, Active Directory, and a growing list of others), these reservoirs and suppliers of data grow increasingly more valuable in self-service BI.
In this session, BI Architect, SQL Server MVP and Analysis Services Maestro Bill Pearson focuses upon the first step in working with data sources in Power BI: connecting to, and extracting data from, a diverse range of data sources. Throughout the session, we explore various sources and witness how to employ Power BI with each.
Speaker(s):
- William E Pearson III
Track and Room: Self-Service BI - LC23
Title: SQL Server Agent : All the Knobs You Need to Know
Abstract: As a production DBA, do you struggle to schedule heavy jobs to avoid times when the server is already overloaded? Have you ever felt like your end users notice data corruption, blocked processes, or a full tempdb even before you do? And have you ever been frustrated by the fact that Agent never stores quite enough job history to help you troubleshoot job failures? The fact is, SQL Server Agent can do way more than just schedule jobs at a fixed time. In this session you’ll learn how to make SQL Agent run jobs only when ample CPU resources are available, how you can be the first to get notified when data corruption has occurred, and how to use Agent for monitoring data file size issues. You will also walk away with a set of scripts that will help you customize job history retention. By the end of this demo rich session you will understand how to leverage SQL Agent’s hidden gems that will make your database management job more efficient without requiring additional development time.
Speaker(s):
- Taiob Ali
Track and Room: DBA - Administration - LC21
Title: Virtual SQL Servers, Actual Performance
Abstract: Virtualizing your business-critical SQL Servers should not imply that they will run slower than if they were physical. When properly architected and managed, virtual SQL Servers should be equally as fast as their physical counterparts, if not faster. However, if not properly constructed, silent and seemingly random performance killers can strike and significantly hurt your database performance.
This session is packed with many tips and tricks for getting the most performance from your virtual SQL Servers. The major roadblocks to performance are discussed, and the knowledge gained can help you work with your infrastructure engineers so that you can optimize the system stack for performance. Tools, techniques, and processes are demonstrated to help you measure and validate the system performance of the key components underneath your data.
Speaker(s):
- David Klee
Track and Room: IT/Server Administration - LC19
Title: Version control with GIT for the DBA
Abstract: In 2005, Linus Torvalds developed the version control system (VCS) git. Since then, it has become as platform agnostic and ubiquitous as the internet. In that same note, github, the most popular service for hosting git repositories has become so ubiquitous that Microsoft chose to host the source code for its OSS fork of the .NET framework there instead of its own codeplex.
What does this mean to a DBA? Whether or not you use SSDT, you should be storing your database schema in version control. In addition, your utility scripts certainly belong in VCS.
In my session. We’ll cover:
What is version control? How does a distributed version control system differ from traditional version control like Visual Sourcesafe, TFS, and SVN? How do I setup git for internal use in my company? How do I host public and private repositories on github. How do pull requests work? How do I fork a SVN repo to github?
We will be covering using git from both the command line and Visual Studio.
Speaker(s):
- Justin Dearing
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC24
Title: 100 Times Faster: Experiences making SQL Server go Fast
Abstract: How do you go about making a program run a lot faster! Like 100 times faster? It’s difficult. Microsoft tried in the Hekaton project, its in-memory tables feature of SQL 2014, and they got close. Inspired by that effort, this presentation looks at some recent cases where I’ve been able to achieve huge performance improvements in SQL Server code and how that happens.
When I work on SQL Server performance I emphasize that the first thing to think about is how to accomplish the task in a different way that will be much faster”. Sometimes there’s a better algorithm. Sometimes a different technology is more appropriate. Sometimes it’s a combination of many changes that combine to create the desired outcome much, much faster.
This presentation is illustrated with examples from my work and we’ll look for common threads that might help us all.
Speaker(s):
- Andrew Novick
Track and Room: DBA - Optimization/Tuning - LC2
Title: Monster Text Manipulation: Regular Expressions for the DBA
Abstract: Regular expressions can help you perform incredible tasks with very little effort. Need to create 1700 logins from an email request? Developers give you a single script with 300 stored procedures filled with table variables instead of temp tables? Need to move 500 databases to a different drive? Any of these tasks can take a long time to code, but regular expressions cuts that work from hours to seconds. I use regular expressions all the time and I have taken many tasks down from several days to just a few minutes. Stop writing code manually and let regular expressions do it for you. Here you’ll learn: • The most useful regular expression commands. • The appropriate times to use regular expressions. • How to use regular expressions to write code for you. • How to incorporate regular expressions into large tasks and combine them with other methods.
Speaker(s):
- Sean McCown
Track and Room: DBA - Administration - LC20
Title: Architecting Availability Groups
Abstract: You are a DBA familiar with some basic Windows clustering and database mirroring concepts, and now you are considering AlwaysOn Availability Groups. This session will cover the pros and cons of four typical configurations of AlwaysOn Availability Groups; stand-alone instances, fail-over cluster instances, multi-subnet, and a hybrid approach that I call disaster-recovery-on-the-cheap. It will also include their exclusive features such as read-only routing and backup off-loading. In addition, you’ll learn how to use the Availability Group Listener correctly and why you should be using Windows Server 2012 R2 or above, along with some of my own personal lessons learned.
Speaker(s):
- Derik Hammer
Track and Room: DBA - Administration - LC19
Title: Rewriting Your Checklist for SQL 2016
Abstract: How big should the page file be for Windows Server 2016? How many data files should SQL Server 2016’s TempDB contain? What trace flags should we use by default now?
These are questions you addressed long ago in your setup checklist. You’ve spent a lot of time with that checklist, and you’re sure it’s perfect. Or is it? When was the last time you visited that checklist? Does it make sense for SQL 2014? What about SQL 2016? Change is hard, and DBAs need to constantly challenge yesterday’s best practices to ensure they meet today’s business needs.
Join Microsoft MVP Mike Hillwig and his list of server administration best practices that need to be revisited for modern versions of SQL Server, especially SQL 2016.
Speaker(s):
- Mike Hillwig
Track and Room: DBA - Administration - LC21
Title: DataSets, Making the Perfect DataSet Efficient in SQL Server 2016!
Abstract: I will teach you the world of making DataSets. The use of T-SQL in SQL Server provides many ways to utilize the data you already have. In this 60 minute session we will go through the progression of useful techniques to manipulate a record set. Whether you use tables,temp tables, CTE’s and/or Table variables, we will find the right situation for each one. We will also take a look at 2016’s SQL Server’s new Columnstore indexes on temp tables if and when they are useful.
Trying to get that impossible result set for that report or extract, then please make it to this intermidiate session on how to resolve your dataset woes!
Speaker(s):
- Joseph Barth
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC25
Title: Finding Islands, Gaps, and Clusters in Complex Data
Abstract: Being able to group data into logical and meaningful sets can be extremely useful. When the data involved is a non-repeating sequence of integers, grouping is not too difficult. Most real data, though, is made up of dates, times, decimals, and rarely can guarantee non-repeating, non-null data sets.
This is a fast-paced session that delves into methods that can be applied to any data. Want to know how many production incidents make up a single common problem? Can we track sales success by the number of consecutive weeks that an agent has exceeded their goal? How about the longest home run streak hit by Derek Jeter at night games on Tuesdays?
Discussion will include performance, CTEs, recursion, set-based vs. iterative analysis, and some pretty hairy TSQL!
Speaker(s):
- Edward Pollack
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC20
Title: Treating Schema Like Code - Database Change Management with Liquibase
Abstract: Over the last few years modern source control systems and continuous integration tools have transformed how application code is developed, tested and deployed but in many cases the way we deploy database changes has not changed at all. It is all too common to hear about teams managing their database with an ad-hoc system of SQL migration scripts manually deployed to various development, testing and production environments. The database supporting your application is arguably just as important as the application code. So why do we treat it differently?
In this talk I will discuss using the open source tool Liquibase to track, manage and apply database changes throughout every step of your development cycle alongside the application code changes. You will learn how Liquibase manages database changes, how to keep your schema up to date with your code base and some best practices, tips and tricks to using Liquibase.
Speaker(s):
- Kyle Titus
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC25
Title: Pragmatic Power BI: Transforming Data
Abstract: Once we’ve extracted data from a source, we typically need to clean, or otherwise change, that data in preparation for loading it into Power BI. In this session, BI Architect, SQL Server MVP and Analysis Services Maestro Bill Pearson will explore the options Power BI offers to unpivot, filter, sort, aggregate, and perform other needed operations to make these preparations. We’ll employ a dataset containing issues that commonly present real-world challenges, and work through the steps we can take in Power BI to transform the data to a state that works within Power BI. Moreover, we’ll define calculations, and get a glimpse of the M language that underlies transformational processes we construct.
Speaker(s):
- William E Pearson III
Track and Room: Self-Service BI - LC23
Title: SSRS 2016 - End-to-end Mobile BI on any device
Abstract: Significant enhancements have been made to mobile BI reporting in SSRS 2016. We can now enable users to get business insights, anyway, anywhere and from any device. Your device could be a tablet, smartphone or laptop, which could be running under iOS, Android or Windows. Come to this interactive session and learn how you can do it.
Speaker(s):
- Sunil Kadimdiwan
Track and Room: Enterprise BI - LC22
Title: Fun in Gerrit Code Review / Git integration with CI
Abstract: Gerrit is a free, web-based team collaboration code review tool which was developed at Google (https://code.google.com/p/gerrit/ ). Adopting Google Project Gerrit is fun! In this presentation, you’ll get a chance to learn the basics of Gerrit: what is Gerrit; how we integrate with Git as well as Continuous Integration tools. We will explore topics including how to adopt Gerrit seamlessly, how to collaborate among teams on code review process, how to navigate Gerrit UI, how to troubleshoot, how to administer Gerrit, and so on. You will learn a benefit of this valuable code review tool as a part of database/application development process improvement.
Speaker(s):
- Emiko Hori
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC24
Title: First Dates
Abstract: Beginners are frequently confused by the myriad of options available for date data types and manipulating date and time values. This presentation will review the most common date and time related data types, date formats, and many of the common challenges in manipulating dates and times. Some examples will be finding the first or last day of a month, quarter, year - adding Time and Dates together, finding and expressing the difference between date and date/time values, and when and how to manipulate dates and times using string manipulation techniques.
Speaker(s):
- Daniel Bowlin
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC20
Title: Demystifying Data Compression
Abstract: High-end storage is expensive, and SQL Server data compression can make your database smaller. So compress all the tables! No–unfortunately, it’s not that easy. We’ll talk about how data compression actually works, and the differences between ROW and PAGE compression. As part of this, we’ll look at the costs and benefits associated with each type of compression. By the end of this session, you’ll have a better idea of when compression is the right solution, as well as what type of compression to use.
Speaker(s):
- Andy Mallon
Track and Room: DBA - Optimization/Tuning - LC2
Title: Power BI Performance Tips
Abstract: It is quick and easy to build large, complex data models in Power BI (based on Power Pivot). However, Building a model that performs well might seem hit or miss unless you are aware of how Power BI manages your data. A Power BI data model can increase your model’s size exponentially even for relatively small data sets causing significant performance issues. This session provides design techniques and tips that will have you building your own models to deliver solutions without those nasty performance surprises!
Speaker(s):
- Rachael Martino
Track and Room: Self-Service BI - LC22
Title: My Brain Has Blue Screened - Let’s Laugh
Abstract: Is your brain mush from too much technical content, but you just need a break before the next session or the raffle? Come share your IT war stories with the group and laugh for an hour. This open panel session is guaranteed to at least get a chuckle as we all relax and share our experiences.
Speaker(s):
- David Klee
Track and Room: Professional/Personal Development - LC23
Title: Getting to know U-SQL
Abstract: With so many languages around to extract, transform, analyze, and visualize data, Microsoft introduced yet another language : U-SQL. In this session, we’ll take a look at what U-SQL is, what it brings to the table, and how it differs from (or overlaps with) the existing constructs (T-SQL, SQL CLR, DAX/MDX, PowerQuery/M, R etc.,). We’ll go over step-by-step in getting started with U-SQL, and review some use case scenarios.
Speaker(s):
- Azhagappan Arunachalam
Track and Room: Cloud Application Development Deployment - LC24
Title: Who’s flying the plane?
Abstract: Every company will eventually have a disaster. It’s just a matter of size and scope. This talk is a general overview of how to respond to an incident and talks about the roles of management and IT.
This is not your typical discussion of disasters focusing on how to make a backup plan or enable high availability.
I’ll touch upon what we can learn from plane crashes and from rescuing stuck or injured cavers.
We’ll learn acronyms like CRM and ICS and what they can mean to your organization.
Speaker(s):
- Greg Moore
Track and Room: IT/Server Administration - LC25
Title: Data Quality
Abstract: Virtually everything in business today is an undifferentiated commodity, except how a company manages its information. How you manage information determines whether you win or lose.” Bill Gates. This talk will be about how important data quality has become part of our lives and how you can apply strategy to test data quality. We will touch briefly on Internet of Things, understand the importance of data quality and high-level approach to test data quality.
Speaker(s):
- Vijaya Kokkili
Track and Room: QA Automation - LC24
Title: Scratching the Surface: Designing your first Power View Report
Abstract: Dashboards have quickly become a cornerstone for decision-making by managers and business leaders in all facets of corporate operations. Microsoft Power View has enabled drastic improvements in the development of dynamic and interactive dashboards within the Microsoft SQL Stack. In this session, we will cover areas such as: Data Considerations; Deployment Options; Building your first report; and using some of the interactive features of Power View.
Speaker(s):
- Chris Seferlis
Track and Room: Self-Service BI - LC23
Title: Dimensional Modeling: The Heart of a Data Warehouse
Abstract: In this presentation, Bryan will explain the principles of Dimensional Modeling, the foundation of a data warehouse. He will identify best practices and pitfalls to avoid especially if you come from a relational database background. The focus is to show how dimensional modeling is applied and provide you with the skills to build your own dimensional models. If you’ve had a hard time understanding dimensional modeling or have put off learning this critical subject, you need to come to this presentation.
Speaker(s):
- Bryan Cafferky
Track and Room: Enterprise BI - LC22
Title: Whacha just say? Talking technology to non-technical people
Abstract: Many tech professionals are faced with the challenge of explaining technical concepts to people who don’t understand technology. And only a few are able to do it well. This session provides some strategies and suggestions to go about bridging the technological knowledge gap. With time and practice, a technical person can serve as an effective interpreter of technical concepts. This is an interactive session; audience participation is expected and encouraged!
Speaker(s):
- Ray Kim
Track and Room: Professional/Personal Development - LC25
Title: An Introduction to Always Encrypted
Abstract: This will be an introduction to the new SQL Server 2016 Always Encryption feature. Unlike Transparent Data Encryption Always Encrypted provides encryption in transit as well as encryption at rest. This will be a survey overview of both the operations and development side of Always Encrypted, but will be mainly operations focused. Considerations for porting existing databases to Always Encrypted will also be discussed.
Speaker(s):
- Justin Dearing
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC21
Title: Beginning T-SQL
Abstract: If you work with SQL Server at all, you need to know Transact-SQL, the SQL Server programming language. During this session, we’ll design and create our own table to demonstrate key concepts, query syntax, and more. If you’ve been meaning to learn T-SQL, here’s your chance!
Speaker(s):
- Jennifer McCown
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC20
Title: Outsourcing database administration to your users.
Abstract: How outsource administrative tasks to your end user groups in a safe, secure, and repeatable pattern. Now you no longer have to pause and stop what you are doing to create that new login, and replicate it to your Disaster Recovery. You do not have to stop and perform a backup/restore to refresh the development environment. Empower your end users, let them do this on their own without compromising your security.
There will be a demo!
Speaker(s):
- Stephen Mokszycki
Track and Room: DBA - Administration - LC25
Title: Designing Meaningful dashboards in Power BI
Abstract: I will walk you through how to create effective dashboards in Power BI and the importance of understanding your audience. There are so many visuals to choose from but how do you know what ones to use? Are there ones that look great on the screen but don’t tell a story?
Speaker(s):
- James Phillips
Track and Room: Enterprise BI - LC24
Title: Painting with PowerShell: SQL Server Administration
Abstract: The SQL Server canvas gives us limitless opportunity for scripting and automation, and PowerShell is the perfect brush to paint with. Configuring our database servers, deploying database code changes, performing backups and restores are just a few examples of a day in the life of a DBA. Automation and scripting bring consistency, simplicity and scalability to many of these sometimes daunting tasks.
Join me to learn how to paint your own SQL Server canvas with PowerShell.
Speaker(s):
- Chris Sommer
Track and Room: DBA - Administration - LC19
Title: Demystifying Storage Area Networks
Abstract: Do you see your storage as a mysterious box that just makes your databases slower? As Database Administrators we all know the importance that storage plays in the performance of our servers, but often times our understanding stop there. In this session we will cover the core components and concepts that make up a Storage Area Network, or SAN, and how to use that knowledge to improve performance and shorten your troubleshooting time.
Speaker(s):
- Michael Wells
Track and Room: Storage and Hardware Architecture - LC19
Title: SQL Server XML 101
Abstract: XML processing become more and more a part of our daily life. Today anyone, DBA or Developer, interferes one way or another with XML-based processes. In the SQL Server XML 101 session I’ll go over XML data type from “ground zero” to advanced tricks and tips. Using real life examples I’ll show most efficient ways to work with an XML of any complexity and size. I’ll cover the problems that you can anticipate to deal with with XML. How to: load the files using T-SQL code, dynamically retrieve and element or attribute, use different XML data types’ methods and functions.
Speaker(s):
- Alex Grinberg
Track and Room: DBA - Database Development - LC20
Title: Machine Learning with R Presented with R/Shiny
Abstract: You’ve seen demos on Azure Machine Learning Studio but did you know the real magic is done by calls to R code. In fact, R has been used to do predictive analytics for years which is why Microsoft integrated it into SQL Server 2016. In this presentation, we’ll see how easy it is to select, train, and use models in R. We’ll also discuss assessing the model’s fit and comparing different models. All this will be done using Shiny, R’s version of ASP .Net, i.e. essentially R Server Pages but amazingly easy to use which serves to demonstrate R’s extensibility.
Speaker(s):
- Bryan Cafferky
Track and Room: Big Data - LC21
Title: Optimizing the SQL Server and Databases for large Fact Tables
Abstract: A session full of demos demonstrating how SQL Server startup parameters, trace flags and the create database and alter database command when used correctly for the underlying hardware can make scanning your fact tables much faster.
We will also as a side effect explore the Mary Go Round query feature and find ways to bulk load data faster and how to load from an OLTP system with zero impact to it.
Speaker(s):
- Thomas Grohser
Track and Room: DBA - Optimization/Tuning - LC2
Title: Taming the Transaction Log
Abstract: Wonder why the transaction log keep filling up the hard-drive? Wonder why a full backup does not backup the transaction log? Wonder how often to back up the transaction log? Wonder if the transaction log can be backed up in parallel? This interactive session will help to you to find answers to those questions and more.
Speaker(s):
- Mike Hays
Track and Room: DBA - Administration - LC21
Speakers
This is a list of speakers from the XML Guidebook records. The details and URLs were valid at the time of the event.
Yoav Yetinson
LinkedIn: Yoav Yetinson
I believe success on a global level requires leadership, a strong work ethic, innovation, but most importantly – working well as part of a team. I possess strong interpersonal communication skills, which were acquired in my jobs as a real estate agent, property manager, and enterprise software sales. My service in the Army helped shape my leadership skills.
Through my education I attained business and technical skills including the ability to create databases, design systems and write basic codes in C++ and SQL.
I have a very deep interest in BI and the financial sector. I acquire my financial knowledge through trading stocks, reading financial articles, and discussing recent events with friends who work in the industry.
Bryan Cafferky
LinkedIn: Bryan Cafferky
Contact: https://www.youtube.com/user/Bryancutube256123
Bryan Cafferky is a Big Data and AI consultant. Bryan was previously a Senior Data Science Training Content Developer for Microsoft Worldwide Learning. Prior to this he was a Microsoft Data and AI Enabler for healthcare customers. He is a Microsoft 2017 Data Platform MVP and a 2016 Cloud and Data Center Management MVP. Bryan is the author of Pro PowerShell for Database Developers by Apress, available on Amazon. He leads The RI Microsoft BI User Group, and The Greater Boston Area Data Science Group. He has been working with the SQL Server stack since 1997 and implemented projects in the banking, insurance, e-commerce, utility, and health care industries. He holds a bachelor of science in computer information systems and an MBA.
Ray Kim
Twitter: - PianoRayK
LinkedIn: Ray Kim
Contact: https://pianorayk.wordpress.com/
Ray Kim is an advocate for documentation and technical communication. He is a co-founder of the Albany, NY SQL group (CASSUG), a member of the AlbanyUX user group, and has spoken at numerous SQLSaturdays and at PASS Summit. He has worked various positions in technology, including as a developer, webmaster, analyst, technical writer, and instructor. He holds an MS in technical communication from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and a BS in computer science from Syracuse University.
A musician in his spare time, Ray plays four different instruments. He also enjoys going to ball games and doing CrossFit, and is a two-time SQLServerCentral.com fantasy football champion. He lives in Troy, NY with his wife, Lianne, and their two cats.
David Klee
Twitter: - kleegeek
LinkedIn: David Klee
Contact: http://davidklee.net
David Klee is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and VMware vExpert with a lifelong passion for technology. David spends his days focusing on the convergence of data and infrastructure as the Founder of Heraflux Technologies. His areas of expertise include cloud, virtualization, performance, and business continuity. David speaks at a number of national and regional technology related events, including PASS Summit, VMware VMworld, SQLBits, SQLSaturday events, and many SQL Server User Groups.
Paresh Motiwala
Twitter: - pareshmotiwala
LinkedIn: Paresh Motiwala
Paresh Motiwala a Azure/Big Data enthusiast, Manager of Database Platform teams has led several large SQL implementations, migrations and upgrades. He has managed multi terabyte OLTP databases. He has also been a Sr. SQL DBA and a Solutions Architect in Fortune 100 companies. He helps/organizes and speaks at many SQLSaturdays, Azure Bootcamp, Azure Datafests and User Groups(Boston BI UG, NESQL, PASS PD VG and PASS DBA VG).
He is certified in Big Data Analytics, FinTech, PMP, Public Speaking, Business Communications. He is a avid singer, cook, open networker, and stand-up comedian. He teaches public speaking, debating, interviewing and group discussion skills and mentors children around the globe via www.circlesofgrowth.com
Michael Wells
Twitter: - @SqlTechMike
LinkedIn: Michael Wells
Contact: http://sqltechmike.com
Michael Wells is a Microsoft Specialist at Dell EMC covering enterprise customers. He has worked in IT since 2000 and has supported all versions of SQL Server from SQL Server 2000 to SQL Server 2014. Michael has been presenting since 2007 for local user groups, CodeCamps, SQLSaturday events, IT Pro Camps, and large conferences like PASS Summit and Oracle OpenWorld.
Derik Hammer
Twitter: - https://twitter.com/sqlhammer
LinkedIn: Derik Hammer
Contact: http://www.sqlhammer.com
I am currently working as a Database Operations Team Lead with Subway World Headquarters. Server configuration, architecture, disaster recovery, high-availability, performance tuning, and maintenance automation form the bulk of my responsibilities. Almost all of my previous experience has resided firmly in the traditional / production DBA realm. I also spend as much time as I can spare attending SQL Server community functions. Currently chapter leader for FairfieldPASS.
Sean McCown
Twitter: - @KenpoDBA
Contact: http://www.midnightdba.com/dbarant
Sean McCown is a Certified Master with 23 years of experience in databases. He is also founder and co-owner of the MidnightDBA.com website, where he records free SQL Server training videos. He also writes the popular Minion Maintenance suite, the most configurable maintenance solution on the planet.
Greg Moore
Twitter: - @stridergdm
LinkedIn: Greg Moore
Contact: https://blog.greenms.com
Greg Moore is a graduate of RPI. There, he majored in CompSci, but probably spent as much time hiking, canoeing, caving and rock-climbing as he did studying. He started working with SQL Server 4.21a in 1995 and has survived numerous upgrades. He’s been a Director and later VP of IT at several startups including PowerOne Media, TownNews and Traffiq and now consults. These days, when he’s not busy with playing with SQL Server or spending time with his family, he can often be found underground caving or teaching cave rescue with the NCRC. While his focus is on the operations side of DBA, his interests include DR, performance and general IT problem solving. He is the author of: IT Disaster Response: Lessons Learned in the Field.
Andy Mallon
Twitter: - AMtwo
LinkedIn: Andy Mallon
Contact: http://www.AM2.co
Andy is a Data Platform MVP and SQL Server DBA that has managed databases in the healthcare, finance, e-commerce, and non-profit sectors. He has been supporting high-volume, highly-available OLTP environments with demanding performance needs since 2003.
Andy is the founder of the BostonSQL User Group, and previous co-organizer of SQLSaturday events in Boston. He blogs at am2.co.
Andy lives just outside Boston, Massachusetts, USA with his husband and their two dogs.
John Shedlosky
LinkedIn: John Shedlosky
John Shedlosky is currently a Senior Systems Engineer with Tintri. Tintri is the leading supplier of VM Aware storage infrastructure and John has helped companies leverage the technology for the last 5 years in the northeast US and eastern Canada.
John has been in the IT infrastructure industry for 18 years, and before Tintri has worked with various emerging technologies in their infancy including deduplication with Data Domain, SSD with Nimble Storage, and storage virtualization.
Rushabh Mehta
Twitter: - @rushabhmehta
LinkedIn: Rushabh Mehta
Contact: http://blogs.solidq.com/RushabhMehta
Rushabh Mehta is a Business Intelligence Mentor with SolidQ and the Managing Director for Solid Quality India Pvt. Ltd. He served as PASS President for 2010/2011 term.
Rushabh has worked with MS Data Platform since 1998 and has designed and developed BI systems since 2001. He has been the lead architect for many large-scale and complex BI solutions for clients such as Publix, Raymond James, Jackson Hewitt, US Dept. of Defense, and Microsoft. He is an MVP with Microsoft, Damp;B amp; Melissa Data
Steve Simon
Twitter: - SQLServerBoffin
LinkedIn: Steve Simon
Contact: http://www.sqlservercentral.com/blogs/simon_says/
Steve Simon is a Database Solutions Architect with Business Knowledge Services Inc. He has been involved with database design and analysis for over 35 years. Steve has presented papers at numerous PASS Summits and PASS SQL Rallies. He is also regular presenter on the SQLSaturday circuit and he is a contributor on SQLShack.com
Mike Hillwig
Twitter: - @mikehillwig
LinkedIn: Mike Hillwig
Contact: http://www.mikehillwig.com
Veteran DBA Mike Hillwig is a native Pittsburgher and resident of the Boston Suburbs. He’s a DBA Manager for a financial software company that’s owned by one of the world’s largest bank. Mike has been working with SQL Server since version 7 and has a background in infrastructure and network. Today, he manages a team of DBAs around the globe.
David Klee
Twitter: - kleegeek
LinkedIn: David Klee
Contact: http://davidklee.net
David Klee is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and VMware vExpert with a lifelong passion for technology. David spends his days focusing on the convergence of data and infrastructure as the Founder of Heraflux Technologies. His areas of expertise include cloud, virtualization, performance, and business continuity. David speaks at a number of national and regional technology related events, including PASS Summit, VMware VMworld, SQLBits, SQLSaturday events, and many SQL Server User Groups.
Rachael Martino
Twitter: - @RMartinoBoston
LinkedIn: Rachael Martino
Rachael has been both an IT Executive and a Consultant. Systems training, data based application development experience and leadership training have prepared her to build stable. maintainable and successful solutions.
Rachael has been in the industry working with SQL Server since SQL 2000. She started out her IT life as an application developer and lead a team of developers, creating data centric applications using SQL Server and Oracle. She has worked in the Business Intelligence field using SSAS, multi-dimensional and Tabular, SSRS, SSIS, and PowerBI. She has two Masters degrees from MIT, Systems Design and Management amp; Civil Engineering Information Technology. Her interests surround the Big Data and Data Science areas.
Joseph Barth
Twitter: - @sql_da
LinkedIn: Joseph Barth
Contact: http://sqlda.com
An eight year Microsoft SQL Server Specialist in SQL Server 2005-2016, Azure SQL DB, he has held many development positions, including SQL query tuner, SSIS and SSRS . Joseph’s early focus as an SQL tuning professional, fixing long running queries by techniques; join order,use of temporary object, also implementing Index optimization, maintenance and design to fix slowness. Joseph has focused on ETL solutions using SSIS for the last 4 years, data warehousing and cloud architecture using Azure. Currently working on a Modern Data Warehouse project involving Azure Data Lake and Azure SQL DW using external tables. MCSE Data Management and Analytics 2016 MCSA: SQL Server 2012 Co-found CASSUG Albany NY 2 yrs AZSSUG Chapter Leader 3 yrs
Daniel Bowlin
Twitter: - @SQLBI_Dan
LinkedIn: Daniel Bowlin
Contact: http://www.danielbowlin.com/
I am a data integration developer at Time Warner Cable. I have been working with SQL Server technologies since the late 90s. About 6 years ago I specialized in the SQL Server BI stack. Lately I have been almost exclusively working in SSIS.
Chris Sommer
Twitter: - @cjsommer
LinkedIn: Chris Sommer
Contact: http://www.cjsommer.com
Chris started in computing and I.T. in the mid to late 1990’s. After the dust had settled from Y2K, he found himself a bit more focused and working with database servers on the Unix platform. His first exposure to SQL Server was in 2007 and he has been working on that platform ever since. Chris is currently a Senior SQL DBA with a focus on reliability, stability and performance. He truly enjoys the building tools with PowerShell to help his fellow DBA#39;s manage their ever growing environment.
Andrew Novick
LinkedIn: Andrew Novick
Contact: http://www.NovickSoftware.com
Andy Novick is a SQL Server MVP and consultant building business solutions with SQL Server. He has expertise in database design, T-SQL coding, SQL Server security, database performance tuning, partitioning, service broker, and database administration. Andy is a frequent speaker at local user group meetings and an author of two books on SQL Server.
William E Pearson III
Twitter: - @Bill_Pearson
LinkedIn: William E Pearson III
Contact: https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile=02C5CD07-7511-4151-A678-3A4A3451F85E
Bill Pearson created Island Technologies Inc. in 1997, and has developed a large and diverse customer base since. Bill#39;s background as a CPA, Internal Auditor, Management Accountant, and SQL Server MVP (BI) enables him to provide value to clients as a liaison between Accounting / Finance and Information Services. Bill has implemented enterprise business intelligence systems over the years for many Fortune 500 companies and focuses his practice upon the integrated Microsoft Business Intelligence
Edward Pollack
Twitter: - EdwardPollack
LinkedIn: Edward Pollack
Contact: https://www.sqlshack.com/author/edward-pollack/
Ed Pollack has over 20 years of experience in database and systems administration, which has developed his passion for performance optimization, database design, and making things go faster. He has spoken at many SQLSaturdays, 24 Hours of PASS, and PASS Summit. This led him to organize SQLSaturday Albany, which has become an annual event for New York’s Capital Region. Sharing these experiences with the community is a top priority, and encouraging everyone to take the leap into public speaking and engaging others, a passion. In his free time, Ed enjoys video games, traveling, cooking exceptionally spicy foods, and hanging out with his amazing wife and sons.
Chris Seferlis
Twitter: - bizdataviz
LinkedIn: Chris Seferlis
Contact: http://blog.bizdataviz.com
Chris Seferlis is a Sr Cloud Solution Architect at Microsoft. He has 20+ years’ experience working in IT and solving technical challenges from a business perspective. Chris is a former CIO with an MBA from UMass, bringing a mix of business acumen and practical technology solutions, primarily focusing on Data and AI within the Microsoft Data Platform, including MCSA and MCT designations.
Andrew Novick
LinkedIn: Andrew Novick
Contact: http://www.NovickSoftware.com
Andy Novick is a SQL Server MVP and consultant building business solutions with SQL Server. He has expertise in database design, T-SQL coding, SQL Server security, database performance tuning, partitioning, service broker, and database administration. Andy is a frequent speaker at local user group meetings and an author of two books on SQL Server.
Bryan Cafferky
LinkedIn: Bryan Cafferky
Contact: https://www.youtube.com/user/Bryancutube256123
Bryan Cafferky is a Big Data and AI consultant. Bryan was previously a Senior Data Science Training Content Developer for Microsoft Worldwide Learning. Prior to this he was a Microsoft Data and AI Enabler for healthcare customers. He is a Microsoft 2017 Data Platform MVP and a 2016 Cloud and Data Center Management MVP. Bryan is the author of Pro PowerShell for Database Developers by Apress, available on Amazon. He leads The RI Microsoft BI User Group, and The Greater Boston Area Data Science Group. He has been working with the SQL Server stack since 1997 and implemented projects in the banking, insurance, e-commerce, utility, and health care industries. He holds a bachelor of science in computer information systems and an MBA.
William E Pearson III
Twitter: - @Bill_Pearson
LinkedIn: William E Pearson III
Contact: https://mvp.support.microsoft.com/profile=02C5CD07-7511-4151-A678-3A4A3451F85E
Bill Pearson created Island Technologies Inc. in 1997, and has developed a large and diverse customer base since. Bill#39;s background as a CPA, Internal Auditor, Management Accountant, and SQL Server MVP (BI) enables him to provide value to clients as a liaison between Accounting / Finance and Information Services. Bill has implemented enterprise business intelligence systems over the years for many Fortune 500 companies and focuses his practice upon the integrated Microsoft Business Intelligence
Thomas Grohser
LinkedIn: Thomas Grohser
Thomas Grohser has spent most of the past 26+ years exploring the deeper inner workings of SQL Server and its features while working for entertainment, pharmaceutical, and financial services industries. His primary focus is to architect, plan, build, and operate reliable, highly available, secure, and scalable infrastructures for SQL Server. Over the years he has managed thousands of SQL Server instances, processing trillions of rows, taking up petabytes of storage. Thomas has been a Microsoft Data Platform MVP for 9 years and has spoken regularly at conferences, SQLSaturdays, and user groups for 12 years.
Alex Grinberg
LinkedIn: Alex Grinberg
I have more than 20 years of IT experience. My primary focus is with the latest Microsoft technologies including .NET (VB and C#), SSRS and SSIS. I provide services in tuning, optimization, analysis and development for the creation of new applications, converting legacy technologies (SQL Server, VB.NET and C# ) and site training. I have worked for CSC, VerticalNet, IDP, LSAC , and TMNAS (to name a few) and I am currently employed with Cox Automotive. I am Apress author book “XML and JSON Recipes for SQL Server”, also wrote number of articles for Simple-Talk and SQLServerCentral.com
Justin Dearing
Twitter: - zippy1981
LinkedIn: Justin Dearing
Contact: http://www.justaprogrammer.net
Justin Dearing has been working in IT in 2002. He started as a night shift AS/400 operator and rose through the ranks at a series of companies. He currently works as a developer in the capital markets industry.
Justin has served in both the development and production side of the house on Windows, Unix and Midrange Platforms. His database experience includes MongoDB, MySQL, Postgres and Microsoft SQL server. These days he programs in C#, PowerShell and PHP.
Sunil Kadimdiwan
Twitter: - @skadimdiwan
LinkedIn: Sunil Kadimdiwan
Contact: http://www.infotrove.com/events.html
Sunil Kadimdiwan Sunil Kadimdiwan has 25+ years’ experience in architecting and implementing database solutions. He has deep knowledge of the Microsoft SQL Server and Business Intelligence technology stack. He is a frequent speaker at SQLSaturdays, Code Camps, User Group meetings
Mike Hays
LinkedIn: Mike Hays
Contact: http://www.thesqlreport.com/
Mike has been working with Microsoft SQL Server for the last twenty years. Currently working as a Database Administrator for a diversified energy company, he has also worked in the retail, manufacturing, banking sectors. He holds a Master’s degree in Computer Information Science from Cleveland State University. He currently resides in Ohio with his girlfriend Alexia, her two children and their dog Lanna.
Stephen Mokszycki
Twitter: - mokszs
LinkedIn: Stephen Mokszycki
Stephen.Mokszycki@outlook.com
DBA for ~4+years, IT Professional for 7.5 years.
Currently I am a Data Architect
Worked with SQL 2000/2005/2008/2012/2014
I’m currently working on a small environments: 5 instances, 60 databases, 1TB of data
Previously I worked on a large environment: 300+ Instances, ~6000 databases, 10s TBs of data.
Automation is my favorite tool.
Jennifer McCown
Twitter: - http://www.Twitter.com/MidnightDBA
LinkedIn: Jennifer McCown
Contact: http://www.MidnightDBA.com/Jen
Jen McCown is CEO of MinionWare, LLC; a Microsoft Certified Master for SQL Server; and an independent consultant. She is Senior Editor at MidnightDBA.com, where she creates training videos, the DBAs at Midnight webshow, blogs, reviews, and podcasts. Jen is a member, volunteer, and speaker in PASS, and the PASS Women in Technology Virtual Group.
Kyle Titus
Kyle is a Senior Design Lead at CommerceHub. For the last 5 years he has worked extensively on performant Java applications supported by MSSQL databases.
Justin Dearing
Twitter: - zippy1981
LinkedIn: Justin Dearing
Contact: http://www.justaprogrammer.net
Justin Dearing has been working in IT in 2002. He started as a night shift AS/400 operator and rose through the ranks at a series of companies. He currently works as a developer in the capital markets industry.
Justin has served in both the development and production side of the house on Windows, Unix and Midrange Platforms. His database experience includes MongoDB, MySQL, Postgres and Microsoft SQL server. These days he programs in C#, PowerShell and PHP.
James Phillips
Twitter: - @JPhillips_Data
James Phillips is the VP Technology for Mizuho Americas and has over 20 years of experience with SQL technologies with the last 10 years focused on Business Intelligence. He is a past Leader of the Northern NJ SQL Server User group and current Leader for SQLSaturday NYC. He has worked in a wide array of industries including finance and insurance. Regularly speaks about Database Performance Tuning, SSIS and Power BI topics. Also an avid softball player and father to 5 beautiful children.
Emiko Hori
Twitter: - @EmiCommerceHub
LinkedIn: Emiko Hori
Emiko Hori, CSM, is Software Engineering Manager at CommerceHub, which helps retailers and brands increase sales with cloud software that facilitates real-time product, offer data integration between omnichannel retail partners. She is the advocate of Engineering Process Improvement as well as Software Quality. Her current interests include public speaking - technical presentation and promoting women in technology. Emiko has been active speaker at Women Who Code @ Silicon Valley (http://www.meetup.com/Women-Who-Code-Silicon-Valley/events/229868869/), Women Who Code CONNECT 2016 Conference in Seattle (https://wwconnect2016.squarespace.com/speakers/ ), and Agile Meetup Seattle (http://www.meetup.com/Fremont-Agile-Meetup) .
George Walters
Twitter: - https://twitter.com/geo_walters
LinkedIn: George Walters
Contact: https://georgewalters.wordpress.com/
Currently a partner technical strategist, George has been solving customer needs and issues. He can translate customer pain into potential solutions.
A seasoned Microsoft SQL and Azure expert, with over 20 years of experience with Microsoft SQL Server, Sybase, Oracle, and other relational databases.
Specialties: Partner strategy, PreSales Engineering, Cloud Architecture, Enterprise Scalability, SQL Server performance, Business Intelligence, High Availability, Scale. I volunteer and present relevant topics at SQLSaturday and internal Microsoft events
Taiob Ali
Twitter: - https://twitter.com/SqlWorldWide
LinkedIn: Taiob Ali
Contact: http://www.sqlworldwide.com
Taiob Ali, MVP Data Platform, is an accomplished technical leader with a proven record of success. For 14 years, he has worked with the Microsoft Data Platform and MongoDB both on-premise and cloud. His experience includes all three major business sectors: finance, e-commerce, and healthcare. Taiob has hands-on experience in managing large database projects, massive data migration, intricate process design, testing and deployment, performance tuning, long term capacity planning. Taiob is currently working at “GMO LLC” as a Database Solution Manager, focusing on cloud migration, automation, improving, and streamlining operational workflow. He is a regular speaker at local and virtual PASS chapters, SQLSaturdays, and Azure conferences.
Vijaya Kokkili
Twitter: - @vkokkili
Vijaya Kokkili is a QA Director at CommerceHub, where her team is responsible for the quality of CommerceHub#39;s external and internal applications. Building the automation from ground up at CommerceHub, she has stumbled upon every issue that you can think of, in the software testing and automation world. #39;Automation is a learning experience#39; is the philosophy she believes in.
Azhagappan Arunachalam
Az Arunachalam has been working with SQL server since v4.21/SQLNT. He started his career with troubleshooting at chip level, worked as a network engineer managing Novell NetWare networks, graduated into managing Windows NT, moved onto development, administered databases, and is currently working as a database architect. He#39;s excited about all the cloud offerings that Microsoft and others have made possible, and in sharing his findings with aspiring data enthusiasts.
Sponsors
The following is a list of sponsors that helped fund the event: