SQLSaturday #624 - Chattanooga 2017

Event Date: 06/24/2017 00:00:00

Event Location:

  • UT Chattanooga EMC Building
  • 784 Vine Street
  • Chattanooga, Tennessee

PDF of Schedule

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Sessions

This is a list of sessions from the event, based on the schedule in the XML files.


Title: Accelerating DevOps and TDM Using Data Virtualization

Abstract: DevOps is the merger of app development, testing, and IT ops. All tasks from coding to testing to operations should be automated so new features and fixes can be continuously quickly.

Test Data Management (TDM) is the optimization of the process of software quality, ensuring that applications properly work according to their specifications.

Constraining both DevOps and TDM is database size. “Storage is cheap” is not merely a lie, but more to the point it takes a lot of time to push terabytes around from place to place, and time itself is expensive and dear.

Providing full databases for each developer or tester on each task of each project seems unrealistic, when each copy might require terabytes of storage, so for decades everyone has limited themselves to working in shared dev/test environments that are refreshed only every few months, where conflicts occur, quality suffers, and things move slowly.

Come learn why data virtualization is the solution to a problem everyone knows.

Speaker(s):

  • Tim Gorman

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 203


Title: Increase Your Coding Speed in SQL Server Management Studio

Abstract: Every developer wants to be productive and get more things accomplished during their day to day work. Given a choice between working harder and working smarter, you will most likely choose the latter. But the big question is – How do you boost your productivity? How do you reduce your development time? How do you increase your coding speed?

Be it a T-SQL developer or DBA, we spend most of our time working in SQL Server Management Studio. In this session, we will learn a number of tips and tricks to increase productivity and efficiency in SSMS IDE. We will also look at the new and improved features of SSMS 2016. We will learn how adding few free third party tools to the SSMS IDE will enhance your coding speed. This will be a content rich session with plenty of live demonstrations.

By the end of this session, you will learn some useful techniques to take back with you and apply in your day to day work.

Speaker(s):

  • Samir Behara

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 301


Title: How To Be The DBA When You Don’t Have A DBA

Abstract: Not everyone has a full time Database Administrator on staff, and in many cases the responsibility of managing the database server falls on you, the developers. But as long as the backups are running successfully you’re good, right? Not exactly. There is ongoing maintenance required to help ensure that your databases are running smoothly. Are your statistics out of date? Are your indexes fragmented? When was the last time the databases were checked for corruption? Has your SQL Server been tuned to fit your workload, or are you still running with the less optimal default settings?

Tailored to the “Non-DBA”, this session will cover these topics and more to ensure that you can avoid some performance issues you may not even realize you’re having. Discussing server settings, database configurations, and recommended maintenance, you will leave this session with the knowledge (and scripts!) you need to help ensure that your SQL Server and databases are in top shape.

Speaker(s):

  • Eric Cobb

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 302


Title: On-Demand Creation of Dev/Test Databases with SQL Clone

Abstract: Imagine a world where developers and testers could run production-like environments on their own workstations, created on-demand and self-serviced. Raising tickets and waiting hours or days to get operations to deliver test databases would be a thing of the past.

With Redgate’s new tool, SQL Clone, this world now exists. Administrators and developers can create their own database copies in seconds using just MEGABYTES of disk space without ever touching production. Developers can see how their application behaves in a production-scale environment during both development and troubleshooting and operations no longer need to find disk space, provision, etc.

In this session we will examine how SQL Clone uses disk virtualization to enable quick, easy and even automated creation of database copies that are just MB in size.

Speaker(s):

  • Kevin Boles

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 201


Abstract: In this talk, we will explore two powerful technologies from the Microsoft Azure Stack: DocumentDB and Azure Search. DocumentDB is Microsoft’s NoSQL service for building globally scalable schema-free applications. Azure Search allows you to integrate the power of Microsoft’s search and natural language processing abilities to explore your complex data stores. During this talk we will cover the benefits of implementing a schema-free database, we will learn how to replicate your data at a global scale with the ease of a simple configuration and we will cover various techniques of querying that data using SQL and the DocumentDB API. Once we have a large datastore in place (we will use 200k+ Jeopardy questions), we will apply the powerful natural language querying capabilities and faceted search features of Azure Search to quickly create an searchable data repository. All of this will be built and exposed using a cross-platform application built in Angular on the Electron framework.

Speaker(s):

  • Christopher Sims

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 402


Title: Microsoft and Big Data - An Overview of the Power Tools and more!

Abstract: Come see Microsoft’s Power tools demonstrated for advanced analytics and hear about Microsoft’s embrace of Open Source and the Hadoop platform. We’ll also present on Microsoft’s tools for handling Big Data, such as the Parallel Data Warehouse and HDInsights.

Speaker(s):

  • David Patrick

Track and Room: BI Information Delivery - 301


Title: The Ins and Outs of SQL Indexes

Abstract: This course will focus on the fundamentals of strategic SQL Server index design and creation. Terms that will be covered and clarified: clustered index, non-clustered index, uniqueness, covering index, fill-factor, scan, seek, key lookup, and fragmentation. This is a beginning level course for those who have always found indexes confusing and somewhat elusive. Lots of valuable information will be provided in a short amount of time.

Speaker(s):

  • Mindy Curnutt

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 230


Title: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle: Automating Your BI Framework

Abstract: Quite frankly, some aspects of building out a business intelligence solution are tedious. As you cycle through iterations of your star schema, you’ll find that even a simple data type change in the data warehouse requires you to make corresponding changes to staging tables, and SSIS packages that take a considerable amount of time to implement. But there’s a better, faster way!In this session, we’ll explore lessons from a project that required implementation of a framework to easily generate BI objects based on reusable patterns. We’ll walk through the decision points in the framework design, review the implementation steps, and see demonstrations of how easily you can make iterative changes to your BI solution’s design by using reusable design patterns. Whether you simply want to accelerate change management or reproduce objects in bulk on demand, this session will give you practical tips for automating these processes.

Speaker(s):

  • Stacia Varga

Track and Room: BI Platform Architecture, Development Administration - 201


Title: New Instance, Now what?

Abstract: Congratulations, you’re now our DBA! A new SQL instance is like a blank canvas, you stare at it and wonder where to start. As an accidental dba, this session will help you learn how to survive in your new role.

In this session, you will be supplied with the beginning brush strokes to make your server a master piece. To do so, we will review best practices for standard configurations, backups, maintenance, and disaster recovery.

By the end of this session, you will have developed a pallet of tools to help you create your SQL Server Masterpiece and be able to use it as a print for others.

Speaker(s):

  • Jim Donahoe

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 219


Title: Understanding Power BI Premium

Abstract: Microsoft Power BI has enjoyed a lot of attention and success since it became generally available in July 2015. But its licensing model and cloud-hosted limitations barred wide adoption, especially with larger organizations. The recently introduced Power BI Premium will change all of this. Join this session to learn how Power BI Premium will allow your organization to achieve: • Flexibility to license by capacity • Greater scale and performance • Extending on-premises reporting with Power BI Report Server • Embedded analytics

Speaker(s):

  • Teo Lachev

Track and Room: BI Information Delivery - 219


Title: Install and Configure SQL Server with Windows PowerShell Desired State Configuration

Abstract: This session accomplishes three goals: (1) Gets you up to speed on what DSC is and how it works; (2) Improves your ability to configure SQL Server by using administrative automation; and (3) Gives you some valuable practical experience with Windows PowerShell.

Speaker(s):

  • Tim Warner

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 302


Title: SQL Server 2016 SP1 ROCKS!!

Abstract: SQL Server 2016 SP1 is probably one of the top 3 announcements for SQL Server … EVER!! Many previously Enterprise Edition only features were opened up to lower SKUs, including SQL Express! Memory usage scenarios changed DRASTICALLY too! This session will be a medium-to-high-level overview of these absolutely incredible changes. If you are like most entities and NOT on SQL Server Enterprise Edition you WILL want to be there after hearing this talk!

Speaker(s):

  • Kevin Boles

Track and Room: Other - 201


Title: R For the SQL Server Developer

Abstract: R is the premiere language for data analysis. If the world of data science sounds fun and exciting, now is the time to get into R. We will walk through the core constructs of R, learn how to retrieve data from flat files and databases, and get a peek at the power behind R. This session will also give resources on where to go in order to become more familiar with statistics, R the language, and the R package ecosystem.

Speaker(s):

  • Kevin Feasel

Track and Room: Analytics and Visualization - 219


Title: 5 Ways to Bypass or Ensure Security

Abstract: In this class, we will walk through 5 ways you can bypass SQL Server security, but then we will also demonstrate how to close off those loopholes. You will be surprised at some of the tactics presented and might even recognize a past experience based on one of the loopholes presented. Inevitably, even some of the best SQL security professionals will walk out with a face-palm and realize they’ve got a lot of work to do come Monday morning to plug these loopholes.

Speaker(s):

  • Matt Martin

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 302


Title: Querying Semistructured Data in Azure Data Lake with USQL

Abstract: Data is exploding across enterprises. Much of it is semi-structured junk. Or is it junk? What are you going to do with it until you can find out? Microsoft’s Azure Data Lake is a cloud storage and analytical service for parking a variety of data. When you are ready, you can query that semi-structured data using an ANSI SQL language called U-SQL. In this session I will demonstrate the similarities and differences between U-SQL and T-SQL. I will demonstrate how easy it is to build a query against 21 GB of CSV files. Such queries can help you determine whether you have a gold mine in your data or a bunch of garbage before investing in a full data warehouse build.

Speaker(s):

  • Russel Loski

Track and Room: Cloud Application Development Deployment - 402


Title: Database Design Fundamentals

Abstract: Data should be easy to work with in SQL Server if the database has been organized as close as possible to the standards of normalization that have been proven for many years, but are often thought of as old-fashioned. Many common T-SQL programming “difficulties” are the result of struggling against these standards and can be avoided by understanding the requirements, applying normalization, as well as a healthy dose of simple common sense. In this session I will give an overview of how to design a relational database, allowing you to work with the data structures instead of against them. This will let you use SQL naturally, enabling the query engine internals to optimize your output needs without you needing to spend a lot of time thinking about it. This will mean less time trying to figure out why SUBSTRING(column,3,1) = ‘A’ is killing your performance, and more time for solving the next customer problem.

Speaker(s):

  • Louis Davidson

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 230


Title: Locks, Blocks, and Deadlocks; Tame the Sibling Rivalry

Abstract: Like parents having to break up a fight between battling siblings, SQL Server must do the same for conflicting transactions. We call these Deadlocks and they can present a problem to many DBAs. Deadlocks can be minor fights or major issues making SQL Server continually choose a side like constantly quarreling siblings.

To understand how Deadlocking occurs, we must understand what caused the fight . Learning about basic locking and blocking of SQL Server is a great place to start.

By the end of this session you will walk away with the knowledge of how the locking/blocking mechanism works, the basics of deadlocking, and what Isolation Levels are . You will know how these can help or hurt your situation. Finally you will have the power to capture, report, and stop the family fighting.

Speaker(s):

  • William Wolf

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 230


Title: 45 Minutes to Your First SSAS Tabular Model

Abstract: Have you been watching SSAS Tabular develop? What about the new Azure Analysis Services product? Or you’ve looked at these and like what they can add in Power BI or classic BI scenarios, but haven’t had a chance to dive in and figure all of this out? Now is the time! SSAS Tabular is a new-ish form of business intelligence model released with SQL Server 2012, intended as an alternative to more traditional Multidimensional cubes. In this session, we will talk briefly about what Tabular is and what it does, in addition to the various options for deployment, before exploring the development process of creating a tabular model ready for ad-hoc querying through Excel or Power BI.

Speaker(s):

  • Kerry Tyler

Track and Room: BI Platform Architecture, Development Administration - 203


Title: Using Biml to Automate the Generation of SSIS Packages

Abstract: So you need to move data from 75 tables on the mainframe to new tables in SQL Azure. Do you: a) hand code one package to load all 75 tables, b) hand code 75 packages that move a table each, or c) wish there was a better way? There is! Business Intelligence Markup Language (Biml) can automate the creation of packages so that they all follow the same script. In this beginner level session, we will create some simple metadata to be able to generate multiple packages and their associated connection managers. You will see Biml in action. You will see the XML that Biml uses to define packages and connections. You will see the C# code that Biml uses to fetch metadata and dynamically generate packages in SSIS. And you will see packages and connection managers generated from Biml before your very eyes.

Speaker(s):

  • Simon Kingaby

Track and Room: BI Platform Architecture, Development Administration - 402


Title: PowerShell Non-Monolithic Script Module Design

Abstract: Creating a script module in PowerShell is a very simplistic process, but there are a number of reasons why you might not want to create one huge monolithic PSM1 script module file that contains all of your module’s functions. During this session, Microsoft MVP Mike F Robbins will demonstrate how to separate each of your module’s functions into its own dedicated PS1 file that’s dot-sourced from your script module’s PSM1 file along with discussing this design methodology and the challenges that it creates. Many times resolving one problem seems to create more problems such as cmdlets from other modules showing up as being exported by your module. The solution to these problems and more will be provided during this session. Mike will also demonstrate using a Pester test to validate that all of the functions are indeed exported along with using a function to help automate the module manifest update process when additional functions are added to your module.

Speaker(s):

  • Mike Robbins

Track and Room: Other - 203


Title: Why should I care about … the plan cache?

Abstract: SQL Server is a huge product, with many different places a DBA can go to look for information on how the server is performing. So many in fact that they can often overlap, which sometimes makes it hard to understand why tackling a new tool is worth the effort. In this installment of Rick’s “Why should I care” series, he lays out a case for why working knowledge of the plan cache is critical for performance tuning efforts in real world environments. A review of relevant views and functions is included for the (newly?) motivated audience.

Perfect for those who are relatively new to performance tuning concerns, or advanced DBAs trying to figure out how to have a similar conversation with their less experienced peers, or developers who are curious as to why their DBAs drink in the morning (allegedly). This is not a deep dive into the cache, it really is primarily a session exploring why these DMOs are worth slogging through.

Speaker(s):

  • Rick Lowe

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 219


Title: Perceptual Intelligence with Cortana Analytics

Abstract: Cortana Analytics is a fully managed big data and advanced analytics suite that enables you to transform your data into intelligent action. Come learn more around how you can take action by going beyond looking in the rear-view mirror to predicting what’s next. Enhance your business applications with machine intelligence to evolve from simple descriptive analytics to prescriptive recommendations. See some of the new ways to infer intent with vision, face, speech, text and sentiment analysis to customize responses and drive appropriate actions in a secure, compliant and scalable way leveraging SQL Server, Azure and Power BI. Expect to leave the discussion understanding new trends in analytics and how you can apply value to your organization.

Speaker(s):

  • Dan Evans

Track and Room: Advanced Analysis Techniques - 301


Title: Performance Monitoring SQL Server Analysis Services

Abstract: SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) servers need continued maintenance and monitoring post deployment to production; however, many projects forgo this part and the overall system performance can suffer.

Join this session to learn how to monitor and evaluate the performance of your SSAS server. You will learn what to measure and how to determine acceptable ranges of those measurements for your environment. You will see demos of Task Manager, Perfmon and SQL Server Extended Events to get insights into your SSAS server’s health, identify the most common issues in production, and make recommendations for changes to SSAS developers on your team.

If you have experience with SSAS development and are interested in learning about SSAS from the server side, this session is for you. This session focuses on SQL Server Analysis Services in multidimensional mode but many of the concepts apply to tabular mode as well.

Speaker(s):

  • Shabnam Watson

Track and Room: BI Platform Architecture, Development Administration - 301


Title: Enterprise Machine Learning with R and SQL Server 2016 2017

Abstract: R is a pure data science and statistics scripting language. It is considered the best fit for Machine Learning. With more than 5000 packages all machine learning algorithms are covered and improving. R packages help you prepare the data, e.g.: packages for cross validation with N folds, build machine learning models, validation, create plots and to generate predictions. SQL Server 2016 and R Server are a perfect match for building enterprise grade solutions that support deployments for real time predictions and continuous model updates. Join this session for an overview based on sample cases about how to build enterprise grade machine learning solutions with SQL Server and R.

Speaker(s):

  • Paco Gonzalez

Track and Room: Advanced Analysis Techniques - 302


Title: Self Service BI – ETL and More From A Business Unit User’s Perspective

Abstract: A business user is responsible for implementing a new electric power system modeling application and has to gather data from hundreds of diverse sources to set up the model. Reference data sources included a multitude of different data types, including historical time series, commodity forward pricing curves, and power plant operating characteristics. The user discovers the “power’ in Power Query and is able to meet the implementation deadline due to the Power Query’s rich tool set. The business user continues to find Power Query to be a useful tool in daily tasks as a Power System Resource Planning Specialist. Witness practical examples of Power Query’s Extract, Transform, Load (ETL) functionality applied to getting and reshaping data to perform the analyst’s daily tasks.

Speaker(s):

  • Paul Southerland

Track and Room: BI Information Delivery - 201


Title: Reduce your DBA ( DEV) task list by using Microsoft BI tools

Abstract: Are you a DBA or DBA Dev with access to the Microsoft BI Stack? Why not utilize some of these amazing tools to make your life a little easier?

Are you working without fancy monitoring and reporting tools? Do you dream of having time to pull data into Excel ans show you management staff what is going on? Do you run queries to answer questions for projects or at the department’s request on a regular basis? Wanna know what is going on with your report server?

Come to this “BI for the Engine Guy” session and let me help you make visualizations for all your engine’s health care needs and your user’s (customer) data demands.

Speaker(s):

  • Tamera Clark

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 301


Title: Making Your List and Checking It Twice: Introduction to unit testing with tSQLt

Abstract: Unit testing allows database code to be consistently tested during the development process, but it can be challenging to get unit testing setup for database development. This session will give an overview on the purpose of unit testing, the installation of the tSQLt framework, and the design of unit tests. I will use general concepts of test driven design to create and run unit tests to confirm that objects exist and to test single and multiple test cases. Learn how to implement unit testing in a development environment and create and run your own units tests.

Speaker(s):

  • Elizabeth Noble

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 219


Title: Leveraging SQL Server R Services to Perform Advanced Analytics

Abstract: SQL Server 2016 is packed with many great features. One of those features is the integration of R in SQL Server via SQL Server R Services. This integration gives us the ability to perform very sophisticated analytics against data inside the database and data warehoused in big data environments such as Spark Hadoop.

In this session I will demonstrate how to productionize models developed by your data scientist via SQL Server R Services. I will demonstrate how to manage the whole process using an IDE that many of us have grown to love, Visual Studio.

Speaker(s):

  • Ryan Wade

Track and Room: Advanced Analysis Techniques - 302


Title: Running SQL Server in AWS

Abstract: Amazon Web Services (AWS) is the world’s largest public cloud hosting provider with many companies successfully running SQL server on AWS infrastructure. In this session, we explore the options available to you for running SQL server in AWS, either as an RDS managed service or using dedicated EC2 instances. We document the different storage options, HA strategies, security and maintenance caveats to be aware of. We will also detail various approaches to licensing you can take when running SQL server in AWS.

Speaker(s):

  • Brian Carrig

Track and Room: Cloud Application Development Deployment - 402


Title: Introduction to SQL Server Integration Services

Abstract: Take an introductory journey into the world of SSIS through the eyes of a SQL Server DBA as he navigates the Business Intelligence waters. This is an introductory course for beginners or users without any SSIS experience. Come learn how to SSIS with me!

Speaker(s):

  • Ed Watson

Track and Room: BI Platform Architecture, Development Administration - 201


Title: Master Data Management with SQL Server 2016 MDS

Abstract: Want to know the position Master Data Management and MDS play in an organization’s overall data strategy? We’ll review the key concepts and the different roles and responsibilities to help you get your organization moving forward with MDM. We’ll then take a look at the features of SQL Server 2016 MDS that make it an excellent tool for MDM. This demo-packed presentation will cover architecture and installation, different ways of processing data, hierarchies, security and many other features that will get you up and running with MDS.

Speaker(s):

  • Neal Waterstreet

Track and Room: BI Platform Architecture, Development Administration - 219


Title: R-ternatives in Power BI

Abstract: R is a very powerful statistical programming language that has been gaining a lot of traction in recent years. In early 2015 Microsoft acquired Revolution Analytics, a major provider of software and services for R. Microsoft have since incorporated R in Azure ML, SQL Server 2016, and Power BI.

There are 3 ways you can leverage R in Power BI. You can use it as a data source, you can leverage it in Power Query, and you can use it to create custom visualizations. In this session I present easy to follow examples of those 3 scenarios. I will also provide resources that will enable you to take what you learned to the next level.

Speaker(s):

  • Ryan Wade

Track and Room: Analytics and Visualization - 301


Title: New Features in SQL Server 2017

Abstract: Microsoft has moved to 18 month releases for new versions of SQL Server. With that, we’re getting new features sooner! In this session, Robert Verell and Dan Evans will cover the new features of 2017, including Graph Database, Adaptive Query Processing, and the Azure Migration Assistant.

Speaker(s):

  • Robert Verell

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 230


Title: Monitoring Availability Groups

Abstract: So you have successfully configured Availability Groups, now what? In this session we will look beyond setup and look at how to monitor your Availability Groups. We will discuss what metrics to look at, what they mean, and what you need to alert on. You will walk away from this session with tools you need to monitor your environment and know how to respond to alerts. This session is for anyone that uses, or plans to use Availability Groups. You should come in with a basic understanding of Availability Groups to get the most out of this session.

Speaker(s):

  • Tracy Boggiano

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 203


Title: SQL Server Internals

Abstract: How does SQL do what it does? Take a look under the hood at how the SQL database engine works with the storage engine. What causes those waits and where do we look to resolve them!

Speaker(s):

  • Naomi Williams

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 230


Title: Crash Course on Better SQL Development

Abstract: SQL Development is a broad subject with many roads to choose from. Often times SQL Developers feel overwhelmed and unsure which areas they need to focus on. The purpose of this session is to give a high-level overview and present paths for further study and growth. Subjects reviewed in this session will include coding patterns, error handling, and execution plans. Demonstrations of free tools will also help developers find ways of simplifying their daily tasks. Attendees will leave this session empowered with knowledge and directions for further growth.

Speaker(s):

  • Vladimir Oselsky

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 230


Title: SSAS 2016 Tabular - Diving into the new features

Abstract: Taking a looking at all the new features of SSAS 2016 Tabular, how to use them effectively and avoid pitfalls. Features include Bi-Directional Cross Filtering, Parallel Partition Processing, Calculated Tables, etc.

Speaker(s):

  • Brian Beswick

Track and Room: BI Platform Architecture, Development Administration - 203


Title: Secure/Encrypt SQL Server Database With TDE

Abstract: TDE, Transparent Database Encryption, is a Microsoft built-in solution to protect sensitive information by encrypting entire SQL Server database. TDE encrypts and decrypts the data on the fly with minimum overhead and no code change at all on the development or application side.

Speaker(s):

  • Thomas Chan

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 402


Title: SQL Server 2017 (Linux and Beyond)

Abstract: Microsoft has leveled the RDBMS playing field, with SQL Server vNext (aka SQL Server 2017), allowing you to deploy and run SQL Server on a variety of operating systems and container solutions.

In this session, we will look at the background of SQL Server’s move to non-Windows platforms, cover how to install using package deployment on Linux and image-containers with Docker. Focus will cover administration and tools that you can leverage while running SQL Server on non-Windows platforms, including migration and current feature function limitations.

Speaker(s):

  • Andrew Loree

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 301


Title: A Tour of Cloud Data Platforms as a Service

Abstract: With the proliferation of SQL, NoSQL and Big Data databases, organizations can now target specific fit-for-purpose database platforms that align with their particular application requirements regarding scalability, elasticity, functionality and manageability. Platform as a Service offerings make this even easier now, enabling developers to roll out their own database infrastructure in minutes with minimal management overhead. However, this same amount of flexibility also comes with the challenges of picking the right tool, on the right provider and with the proper expectations.

Speaker(s):

  • Richard Weiss

Track and Room: Cloud Application Development Deployment - 301


Title: The Real Value of Name-Value Pairs: Using PIVOT and UNPIVOT

Abstract: This session will show in-depth how to use both PIVOT and UNPIVOT. We’ll go in depth on why you would use it, how you would use it, why it’s set up the way it is, and along the way show you numerous tips and tricks.

Speaker(s):

  • Kevin Wilkie

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 219


Title: Power BI SharePoint - A Marriage Made in Redmond

Abstract: We will explore the relationship between SharePoint and Excel, how Power BI swooped SharePoint off her feet, and the current Business Intelligence soap opera that stars all three. Using live demos, we will look at data interaction between SharePoint, Excel, Power BI (including the iOS app), and the intriguing new next door neighbor - Microsoft Flow.

Speaker(s):

  • Daniel Glenn

Track and Room: BI Platform Architecture, Development Administration - 201


Title: Transforming Data using the T-SQL PIVOT / UNPIVOT operators

Abstract: Ever wish your horizontal data were vertical for easier data storage, as well as vice-versa for reporting purposes? Are you writing elaborate routines to transform between them for one-time usage? Are your queries repeating “OUTER JOIN” or “UNION” so often that you wind up back in Kansas when you read them aloud? Join Jeff Foushee as he explains SQL Server’s lesser-known PIVOT and UNPIVOT operators using SQL 2016. After this session, you will no longer need to rotate your monitor!

Speaker(s):

  • Jeff Foushee

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 402


Title: Excel with DAX

Abstract: DAX is the new formula language (builds upon Excel’s) supporting PowerPivot and Analysis Services Tabular mode. If you know Excel, you already know the basics of DAX (without even knowing it). PowerBI also uses DAX for all the formula expressions. We’ll cover the basics of DAX, and go over some time intelligence functions.

Speaker(s):

  • Azhagappan Arunachalam

Track and Room: Application Database Development - 203


Title: SQL Server Security model, in plain English

Abstract: What is the difference between a Login and a User? What is a schema? Why can I view one table but not another?

If the security portion of SQL Server is confusing to you, you are not alone. Join me for a short overview of the SQL Server security model, using non-technical terms. We will look at it from the point of view of something we are all familiar with, so that you will remember it 6 months or a year or more down the road.

This will be a highly interactive session, designed for you to be able to absorb the info without having to take notes. Bring coffee and learn!

Speaker(s):

  • Kevin Hill

Track and Room: Enterprise Database Administration Deployment - 302


Speakers

This is a list of speakers from the XML Guidebook records. The details and URLs were valid at the time of the event.

Ed Watson

Twitter: - http://twitter.com/SQLGator

LinkedIn: Ed Watson

Contact: http://sqlgator.com

Ed Watson is a Principal Data Platform Consultant for Improving Enterprises, a full-stack Microsoft consulting firm in Atlanta. Ed is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP since 2014 and like most children, Ed was born at an early age. Today, Ed specializes in the Business Intelligence stack and enjoys specializing in Power BI immensely. He currently lives in Atlanta and is active with the Atlanta MDF and Atlanta BI user groups and is an organizer for SQLSaturday Atlanta, Atlanta BI, and Pensacola.

Teo Lachev

Twitter: - https://twitter.com/tlachev

LinkedIn: Teo Lachev

Contact: http://prologika.com/cs/blogs

Teo Lachev is an internationally-recognized authority on Data Analytics. Through his Atlanta-based company Prologika, a Microsoft Gold Partner in Data Analytics, he helps organizations make sense of their most valuable asset: their data. His strategy formulation, trusted advisory and mentoring, design and implementation services empower clients to apply effectively data analytics in order to understand, improve, and transform their business processes.

Teo has authored and co-authored several bestselling books on organizational and self-service data analytics, and he has been leading the Atlanta Microsoft BI and Power BI group since he founded it in 2010. Teo has been a Microsoft Most Valued Professional (MVP) Data Platform since 2010.

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.

Kevin Boles

Twitter: - @TheSQLGuru

LinkedIn: Kevin Boles

Kevin Boles is a SQL Server expert, working exclusively with the product since v6.5. With over 25 years of database experience and over 45,000 man hours of SQL Server engine experience, he holds many related certifications, is an MCT and was a SQL Server MVP from 2007 to 2012. Kevin has been a very successful independent consultant for over 20 years. His passion is the relational engine, especially designing, building, analyzing and tuning high-performance database applications.

Mindy Curnutt

Twitter: - @sqlgirl

LinkedIn: Mindy Curnutt

Contact: http://www.mindycurnutt.com

Mindy Curnutt is a 5X Microsoft Data Platform MVP, Business Owner and Entrepreneur. Her specialties include SQL Server hardware, configuration, migrations, scalability, performance tuning. She has been actively involved in the SQL Server Community for over two decades and has become a well known speaker within the SQL and Transportation Management communities. She is a two-time PASS Volunteer of the Month, has presented at 6 SQLPASS Summits, Live360, DevConnections, MVPMix and too many SQLSaturdays to count. She is currently the President of the North Texas SQL Server User Group out of Dallas/Fort Worth, TX.

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.

Kevin Boles

Twitter: - @TheSQLGuru

LinkedIn: Kevin Boles

Kevin Boles is a SQL Server expert, working exclusively with the product since v6.5. With over 25 years of database experience and over 45,000 man hours of SQL Server engine experience, he holds many related certifications, is an MCT and was a SQL Server MVP from 2007 to 2012. Kevin has been a very successful independent consultant for over 20 years. His passion is the relational engine, especially designing, building, analyzing and tuning high-performance database applications.

Mindy Curnutt

Twitter: - @sqlgirl

LinkedIn: Mindy Curnutt

Contact: http://www.mindycurnutt.com

Mindy Curnutt is a 5X Microsoft Data Platform MVP, Business Owner and Entrepreneur. Her specialties include SQL Server hardware, configuration, migrations, scalability, performance tuning. She has been actively involved in the SQL Server Community for over two decades and has become a well known speaker within the SQL and Transportation Management communities. She is a two-time PASS Volunteer of the Month, has presented at 6 SQLPASS Summits, Live360, DevConnections, MVPMix and too many SQLSaturdays to count. She is currently the President of the North Texas SQL Server User Group out of Dallas/Fort Worth, TX.

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.

Kevin Boles

Twitter: - @TheSQLGuru

LinkedIn: Kevin Boles

Kevin Boles is a SQL Server expert, working exclusively with the product since v6.5. With over 25 years of database experience and over 45,000 man hours of SQL Server engine experience, he holds many related certifications, is an MCT and was a SQL Server MVP from 2007 to 2012. Kevin has been a very successful independent consultant for over 20 years. His passion is the relational engine, especially designing, building, analyzing and tuning high-performance database applications.

Mindy Curnutt

Twitter: - @sqlgirl

LinkedIn: Mindy Curnutt

Contact: http://www.mindycurnutt.com

Mindy Curnutt is a 5X Microsoft Data Platform MVP, Business Owner and Entrepreneur. Her specialties include SQL Server hardware, configuration, migrations, scalability, performance tuning. She has been actively involved in the SQL Server Community for over two decades and has become a well known speaker within the SQL and Transportation Management communities. She is a two-time PASS Volunteer of the Month, has presented at 6 SQLPASS Summits, Live360, DevConnections, MVPMix and too many SQLSaturdays to count. She is currently the President of the North Texas SQL Server User Group out of Dallas/Fort Worth, TX.

Brian Beswick

LinkedIn: Brian Beswick

Contact: http://brianbeswick.com/

Brian is a Managing Consultant at Allegient. He has many years of experience in database architecture and development across multiple versions of SQL Server. He’s an accomplished Database Architect with a specialty in Business Intelligence. He’s particularly strong at understanding and designing solutions for complex requirements.

Ryan Wade

Twitter: - MrDataGeek

LinkedIn: Ryan Wade

Ryan is an experienced data analytics professional. His education and work experience enables him to understand things from a technical, analytical, and business viewpoint. He has the ability to present complex data in an intuitive way using sound analytical and visualization methods.

He has an advanced analytical and technical skill-set which includes Power BI, T-SQL, R, Python, Azure Machine Learning Services, Azure Databricks, SQL Server Machine Learning Services, Advanced Modern Excel, SSIS, SSAS Tabular.

He is a data analytics enthusiast that has spoken at a variety of database and data science conferences about various topics dealing with data analytics.

Matt Martin

Twitter: - @sqletl_matt

Contact: https://sqletl.com/blog/

Matt Martin is an ETL professional with over 9 years experience working with Big data systems. He has built financial forecasting models for fortune 50 companies, loves to optimize queries, and likes to build tools that are easy to learn and quick to use. In 2015, Matt co-founded SQLETL.com, a company that markets and sells an ETL tool that uses native SQL to perform ETL operations instead of using SSIS packages or learning a 3rd party language.

Ryan Wade

Twitter: - MrDataGeek

LinkedIn: Ryan Wade

Ryan is an experienced data analytics professional. His education and work experience enables him to understand things from a technical, analytical, and business viewpoint. He has the ability to present complex data in an intuitive way using sound analytical and visualization methods.

He has an advanced analytical and technical skill-set which includes Power BI, T-SQL, R, Python, Azure Machine Learning Services, Azure Databricks, SQL Server Machine Learning Services, Advanced Modern Excel, SSIS, SSAS Tabular.

He is a data analytics enthusiast that has spoken at a variety of database and data science conferences about various topics dealing with data analytics.

Matt Martin

Twitter: - @sqletl_matt

Contact: https://sqletl.com/blog/

Matt Martin is an ETL professional with over 9 years experience working with Big data systems. He has built financial forecasting models for fortune 50 companies, loves to optimize queries, and likes to build tools that are easy to learn and quick to use. In 2015, Matt co-founded SQLETL.com, a company that markets and sells an ETL tool that uses native SQL to perform ETL operations instead of using SSIS packages or learning a 3rd party language.

Kevin Wilkie

Twitter: - Oskaruth

LinkedIn: Kevin Wilkie

Contact: http://sherpaofdata.com

Kevin has 15+ years experience with SQL Server and has worked with the product since version 6.5, although he remembers with distaste the early versions of the product. He started working with SQL Server as an “Accidental” DBA, and has moved up through the ranks as a SQL Developer, a BI Associate, and Production DBA at various parts of his career. Currently, he works as a Lead Data Analyst spreading the gospel of how great data can be to anyone and everyone who will listen.

Tracy Boggiano

Twitter: - TracyBoggiano

LinkedIn: Tracy Boggiano

Contact: http://databasesuperhero.com

Tracy Boggiano is a Senior Database Administrator for DocuSIgn. She has spent over 20 years in IT, using SQL Server since 1999, and is currently certified as an MCSE Data Platform. Tracy has worked on SQL Server since 6.5. She has spoken at local user groups and numerous SQLSaturdays. She is currently a co-leader of a TriPASS Local Group in Raleigh, NC.

Tracy also tinkered with databases in middle school to keep her sports card collection organized. She blogs at databasesuperhero.com.

Her passion outside of SQL Server is volunteering with foster children as their advocate in court through volunteerforgal.org and being a mental health advocate as part of the PAIMI NC Advisory Council.

William Wolf

Twitter: - sqlwarewolf

LinkedIn: William Wolf

Contact: http://www.sqlwarewolf.com

Bill is the Manager of SQL Server Performance Tuning for RDX. He works with over 400 customers on solutions within the SQL Server environment and specialized in code tuning and mentoring the team within RDX. He has become a SQLSaturday veteran speaking at nearly 40 SQLSaturdays in the last 3 years. He has also spoken at Summit and is an Idera Ace class of 2018. Bill is active in the Pittsburgh SQL Server User Group. He is also the chapter lead for the DevOps Virtual User Group. He is passionate about educating users on SQL Server and mentoring others.

Vladimir Oselsky

Twitter: - @VladyOselsky

LinkedIn: Vladimir Oselsky

Vladimir Oselsky (Vlady) is an IT Professional with over 15 years of experience in various IT Jobs. Born and raised in Siberia, moved to United States in late 90s. Passion for computer and programming started with DOS games and learning Borland Paschal in 8th grade as a hobby. IT career consisted of everything from hardware and software support to server administration. Current focus on SQL Server Database Development and .NET programming

Tim Warner

Twitter: - http://twitter.com/techtrainertim

LinkedIn: Tim Warner

Contact: https://techtrainertim.com

I am a full-time author with Pluralsight, specializing in Microsoft Azure. In addition, I consult as an Azure solutions architect and do a great deal of technical writing.

David Patrick

Twitter: - DavidEPatrick

LinkedIn: David Patrick

Contact: http://www.madsharepoint.com

Dave has been developing database applications for over 25 years. An MCT since 2001, he has taught many classes from Intro to Visual Interdev to Advanced SharePoint Development. Dave runs two user groups, the Maryland and Pennsylvania Microsoft Developers User Group, www.mapamdug.com, and MAD SharePoint, www.madsharepoint.com. Dave does SharePoint training and development for DSA, Inc., a DoD contractor that does great work for the Army over at Aberdeen Proving Ground. Dave is also an MVP.

Vladimir Oselsky

Twitter: - @VladyOselsky

LinkedIn: Vladimir Oselsky

Vladimir Oselsky (Vlady) is an IT Professional with over 15 years of experience in various IT Jobs. Born and raised in Siberia, moved to United States in late 90s. Passion for computer and programming started with DOS games and learning Borland Paschal in 8th grade as a hobby. IT career consisted of everything from hardware and software support to server administration. Current focus on SQL Server Database Development and .NET programming

Tim Warner

Twitter: - http://twitter.com/techtrainertim

LinkedIn: Tim Warner

Contact: https://techtrainertim.com

I am a full-time author with Pluralsight, specializing in Microsoft Azure. In addition, I consult as an Azure solutions architect and do a great deal of technical writing.

David Patrick

Twitter: - DavidEPatrick

LinkedIn: David Patrick

Contact: http://www.madsharepoint.com

Dave has been developing database applications for over 25 years. An MCT since 2001, he has taught many classes from Intro to Visual Interdev to Advanced SharePoint Development. Dave runs two user groups, the Maryland and Pennsylvania Microsoft Developers User Group, www.mapamdug.com, and MAD SharePoint, www.madsharepoint.com. Dave does SharePoint training and development for DSA, Inc., a DoD contractor that does great work for the Army over at Aberdeen Proving Ground. Dave is also an MVP.

Samir Behara

Twitter: - samirbehara

LinkedIn: Samir Behara

Contact: https://dotnetvibes.com/

Samir Behara is a Solution Architect with EBSCO Industries and builds software solutions using cutting edge technologies. He is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP with over 13 years of IT experience working on large-scale enterprise applications involving complex business functions, web integration, and data management in various domains like Insurance, Manufacturing and Publishing.

Samir is a frequent speaker at conferences such as PASS Summit, IT/Dec Connections, CodeStock, SQLSaturdays and CodeCamps. He is the Co-Chapter Lead of the Steel City SQL Server UserGroup, Birmingham, AL. He is the author of www.dotnetvibes.com

Samir Behara

Twitter: - samirbehara

LinkedIn: Samir Behara

Contact: https://dotnetvibes.com/

Samir Behara is a Solution Architect with EBSCO Industries and builds software solutions using cutting edge technologies. He is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP with over 13 years of IT experience working on large-scale enterprise applications involving complex business functions, web integration, and data management in various domains like Insurance, Manufacturing and Publishing.

Samir is a frequent speaker at conferences such as PASS Summit, IT/Dec Connections, CodeStock, SQLSaturdays and CodeCamps. He is the Co-Chapter Lead of the Steel City SQL Server UserGroup, Birmingham, AL. He is the author of www.dotnetvibes.com

William Wolf

Twitter: - sqlwarewolf

LinkedIn: William Wolf

Contact: http://www.sqlwarewolf.com

Bill is the Manager of SQL Server Performance Tuning for RDX. He works with over 400 customers on solutions within the SQL Server environment and specialized in code tuning and mentoring the team within RDX. He has become a SQLSaturday veteran speaking at nearly 40 SQLSaturdays in the last 3 years. He has also spoken at Summit and is an Idera Ace class of 2018. Bill is active in the Pittsburgh SQL Server User Group. He is also the chapter lead for the DevOps Virtual User Group. He is passionate about educating users on SQL Server and mentoring others.

Kevin Feasel

Twitter: - feaselkl

LinkedIn: Kevin Feasel

Contact: http://www.catallaxyservices.com

Kevin Feasel is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and CTO at Envizage, where he specializes in data analytics with T-SQL and R, forcing Spark clusters to do his bidding, fighting with Kafka, and pulling rabbits out of hats on demand. He is the lead contributor to Curated SQL (https://curatedsql.com), president of the Triangle Area SQL Server Users Group (https://www.meetup.com/tripass), and author of PolyBase Revealed (https://www.apress.com/us/book/9781484254608). A resident of Durham, North Carolina, he can be found cycling the trails along the triangle whenever the weather’s nice enough.

Kevin Feasel

Twitter: - feaselkl

LinkedIn: Kevin Feasel

Contact: http://www.catallaxyservices.com

Kevin Feasel is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and CTO at Envizage, where he specializes in data analytics with T-SQL and R, forcing Spark clusters to do his bidding, fighting with Kafka, and pulling rabbits out of hats on demand. He is the lead contributor to Curated SQL (https://curatedsql.com), president of the Triangle Area SQL Server Users Group (https://www.meetup.com/tripass), and author of PolyBase Revealed (https://www.apress.com/us/book/9781484254608). A resident of Durham, North Carolina, he can be found cycling the trails along the triangle whenever the weather’s nice enough.

Jeff Foushee

Jeff Foushee has his MCITP certification in both SQL Server and Windows Server. He is also an Enterprise DBA at Louisville-based Humana, Inc., where he supports almost 20,000 databases on 1,800 SQL Servers. His latest endeavor has been around building a warehouse/website in C#/MVC to automate many database-related processes.

Andrew Loree

Twitter: - @LowOnDiskSpace

LinkedIn: Andrew Loree

Contact: http://www.andyloree.com

Andrew Loree has over nineteen years of database experience with roles in architecture, design, development, and implementation of enterprise-scale SQL Server data solutions, supporting industries from legal e-discovery to manufacturing. Areas of expertise since SQL Server 2000 include data migration and ETL/ELT solutions, disaster recovery planning, high availability service design, licensing and virtualization. Andrew holds fourteen Microsoft certifications, has both a Bachelor and Masters of Science in Computer Science from Wright State University and is a Columbus (Ohio) PASS board member.

Louis Davidson

Twitter: - drsql

LinkedIn: Louis Davidson

Contact: https://www.red-gate.com/simple-talk/author/louis-davidson/

Louis Davidson has worked in the IT industry for over 25 years as a corporate database developer and architect. He has been a Microsoft SQL Server MVP for 15 years and has written five books on database design, and contributed to many other SQL Server books as an author and tech editor. He has a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. You can read more about Louis at http://drsql.org.

Tim Gorman

Twitter: - @TimGormanTech

LinkedIn: Tim Gorman

Contact: http://evdbt.com

Tim Gorman is a senior technical consultant for Delphix who securely enables masked data virtualization to increase the agility of IT development and testing while ending decades of security risk in SDLC.

Tim has co-authored six books on data warehousing and database administration, has performed technical review on eight more books, and has an author#39;s page on Amazon.com (http://www.amazon.com/Tim-Gorman/e/B00BKCTO5E).

David Patrick

Twitter: - DavidEPatrick

LinkedIn: David Patrick

Contact: http://www.madsharepoint.com

Dave has been developing database applications for over 25 years. An MCT since 2001, he has taught many classes from Intro to Visual Interdev to Advanced SharePoint Development. Dave runs two user groups, the Maryland and Pennsylvania Microsoft Developers User Group, www.mapamdug.com, and MAD SharePoint, www.madsharepoint.com. Dave does SharePoint training and development for DSA, Inc., a DoD contractor that does great work for the Army over at Aberdeen Proving Ground. Dave is also an MVP.

Jim Donahoe

Twitter: - SQLFlipFlopsDBA

Contact: http://www.sqlflipflopsdba.com

Jim is a Premier Field Engineer for Microsoft in the Data/AI space. He lives in Pittsburgh in a small suburb. He loves working with all things Azure(ARM templates, DBaaS, SQL on IaaS). He is an avid collector of retro video games! He is a member of the Idera ACE program for 2018.

David Patrick

Twitter: - DavidEPatrick

LinkedIn: David Patrick

Contact: http://www.madsharepoint.com

Dave has been developing database applications for over 25 years. An MCT since 2001, he has taught many classes from Intro to Visual Interdev to Advanced SharePoint Development. Dave runs two user groups, the Maryland and Pennsylvania Microsoft Developers User Group, www.mapamdug.com, and MAD SharePoint, www.madsharepoint.com. Dave does SharePoint training and development for DSA, Inc., a DoD contractor that does great work for the Army over at Aberdeen Proving Ground. Dave is also an MVP.

Kevin Wilkie

Twitter: - Oskaruth

LinkedIn: Kevin Wilkie

Contact: http://sherpaofdata.com

Kevin has 15+ years experience with SQL Server and has worked with the product since version 6.5, although he remembers with distaste the early versions of the product. He started working with SQL Server as an “Accidental” DBA, and has moved up through the ranks as a SQL Developer, a BI Associate, and Production DBA at various parts of his career. Currently, he works as a Lead Data Analyst spreading the gospel of how great data can be to anyone and everyone who will listen.

Kevin Feasel

Twitter: - feaselkl

LinkedIn: Kevin Feasel

Contact: http://www.catallaxyservices.com

Kevin Feasel is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and CTO at Envizage, where he specializes in data analytics with T-SQL and R, forcing Spark clusters to do his bidding, fighting with Kafka, and pulling rabbits out of hats on demand. He is the lead contributor to Curated SQL (https://curatedsql.com), president of the Triangle Area SQL Server Users Group (https://www.meetup.com/tripass), and author of PolyBase Revealed (https://www.apress.com/us/book/9781484254608). A resident of Durham, North Carolina, he can be found cycling the trails along the triangle whenever the weather’s nice enough.

Kevin Hill

Twitter: - @Kevin3NF

LinkedIn: Kevin Hill

Contact: http://www.dallasdbas.com/Blog

I have been working with Microsoft Database technologies since 1994, in Design, Data Modeling, Development and Administration. 18 years of that time have been with SQL Server, going all the way back to 6.5.

I find that I am most passionate about the Admin and HA/DR side, but will still dive into design when called upon.

The Azure cloud is exciting and I believe is the future of SQL Server. I love teaching new and accidental DBAs all of the things I didn’t know when I started.

Stacia Varga

Twitter: - @StaciaV

LinkedIn: Stacia Varga

Contact: http://blog.datainspirations.com

Stacia Varga is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and SSAS Maestro with a Bachelor’s Degree in Social Sciences. A consultant, educator, author, and principal of Data Inspirations, her career spans more than 30 years, with a focus on improving business practices through technology.

Since 2000, Stacia has provided consulting and education services for Microsoft’s Business Intelligence technologies. As Stacia Misner, she also authored several books covering the Microsoft BI stack.

Richard Weiss

Twitter: - @RichardAWeiss

LinkedIn: Richard Weiss

Contact: http://www.Pythian.com

Richard Weiss is a Principal Consultant and Solution Architect at Pythian specializing in Cloud, SQL Server, and Wintel technologies. Over the past 20 years, he has held senior technology roles at First Data, Western Union, and AAA. Additionally, Richard serves on the Data and IOT standards committee for the National Retail Foundation

Stacia Varga

Twitter: - @StaciaV

LinkedIn: Stacia Varga

Contact: http://blog.datainspirations.com

Stacia Varga is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and SSAS Maestro with a Bachelor’s Degree in Social Sciences. A consultant, educator, author, and principal of Data Inspirations, her career spans more than 30 years, with a focus on improving business practices through technology.

Since 2000, Stacia has provided consulting and education services for Microsoft’s Business Intelligence technologies. As Stacia Misner, she also authored several books covering the Microsoft BI stack.

Elizabeth Noble

Twitter: - SQLZelda

LinkedIn: Elizabeth Noble

Elizabeth Noble is a Director of Database Development in the metro Atlanta area. When she was introduced to her first database over 10 years ago, it was love at first sight. Her passion is to help others improve the quality and speed of deploying database changes through automation. When she is not trying to automate all of the things, she can be found spending time with her dogs, playing disc golf, or taking a walk at the gym.

Kevin Boles

Twitter: - @TheSQLGuru

LinkedIn: Kevin Boles

Kevin Boles is a SQL Server expert, working exclusively with the product since v6.5. With over 25 years of database experience and over 45,000 man hours of SQL Server engine experience, he holds many related certifications, is an MCT and was a SQL Server MVP from 2007 to 2012. Kevin has been a very successful independent consultant for over 20 years. His passion is the relational engine, especially designing, building, analyzing and tuning high-performance database applications.

Rick Lowe

Twitter: - DataFLowe

LinkedIn: Rick Lowe

Contact: http://dataflowe.wordpress.com/

Rick is a Microsoft Certified Master with more than 20 years of SQL Server experience in a variety of roles. He currently lives in Washington state and works as an independent consultant providing remote performance DBA and performance tuning services for clients in the USA and Canada. His first exposure to SQL Server was as a database developer, but over time he became more and more interested in how the database engine operated… eventually specializing more on performance issues than code.

Rick will work with all things relational, but most enjoys helping smaller companies get better performance from MSSQL, as well as smoothing over relationships between DBA and development teams.

Naomi Williams

Twitter: - naomithesqldba

LinkedIn: Naomi Williams

Naomi Williams is a SQL Server professional working in the San Antonio area. Currently a seasoned Database Administrator for both Oracle and SQL Server doing database development, SSIS, SSRS and SSAS. Naomi has been working with SQL Server for almost 15 years. Naomi is passionate about performance, high availability, and creative non standard solutions to complex problems

Andrew Loree

Twitter: - @LowOnDiskSpace

LinkedIn: Andrew Loree

Contact: http://www.andyloree.com

Andrew Loree has over nineteen years of database experience with roles in architecture, design, development, and implementation of enterprise-scale SQL Server data solutions, supporting industries from legal e-discovery to manufacturing. Areas of expertise since SQL Server 2000 include data migration and ETL/ELT solutions, disaster recovery planning, high availability service design, licensing and virtualization. Andrew holds fourteen Microsoft certifications, has both a Bachelor and Masters of Science in Computer Science from Wright State University and is a Columbus (Ohio) PASS board member.

Russel Loski

Twitter: - sqlmovers

LinkedIn: Russel Loski

Contact: http://www.sqlmovers.com

Russ Loski is a SQL Server BI Developer based in Dallas-Fort Worth. He current works as a Data Analytics Engineer for Navisite, a remote managed IT services company. Twenty years ago, he began working with SQL Server 6.5. He has since continued to develop applications connected to all of the versions of SQL Server. He has worked with clients in industries from insurance to healthcare, from movie theaters to American football. Russ is a regular speaker at SQLSaturday events, as well as the SQL Server Users Groups in the North Texas region. Russ likes working with data in various shapes.

William Wolf

Twitter: - sqlwarewolf

LinkedIn: William Wolf

Contact: http://www.sqlwarewolf.com

Bill is the Manager of SQL Server Performance Tuning for RDX. He works with over 400 customers on solutions within the SQL Server environment and specialized in code tuning and mentoring the team within RDX. He has become a SQLSaturday veteran speaking at nearly 40 SQLSaturdays in the last 3 years. He has also spoken at Summit and is an Idera Ace class of 2018. Bill is active in the Pittsburgh SQL Server User Group. He is also the chapter lead for the DevOps Virtual User Group. He is passionate about educating users on SQL Server and mentoring others.

Brian Carrig

Twitter: - @briancarrig

Brian Carrig is a Microsoft Certified Master of SQL Server and is currently a Senior Program Manager on the SQL Server Tiger Team at Microsoft focusing primarily on persistent memory technology and replication. In a previous life, Brian spent some time as an academic and holds a PhD in Computer Science. He is a native of Dublin, Ireland but now lives with his wife and two daughters in Redmond, Washington. If he is not talking about, thinking about or working with technology you will usually find him watching Chelsea FC.

Shabnam Watson

Twitter: - ShbWatson

LinkedIn: Shabnam Watson

Contact: https://shabnamwatson.wordpress.com/

Shabnam Watson is a Business Intelligence architect with 20 years of experience developing data warehouse and business intelligence solutions. Her work focus within the Microsoft BI Stack has been on Analysis Services and Power BI.

She is an active member of PASS community and has spoken at PASS Summit, SQLSaturdays, PASS Business Analytics and Women in Technology virtual chapters, and many other local user groups and conferences. She is one of the organizers of SQLSaturday Atlanta BI Edition.

She holds a master’s degree in computer science, a bachelor’s degree in Computer Engineering, and a Certified Business Intelligence Professional (CBIP) certification by The Data Warehouse Institute (TDWI).

Kevin Hill

Twitter: - @Kevin3NF

LinkedIn: Kevin Hill

Contact: http://www.dallasdbas.com/Blog

I have been working with Microsoft Database technologies since 1994, in Design, Data Modeling, Development and Administration. 18 years of that time have been with SQL Server, going all the way back to 6.5.

I find that I am most passionate about the Admin and HA/DR side, but will still dive into design when called upon.

The Azure cloud is exciting and I believe is the future of SQL Server. I love teaching new and accidental DBAs all of the things I didn’t know when I started.

Stacia Varga

Twitter: - @StaciaV

LinkedIn: Stacia Varga

Contact: http://blog.datainspirations.com

Stacia Varga is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and SSAS Maestro with a Bachelor’s Degree in Social Sciences. A consultant, educator, author, and principal of Data Inspirations, her career spans more than 30 years, with a focus on improving business practices through technology.

Since 2000, Stacia has provided consulting and education services for Microsoft’s Business Intelligence technologies. As Stacia Misner, she also authored several books covering the Microsoft BI stack.

Daniel Glenn

Twitter: - DanielGlenn

LinkedIn: Daniel Glenn

Contact: https://DanielGlenn.com

Daniel is a Microsoft MVP with 15 years’ experience building technology solutions, intranets and extranets. As Practice Leader for the Nashville-based InfoWorks Inc., Daniel helps organizations of all sizes solve complex data challenges by implementing Office 365 and SharePoint without the need of customization and costly investments.

Daniel is passionate about giving back and building the Microsoft technical community. Daniel holds leadership roles in various local user groups, serves as an organizer for Microsoft 365 Nashville, and is a co-host for the popular podcast 365 Message Center Show on https://MessageCenter.Show. You can follow Daniel online at https://DanielGlenn.com and @DanielGlenn on Twitter.

Rick Lowe

Twitter: - DataFLowe

LinkedIn: Rick Lowe

Contact: http://dataflowe.wordpress.com/

Rick is a Microsoft Certified Master with more than 20 years of SQL Server experience in a variety of roles. He currently lives in Washington state and works as an independent consultant providing remote performance DBA and performance tuning services for clients in the USA and Canada. His first exposure to SQL Server was as a database developer, but over time he became more and more interested in how the database engine operated… eventually specializing more on performance issues than code.

Rick will work with all things relational, but most enjoys helping smaller companies get better performance from MSSQL, as well as smoothing over relationships between DBA and development teams.

Dan Evans

Twitter: - @danthebiman

LinkedIn: Dan Evans

Dan Evans is a Data and Analytics evangelist with over 25 years’ experience deploying strategic and innovative analytic solutions. He’s focused on Microsoft technologies including Data Platform, Advanced Analytics and Business Applications. Current focuses include SQL Server, Power Suite, Cognitive Services, Artifical Inteligence and other Data Platform related topics in Azure. Dan presents at many local, regional and national events including SQL PASS, DAMA, TDWI, TechEd and Ignite and supports best practices in Microsoft data and analytics across North America.

Mike Robbins

Twitter: - @mikefrobbins

LinkedIn: Mike Robbins

Contact: http://mikefrobbins.com/

Mike F Robbins is a Microsoft MVP on Windows PowerShell and a SAPIEN Technologies MVP. He is a co-author of Windows PowerShell TFM 4th Edition and is a contributing author of a chapter in the PowerShell Deep Dives book. Mike has written guest blog articles for the Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog, PowerShell Magazine, and PowerShell.org. He is the winner of the advanced category in the 2013 PowerShell Scripting Games. Mike is also the leader and co-founder of the Mississippi PowerShell User Group. He blogs at mikefrobbins.com and can be found on twitter @mikefrobbins.

Kerry Tyler

Twitter: - AirborneGeek

LinkedIn: Kerry Tyler

Contact: http://airbornegeek.com

Kerry Tyler is a SQL Server, Business Intelligence, and Azure consultant. His initial IT experience was in network engineering and Windows system administration before moving into the data realm. This infrastructure background builds a firm foundation for performance tuning and cloud infrastructure design and implementation. Kerry has full-time DBA experience in SQL Server since version 2000 and business intelligence architecture since SQL Server 2005. In addition to consulting work, he delivers presentations and training on SQL Server administration, business intelligence, and Azure data and infrastructure components.

Neal Waterstreet

Twitter: - @nealwaterstreet

LinkedIn: Neal Waterstreet

Contact: http://www.nealwaterstreet.com

Neal is a BI Architect/Consultant with more than 20 years of industry experience. Neal is skilled in the entire BI spectrum, including dimensional modeling, ETL design and development using Integration Services (SSIS), designing and developing multidimensional cubes and Tabular models using Analysis Services (SSAS) and Master Data Management using Microsoft Data Services (MDS). He’s also involved with the database community and is the co-founder and co-leader of the PASS Healthcare Virtual Chapter and the Atlanta Modern Excel User Group.

Tamera Clark

Twitter: - https://twitter.com/tameraclark

LinkedIn: Tamera Clark

Contact: http://tameraclark.com

Tamera Clark has been involved in the IT industry for greater than ten years, with experiences ranging from systems analysis/engineering to SQL Server and SSRS administration/development. She is an active member of the SQL Server community, participating in the Women in Technology Virtual Chapter, Co-leading the Nashville BI Chapter, assisting the Nashville PASS Chapter and serving as a Regional Mentor. Tamera is also the event chair of SQLSaturday Nashville.

Paul Southerland

Paul started his career at IBM in last century as an Marketing Representative specializing in engineering and scientific applications. He joined the Tennessee Valley Authority over twenty-five years ago as a network engineer. Since that time, he has held a wide array of positions in Technology Advancements (RD), Fossil Power Group, Supply Chain, Electric System Projects, Commercial Operations and Fuel Supply, Risk Management, and Corporate Strategic Planning. Paul is currently a Power System Planning Specialist at the Tennessee Valley Authority. Paul has a B.A. in Economics, and an M.B.A., both from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.

Eric Cobb

Twitter: - cfgears

LinkedIn: Eric Cobb

Contact: http://www.sqlnuggets.com

After a 14-year programming career as a web and software developer, Eric decided to move full time into the world of databases and became a SQL Server Database Administrator, earning 2 SQL Server MCSE certifications along the way, and now manages a team of SQL Server professionals.

Eric regularly presents and blogs about SQL Sever, with a focus on teaching database administration and design concepts to the developer community, and frequently speaks at Developer and Database conferences throughout the country. In 2019 Eric was selected to be a 2020 IDERA ACE, for showing a passion in helping the developer community and sharing his knowledge.

Russel Loski

Twitter: - sqlmovers

LinkedIn: Russel Loski

Contact: http://www.sqlmovers.com

Russ Loski is a SQL Server BI Developer based in Dallas-Fort Worth. He current works as a Data Analytics Engineer for Navisite, a remote managed IT services company. Twenty years ago, he began working with SQL Server 6.5. He has since continued to develop applications connected to all of the versions of SQL Server. He has worked with clients in industries from insurance to healthcare, from movie theaters to American football. Russ is a regular speaker at SQLSaturday events, as well as the SQL Server Users Groups in the North Texas region. Russ likes working with data in various shapes.

Mike Robbins

Twitter: - @mikefrobbins

LinkedIn: Mike Robbins

Contact: http://mikefrobbins.com/

Mike F Robbins is a Microsoft MVP on Windows PowerShell and a SAPIEN Technologies MVP. He is a co-author of Windows PowerShell TFM 4th Edition and is a contributing author of a chapter in the PowerShell Deep Dives book. Mike has written guest blog articles for the Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog, PowerShell Magazine, and PowerShell.org. He is the winner of the advanced category in the 2013 PowerShell Scripting Games. Mike is also the leader and co-founder of the Mississippi PowerShell User Group. He blogs at mikefrobbins.com and can be found on twitter @mikefrobbins.

Kerry Tyler

Twitter: - AirborneGeek

LinkedIn: Kerry Tyler

Contact: http://airbornegeek.com

Kerry Tyler is a SQL Server, Business Intelligence, and Azure consultant. His initial IT experience was in network engineering and Windows system administration before moving into the data realm. This infrastructure background builds a firm foundation for performance tuning and cloud infrastructure design and implementation. Kerry has full-time DBA experience in SQL Server since version 2000 and business intelligence architecture since SQL Server 2005. In addition to consulting work, he delivers presentations and training on SQL Server administration, business intelligence, and Azure data and infrastructure components.

Rick Lowe

Twitter: - DataFLowe

LinkedIn: Rick Lowe

Contact: http://dataflowe.wordpress.com/

Rick is a Microsoft Certified Master with more than 20 years of SQL Server experience in a variety of roles. He currently lives in Washington state and works as an independent consultant providing remote performance DBA and performance tuning services for clients in the USA and Canada. His first exposure to SQL Server was as a database developer, but over time he became more and more interested in how the database engine operated… eventually specializing more on performance issues than code.

Rick will work with all things relational, but most enjoys helping smaller companies get better performance from MSSQL, as well as smoothing over relationships between DBA and development teams.

Robert Verell

Twitter: - @sqlcowbell

LinkedIn: Robert Verell

Contact: http://sqlcowbell.com/wordpress/

Robert Verell is a SQL Server professional working in the Nashville area and has worked in healthcare, insurance, and banking. He found his passion for databases by learning SQL Server Integration Services and writing stored procedures, and eventually became a database administrator. Robert is a chapter lead for the Nashville SQL Server User’s Group, a volunteer for SQLSaturday, and was a finalist in the 2016 PASS Summit Speaker Idol competition.

Simon Kingaby

Twitter: - SimonKingaby

LinkedIn: Simon Kingaby

Contact: http://omwtm.blog

Simon Kingaby has been moving data for 20 plus years. In the last few years, he’s been moving data from DB2, Oracle, Netezza and SQL Server to Azure SQL and Azure Data Warehouse, using Azure Data Factory, SSIS and SQL. At BMI, he developed a Rules Engine Sync application that uses DB2 QRep messaging and Azure ESB to move DB2 transactions to the cloud in near-real-time. Now at Deloitte on the Big Data team, he is developing ETL processes to move API, SaaS and SQL data into reporting databases on-premise and in the cloud. He is also creating SSRS and Power BI dashboards for the CIO and related Services.

Mike Robbins

Twitter: - @mikefrobbins

LinkedIn: Mike Robbins

Contact: http://mikefrobbins.com/

Mike F Robbins is a Microsoft MVP on Windows PowerShell and a SAPIEN Technologies MVP. He is a co-author of Windows PowerShell TFM 4th Edition and is a contributing author of a chapter in the PowerShell Deep Dives book. Mike has written guest blog articles for the Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog, PowerShell Magazine, and PowerShell.org. He is the winner of the advanced category in the 2013 PowerShell Scripting Games. Mike is also the leader and co-founder of the Mississippi PowerShell User Group. He blogs at mikefrobbins.com and can be found on twitter @mikefrobbins.

Dan Evans

Twitter: - @danthebiman

LinkedIn: Dan Evans

Dan Evans is a Data and Analytics evangelist with over 25 years’ experience deploying strategic and innovative analytic solutions. He’s focused on Microsoft technologies including Data Platform, Advanced Analytics and Business Applications. Current focuses include SQL Server, Power Suite, Cognitive Services, Artifical Inteligence and other Data Platform related topics in Azure. Dan presents at many local, regional and national events including SQL PASS, DAMA, TDWI, TechEd and Ignite and supports best practices in Microsoft data and analytics across North America.

Ben Miller

Twitter: - DBAduck

LinkedIn: Ben Miller

Contact: https://dbaduck.com

Ben has been a member of the SQL Server Community since 2000. He loves a challenge and has fixed many SQL Servers and helped hundreds of people get more out of their DBA jobs. He is a Data Platform MVP a SQL Server Certified Master (MCM). He has worked at various companies throughout the USA, as well as at Microsoft for 7 years. He is passionate about SQL Server Infrastructure, High Availability, Automation and Integration using SMO and PowerShell. He teaches DBAs how to use PowerShell to do their job and teaches SQL Server Internals. He is @DBAduck all around the web (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Blog) so let’s catch up.

Ben Miller

Twitter: - DBAduck

LinkedIn: Ben Miller

Contact: https://dbaduck.com

Ben has been a member of the SQL Server Community since 2000. He loves a challenge and has fixed many SQL Servers and helped hundreds of people get more out of their DBA jobs. He is a Data Platform MVP a SQL Server Certified Master (MCM). He has worked at various companies throughout the USA, as well as at Microsoft for 7 years. He is passionate about SQL Server Infrastructure, High Availability, Automation and Integration using SMO and PowerShell. He teaches DBAs how to use PowerShell to do their job and teaches SQL Server Internals. He is @DBAduck all around the web (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Blog) so let’s catch up.

Ben Miller

Twitter: - DBAduck

LinkedIn: Ben Miller

Contact: https://dbaduck.com

Ben has been a member of the SQL Server Community since 2000. He loves a challenge and has fixed many SQL Servers and helped hundreds of people get more out of their DBA jobs. He is a Data Platform MVP a SQL Server Certified Master (MCM). He has worked at various companies throughout the USA, as well as at Microsoft for 7 years. He is passionate about SQL Server Infrastructure, High Availability, Automation and Integration using SMO and PowerShell. He teaches DBAs how to use PowerShell to do their job and teaches SQL Server Internals. He is @DBAduck all around the web (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Blog) so let’s catch up.

Kerry Tyler

Twitter: - AirborneGeek

LinkedIn: Kerry Tyler

Contact: http://airbornegeek.com

Kerry Tyler is a SQL Server, Business Intelligence, and Azure consultant. His initial IT experience was in network engineering and Windows system administration before moving into the data realm. This infrastructure background builds a firm foundation for performance tuning and cloud infrastructure design and implementation. Kerry has full-time DBA experience in SQL Server since version 2000 and business intelligence architecture since SQL Server 2005. In addition to consulting work, he delivers presentations and training on SQL Server administration, business intelligence, and Azure data and infrastructure components.

Robert Verell

Twitter: - @sqlcowbell

LinkedIn: Robert Verell

Contact: http://sqlcowbell.com/wordpress/

Robert Verell is a SQL Server professional working in the Nashville area and has worked in healthcare, insurance, and banking. He found his passion for databases by learning SQL Server Integration Services and writing stored procedures, and eventually became a database administrator. Robert is a chapter lead for the Nashville SQL Server User’s Group, a volunteer for SQLSaturday, and was a finalist in the 2016 PASS Summit Speaker Idol competition.

Ben Miller

Twitter: - DBAduck

LinkedIn: Ben Miller

Contact: https://dbaduck.com

Ben has been a member of the SQL Server Community since 2000. He loves a challenge and has fixed many SQL Servers and helped hundreds of people get more out of their DBA jobs. He is a Data Platform MVP a SQL Server Certified Master (MCM). He has worked at various companies throughout the USA, as well as at Microsoft for 7 years. He is passionate about SQL Server Infrastructure, High Availability, Automation and Integration using SMO and PowerShell. He teaches DBAs how to use PowerShell to do their job and teaches SQL Server Internals. He is @DBAduck all around the web (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Blog) so let’s catch up.

Robert Verell

Twitter: - @sqlcowbell

LinkedIn: Robert Verell

Contact: http://sqlcowbell.com/wordpress/

Robert Verell is a SQL Server professional working in the Nashville area and has worked in healthcare, insurance, and banking. He found his passion for databases by learning SQL Server Integration Services and writing stored procedures, and eventually became a database administrator. Robert is a chapter lead for the Nashville SQL Server User’s Group, a volunteer for SQLSaturday, and was a finalist in the 2016 PASS Summit Speaker Idol competition.

Ben Miller

Twitter: - DBAduck

LinkedIn: Ben Miller

Contact: https://dbaduck.com

Ben has been a member of the SQL Server Community since 2000. He loves a challenge and has fixed many SQL Servers and helped hundreds of people get more out of their DBA jobs. He is a Data Platform MVP a SQL Server Certified Master (MCM). He has worked at various companies throughout the USA, as well as at Microsoft for 7 years. He is passionate about SQL Server Infrastructure, High Availability, Automation and Integration using SMO and PowerShell. He teaches DBAs how to use PowerShell to do their job and teaches SQL Server Internals. He is @DBAduck all around the web (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Blog) so let’s catch up.

Robert Verell

Twitter: - @sqlcowbell

LinkedIn: Robert Verell

Contact: http://sqlcowbell.com/wordpress/

Robert Verell is a SQL Server professional working in the Nashville area and has worked in healthcare, insurance, and banking. He found his passion for databases by learning SQL Server Integration Services and writing stored procedures, and eventually became a database administrator. Robert is a chapter lead for the Nashville SQL Server User’s Group, a volunteer for SQLSaturday, and was a finalist in the 2016 PASS Summit Speaker Idol competition.

Thomas Chan

LinkedIn: Thomas Chan

I work with SQL Server since 2001 with version 7.

Mike Robbins

Twitter: - @mikefrobbins

LinkedIn: Mike Robbins

Contact: http://mikefrobbins.com/

Mike F Robbins is a Microsoft MVP on Windows PowerShell and a SAPIEN Technologies MVP. He is a co-author of Windows PowerShell TFM 4th Edition and is a contributing author of a chapter in the PowerShell Deep Dives book. Mike has written guest blog articles for the Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog, PowerShell Magazine, and PowerShell.org. He is the winner of the advanced category in the 2013 PowerShell Scripting Games. Mike is also the leader and co-founder of the Mississippi PowerShell User Group. He blogs at mikefrobbins.com and can be found on twitter @mikefrobbins.

Paco Gonzalez

Twitter: - @pacosql

LinkedIn: Paco Gonzalez

Paco Gonzalez is the CEO of SolidQ North America, and a Microsoft Data Platform MVP. Focused on Business Analytics and Artificial Intelligence, he specializes in helping organizations become data driven from a strategic and technical perspective. Paco is a speaker at small and large conferences such as PASS Summit, Ignite, and Business Applications Summit, and he has published several books and whitepapers. He is based in Atlanta, GA.

Louis Davidson

Twitter: - drsql

LinkedIn: Louis Davidson

Contact: https://www.red-gate.com/simple-talk/author/louis-davidson/

Louis Davidson has worked in the IT industry for over 25 years as a corporate database developer and architect. He has been a Microsoft SQL Server MVP for 15 years and has written five books on database design, and contributed to many other SQL Server books as an author and tech editor. He has a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. You can read more about Louis at http://drsql.org.

Ed Watson

Twitter: - http://twitter.com/SQLGator

LinkedIn: Ed Watson

Contact: http://sqlgator.com

Ed Watson is a Principal Data Platform Consultant for Improving Enterprises, a full-stack Microsoft consulting firm in Atlanta. Ed is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP since 2014 and like most children, Ed was born at an early age. Today, Ed specializes in the Business Intelligence stack and enjoys specializing in Power BI immensely. He currently lives in Atlanta and is active with the Atlanta MDF and Atlanta BI user groups and is an organizer for SQLSaturday Atlanta, Atlanta BI, and Pensacola.

Matt Martin

Twitter: - @sqletl_matt

Contact: https://sqletl.com/blog/

Matt Martin is an ETL professional with over 9 years experience working with Big data systems. He has built financial forecasting models for fortune 50 companies, loves to optimize queries, and likes to build tools that are easy to learn and quick to use. In 2015, Matt co-founded SQLETL.com, a company that markets and sells an ETL tool that uses native SQL to perform ETL operations instead of using SSIS packages or learning a 3rd party language.

Kevin Feasel

Twitter: - feaselkl

LinkedIn: Kevin Feasel

Contact: http://www.catallaxyservices.com

Kevin Feasel is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and CTO at Envizage, where he specializes in data analytics with T-SQL and R, forcing Spark clusters to do his bidding, fighting with Kafka, and pulling rabbits out of hats on demand. He is the lead contributor to Curated SQL (https://curatedsql.com), president of the Triangle Area SQL Server Users Group (https://www.meetup.com/tripass), and author of PolyBase Revealed (https://www.apress.com/us/book/9781484254608). A resident of Durham, North Carolina, he can be found cycling the trails along the triangle whenever the weather’s nice enough.

Thomas Chan

LinkedIn: Thomas Chan

I work with SQL Server since 2001 with version 7.

Tracy Boggiano

Twitter: - TracyBoggiano

LinkedIn: Tracy Boggiano

Contact: http://databasesuperhero.com

Tracy Boggiano is a Senior Database Administrator for DocuSIgn. She has spent over 20 years in IT, using SQL Server since 1999, and is currently certified as an MCSE Data Platform. Tracy has worked on SQL Server since 6.5. She has spoken at local user groups and numerous SQLSaturdays. She is currently a co-leader of a TriPASS Local Group in Raleigh, NC.

Tracy also tinkered with databases in middle school to keep her sports card collection organized. She blogs at databasesuperhero.com.

Her passion outside of SQL Server is volunteering with foster children as their advocate in court through volunteerforgal.org and being a mental health advocate as part of the PAIMI NC Advisory Council.

William Wolf

Twitter: - sqlwarewolf

LinkedIn: William Wolf

Contact: http://www.sqlwarewolf.com

Bill is the Manager of SQL Server Performance Tuning for RDX. He works with over 400 customers on solutions within the SQL Server environment and specialized in code tuning and mentoring the team within RDX. He has become a SQLSaturday veteran speaking at nearly 40 SQLSaturdays in the last 3 years. He has also spoken at Summit and is an Idera Ace class of 2018. Bill is active in the Pittsburgh SQL Server User Group. He is also the chapter lead for the DevOps Virtual User Group. He is passionate about educating users on SQL Server and mentoring others.

Stacia Varga

Twitter: - @StaciaV

LinkedIn: Stacia Varga

Contact: http://blog.datainspirations.com

Stacia Varga is a Microsoft Data Platform MVP and SSAS Maestro with a Bachelor’s Degree in Social Sciences. A consultant, educator, author, and principal of Data Inspirations, her career spans more than 30 years, with a focus on improving business practices through technology.

Since 2000, Stacia has provided consulting and education services for Microsoft’s Business Intelligence technologies. As Stacia Misner, she also authored several books covering the Microsoft BI stack.

Rick Lowe

Twitter: - DataFLowe

LinkedIn: Rick Lowe

Contact: http://dataflowe.wordpress.com/

Rick is a Microsoft Certified Master with more than 20 years of SQL Server experience in a variety of roles. He currently lives in Washington state and works as an independent consultant providing remote performance DBA and performance tuning services for clients in the USA and Canada. His first exposure to SQL Server was as a database developer, but over time he became more and more interested in how the database engine operated… eventually specializing more on performance issues than code.

Rick will work with all things relational, but most enjoys helping smaller companies get better performance from MSSQL, as well as smoothing over relationships between DBA and development teams.

Paco Gonzalez

Twitter: - @pacosql

LinkedIn: Paco Gonzalez

Paco Gonzalez is the CEO of SolidQ North America, and a Microsoft Data Platform MVP. Focused on Business Analytics and Artificial Intelligence, he specializes in helping organizations become data driven from a strategic and technical perspective. Paco is a speaker at small and large conferences such as PASS Summit, Ignite, and Business Applications Summit, and he has published several books and whitepapers. He is based in Atlanta, GA.

Christopher Sims

Twitter: - https://twitter.com/sigaostudios

LinkedIn: Christopher Sims

Contact: http://www.sigaostudios.com/blog

Chris is a software engineer and program manager with over 18 years of programming and 14 years of project management experience. Chris continually pushes his personal and professional boundaries by actively seeking out complex projects and applying innovative, sophisticated and elegant solutions to real-world problems. Chris is the technical principal of agile consulting firm, Sigao Studios. Sigao Studios specializes in offering modern responsive web solutions based on technologies that include Azure, CosmosDB and Azure Search. In addition to his technical pursuits, Chris enjoys stage acting and wood working in his free time.

Louis Davidson

Twitter: - drsql

LinkedIn: Louis Davidson

Contact: https://www.red-gate.com/simple-talk/author/louis-davidson/

Louis Davidson has worked in the IT industry for over 25 years as a corporate database developer and architect. He has been a Microsoft SQL Server MVP for 15 years and has written five books on database design, and contributed to many other SQL Server books as an author and tech editor. He has a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. You can read more about Louis at http://drsql.org.

Sponsors

The following is a list of sponsors that helped fund the event:

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