Clippy Is Not Dead, Clippy Is Alive.....On Linux

So we all know that Clippy hasn't made it to Office 2007 but guess what? Clippy is not dead, it's alive! DR. FrankGNUstein has dug up Clippy from the cemetery near Redmond, Clippy was resting (in peace) near MS Bob and now only an empty grave can be found.
Below is a picture of Clippy on Linux, kind of creepy and if you look closely you can still see the scars. Now you know why Seattle had a blackout recently because DR. FrankGNUstein used a tremendous amount of power to resurrect Clippy

Click on the image to see a bigger image. And yes I will post some real SQL later today, it will be about ten hardly used functions in T-SQL (STUFF, NULLIF, PARSENAME, REVERSE, UNICODE and more.....)

And if you want to see more Linux Clippy images and a video as well then visit this link: http://vigor.sourceforge.net/screenshots/

Wal-Mart Wine

Wal-Mart announced that, on January 1, 2007, it will begin offering
customers a new discount item - Wal-Mart's own brand of wine.

The world's largest retail chain is teaming up with Ernest & Julio
Gallo Winery of California to produce the spirits at an affordable
price, in the $2-$5 range.

Wine connoisseurs may not be inclined to throw a bottle of Wal-Mart
brand into their shopping carts, but "there is a market for
inexpensive wine," said Kathy Micken, professor of marketing at
University of Arkansas, Bentonville. She said: "But the right name
is important."

Customer surveys were conducted to determine the most attractive
name for the Wal-Mart wine brand. The top surveyed names in order of
popularity were:

10. Chateau Traileur Parc

9. White Trashfindel

8. Big Red Gulp

7. World Championship Riesling

6. NASCARbernet

5. Chef Boyardeaux

4. Peanut Noir

3. I Can't Believe It's Not Vinegar!

2. Grape Expectations

1. Nasti Spumante

The beauty of Wal-Mart wine is that it can be served with either
white meat (Possum) or red meat (Squirrel).

ASP.NET:DataFormatString Doesn't Work In A GridView If HtmlEncode Is True

So this took me most of my lunch hour to figure out the other day. If you have a gridview and you want to apply formatting to a column then you have to set HtmlEncode to false, by default HtmlEncode is set to true. Of course I thought initially that my super advanced formatting formula ({0:c}) was wrong. A quick Google search found the answer. So below where you see this part HtmlEncode="False" that is the culprit, initiall this will be HtmlEncode="True"

<Columns><asp:BoundField DataField="OrderCost" DataFormatString="{0:c}" HeaderText="OrderCost" HtmlEncode="False" SortExpression="Currency" /></Columns>

I must say that having been away from front-end programming for 5 years I am kind of glad to be back (back is a strong word, I am doing this mostly during lunch and at home because my plate is full with SQL SERVER tasks). But I still have a lot to learn, yep back to n00b status ;-(
Yesterday I was debugging a web service that I wrote in VS 2005. It's kind of cool to see that that works because after you spend time with the SQL Server debugger you would think that something like that would never work

How to Backup Your Blogger Blog

If you have a blog hosted on Blog*Spot (Blogger) and you've upgraded to the new version, there's an easy way to backup your blog. The Google Operating System blog shows you just the way to do this. The link to the article is below

http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2007/02/how-to-backup-blogger-blog.html

Use A Combination OF NULLIF and COALESCE TO Display A Custom Value

Let's you inherit a table with a column that can contain blanks, empty strings or NULL values. I am saying inherit because surely you would have a constraint on the column that wouldn't allow those values to begin with right? For all the values that are '',' ' or NULL you want to display 'N/A'.
What is the best way to do this? You can Use CASE and test for the values or you can use COALESCE with NULLIF which is much shorter. A lot of people don't know that you can stack these functions so that it makes your life so much easier.
Let's get started

CREATE TABLE Blah (SomeCol VARCHAR(33))

INSERT Blah VALUES(NULL)
INSERT Blah VALUES('')
INSERT Blah VALUES(' ')
INSERT Blah VALUES('A')
INSERT Blah VALUES('B B')

--Using COALESCE and NULLIF
SELECT COALESCE(NULLIF(RTRIM(SomeCol),' '),'N/A')
FROM Blah


--Using CASE
SELECT CASE WHEN RTRIM(SomeCol) = '' THEN 'N/A'
WHEN RTRIM(SomeCol) IS NULL THEN 'N/A'
ELSE SomeCol END SomeCol
FROM Blah


Output for both queries
-----------------------
N/A
N/A
N/A
A
B B

SSIS Connectivity White Papers Available On Microsoft's Site

Bob Beauchemin's SSIS whitepapers are now available on Microsoft's website

Connectivity and SQL Server 2005 Integration Services
http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/7/c/27cd7357-2649-4035-84af-e9c47df4329c/ConnectivitySSIS.doc

Planning, Implementing, and Administering Scaleout Solutions with SQL Server 2005
http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/7/a/47a548b9-249e-484c-abd7-29f31282b04d/ImplementingScaleOut.doc

Internals, Troubleshooting, and Best Practices for use of Scaleout Technologies in SQL Server 2005
http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/7/a/47a548b9-249e-484c-abd7-29f31282b04d/InternalsTroubleshootingScaleOut.doc

Enjoy reading them

What Happens When You Let a Three Year Old Use Your Computer For 2 Minutes?

What Happens When You Let a Three Year Old Use Your Computer For 2 Minutes?

This (I Spy a bunch of trouble)

Shipping Method: Standard Shipping
Shipping Preference: Group my items into as few shipments as possible
Subtotal of Items: $234.62
Shipping & Handling: $32.70
Promotion Applied: -$19.95

------
Total for this Order: $247.37


Shipping estimate for these items: February 7, 2007
Delivery estimate: February 12, 2007 - February 14, 2007 1 "I Spy A Penguin (Level 1) (I Spy)"
JEAN MARZOLLO; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy Santa Claus (Scholastic Reader, Level 1)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy A Balloon (Scholastic Reader Level 1)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy Lightning In The Sky (level 1): I Spy Lightning In The Sky (Scholastic Readers)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy A Dinosaur's Eye (Scholastic Readers)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy A Dinosaur's Eye (Scholastic Readers)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy A Pumpkin (Scholastic Reader Level 1)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy A Pumpkin (Scholastic Reader Level 1)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy: Year-round Challenger: Year-round Challenger (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $9.95

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy A School Bus (Scholastic Readers)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy Little Animals (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Board book; $6.99

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy Fun House: A Book of Picture Riddles"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $11.16

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy School Days (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $11.16

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy Fun House: A Book of Picture Riddles"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $11.16

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy Extreme Challenger! A Book of Picture Riddles"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $11.16

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy Funny Teeth (Scholastic Readers)"
Jean Marzollo; Paperback; $3.99

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1 "I Spy Gold Challenger (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $11.58

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1 "I Spy Spooky Night (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $11.16

Sold by: Amazon.com
1 "I Spy: A Book Of Picture Riddles: A Book Of Picture Riddles (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $9.95

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1 "I Spy Christmas: A Book of Picture Riddles"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $11.16

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1 "I Spy: Ultimate Challenger: Ultimate Challenger (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $9.95

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1 "I Spy: Ultimate Challenger: Ultimate Challenger (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $9.95

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1 "I Spy: Ultimate Challenger: Ultimate Challenger (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $9.95

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1 "I Spy Little Letters (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Board book; $6.99

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1 "I Spy Little Letters (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Board book; $6.99

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1 "I Spy: Mystery A Book Of Picture Riddles: Mystery A Book Of Picture Riddles (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $9.95

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1 "I Spy: Mystery A Book Of Picture Riddles: Mystery A Book Of Picture Riddles (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Hardcover; $9.95

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1 "I Spy Little Wheels (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Board book; $6.99

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1 "I Spy Little Book (I Spy)"
Jean Marzollo; Board book; $6.99

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1 "Can You See What I See? Dream Machine"
Walter Wick; Hardcover; $11.58

Sold by: Amazon.com


And of course it already shipped, how come when I place an order it doesn't ship for 2 days.....

More Than 10 Tips To Help Your Virtual PC Performance.

Sahil Malik has posted on his blog 10 Tips To Help Your Virtual PC Performance. If you use Virtual PC a lot to test service pack 2 for SQL Server for example then you want to check these tips out. The URL is below
http://blah.winsmarts.com/2007-2-10_tips_to_help_your_Virtual_PC_performance.aspx

John Carpenter’s The Thing

I brought in John Carpenter’s The Thing to work only to discover that 80% of my co-workers never heard of this movie. This movie is probably one of the best in its genre. If you like Alien(s) then you will love this movie. The story is about a bunch of researchers on Antarctica, they discover a spaceship and take a dog in (bad idea) I won’t spoil the story but let’s just say that a lot of people die. I watched this movie at least 10 times since its release in 1982. even nowadays the special effects are still amazing.

IMDB lists this movie in the top 250 movies of all time with a rating of 8.0 and 29,153 votes. If you have problems picking out a movie at blockbuster with your significant other then consider this a favor because I know what it feels like spending 30 minutes in Blockbuster trying to agree on a movie. I even went home a couple of times without a movie because my wife and I couldn’t agree on a movie. So what are you waiting for it is Saturday afternoon (well it is in Princeton, NJ anyway)? Go to the movie rental store and watch this movie. Let me know what you thought of it after you watch it

If you are in doubt then just check out the comments on IMDB http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084787/usercomments

And here is the trailer
http://srv12.movie-list.net/bendermac/thing_redux_h640_ml.mov

Give Me One Good Reason Why You Would Store Documents In The Database?

Why would you ever store PDF, Doc or Excel files in the database? What is the point? I don't see any advantages only disadvantages
Let's say you have 8 webservers and 1 big SQL monster. If you store these documents in the DB and you get hit by these 8 webservers for documents all the time your DB is going to slow down. A much better way is to have the files on the webservers itself, sending 9MB pdf files over the network is just wrong.
Also if you store all these files in the DB your backups will take much longer.
Updating BLOBs is another pain in the neck; UPDATETEXT and WRITETEXT are not my favorite SQL commands.

So here is the question:
Would you store images/documents/spreadsheets in the Database and why?

SQL Server 2005 High Availability Podcast On DotNet Rocks

.NET Rocks has made their latest podcast available, this one deals with SQL Server 2005 high availability
Allan Hirt discusses the details of providing high availability with SQL Server 2005, and the things developers need to know in order to make their applications compatible. He discusses clustering, transaction log shipping, mirroring, and more

The podcast is available in MP3, WMA,WMA L lo-Fi and IPOD (AAC) formats and the duration is one hour and 15 minutes (1:14:55)

Get the podcast here: http://dotnetrocks.com/default.aspx?showID=215

How To Restart A Remote Computer

Sometimes you have to login to your work PC from home over the VPN and after a while for some reason or another you want to restart your PC. How can you do that? You can't use the start menu because only the log off button is displayed
Well one way is to open a command window and executing shutdown -r
That will restart your computer

Here is the basic usage of the shutdown command

Usage: shutdown [-i -l -s -r -a] [-f] [-m \\computername] [-t xx] [-c "comment"] [-d up:xx:yy]

No args Display this message (same as -?)
-i Display GUI interface, must be the first option
-l Log off (cannot be used with -m option)
-s Shutdown the computer
-r Shutdown and restart the computer
-a Abort a system shutdown
-m \\computername Remote computer to shutdown/restart/abort
-t xx Set timeout for shutdown to xx seconds
-c "comment" Shutdown comment (maximum of 127 characters)
-f Forces running applications to close without warning
-d [u][p]:xx:yy The reason code for the shutdown
u is the user code
p is a planned shutdown code
xx is the major reason code (positive integer less than 256)
yy is the minor reason code (positive integer less than 65536)

Need Help With Picking Out An ASP.NET 2.0 Book

I decided to get back into some web development again, the last time I did this was in October 2001. I have developed in ASP, JSP and ColdFusion. Since I know some C# and have been using that on and off for the last 2 years with windows forms I decided to use ASP.NET 2.0. Another factor is that it is also a corporate standard at work.
So for someone like me which book would you recommend? Or maybe you have read an ASP.NET book that is just awesome either way let me know.

Don't worry I will never spend less than 51% of my time with SQL ;-)

ASP.NET AJAX PDF Cheat Sheets Available For Download

The ASP.NET AJAX PDF Cheat Sheets have been updated for the ASP.NET AJAX 1.0 final release. There are 6 sheets that you can download in PDF or XPS format. Get the sheets here: http://aspnetresources.com/blog/ms_ajax_cheat_sheets_batch2.aspx

Are You ready For Daylight Saving Time Changes In 2007

In August of 2005 the United States Congress passed the Energy Policy Act, which changes the dates of both the start and end of daylight saving time (DST). When this law goes into effect in 2007, DST will start three weeks earlier (2:00 A.M. on the second Sunday in March) and will end one week later (2:00 A.M. on the first Sunday in November) than what had traditionally occurred.

Read this article (preparing for daylight saving time changes in 2007) to see how you are affected

I hope that you are not running NT4

Here are some direct update links
Windows XP
Windows 2003 Server
Full List

Microsoft products affected by the DST legislation
Windows Client
Windows Server
Windows Mobile
Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services
Microsoft Exchange Server
Microsoft Office Outlook
Microsoft Dynamics CRM
Microsoft Biztalk Server
Microsoft Entourage

ASP.NET AJAX Version 1.0 Released

ASP.NET AJAX formerly known as Atlas has been released get it here http://ajax.asp.net/

Microsoft SQL Server Database Publishing Wizard 1.0,SharePoint Server 2007 SDK And Windows SharePoint Services v3 SDK Available For Download

Microsoft SQL Server Database Publishing Wizard 1.0
SQL Server Database Publishing Wizard enables the deployment of SQL Server databases into a hosted environment on either a SQL Server 2000 or 2005 server. It generates a single SQL script file which can be used to recreate a database (both schema and data) in a shared hosting environment where the only connectivity to a server is through a web-based control panel with a script execution window. If supported by the hosting service provider, the Database Publishing Wizard can also directly upload databases to servers located at the shared hosting provider.

Optionally, SQL Server Database Publishing Wizard can integrate directly into Visual Studio 2005 and/or Visual Web Developer 2005 allowing easy publishing of databases from within the development environment.



SharePoint Server 2007 SDK
The Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 Software Development Kit (SDK) contains conceptual overviews, programming tasks, code samples, references, and an Enterprise Content Management (ECM) starter kit to guide you in developing solutions based on Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007.

Windows SharePoint Services v3 SDK
The Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 software development kit (SDK) contains conceptual overviews, programming tasks, samples, and references to guide you in developing solutions based on Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0.

Check If Auto Update Statistics Is Enabled With DATABASEPROPERTY

How do you check if auto update statistics is enabled on your database? It is pretty easy to check that, you can use the DATABASEPROPERTY function
Run the following line of code

SELECT DATABASEPROPERTY('pubs','IsAutoUpdateStatistics') AS IsAutoUpdateStatistics

If 1 is returned(true) it is enabled, if 0 is returned(false) then it is not enabled

Now to save me (and you) time I have pasted a code block below with all the properties, just change the database name from pubs to your database name and run the code


DECLARE @v VARCHAR(55)
SELECT @v = 'pubs'

SELECT
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsAnsiNullDefault') AS IsAnsiNullDefault,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsAnsiNullsEnabled') AS IsAnsiNullsEnabled,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsAnsiWarningsEnabled') AS IsAnsiWarningsEnabled,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsAutoClose') AS IsAutoClose,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsAutoCreateStatistics') AS IsAutoCreateStatistics,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsAutoShrink') AS IsAutoShrink,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsAutoUpdateStatistics') AS IsAutoUpdateStatistics,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsBulkCopy') AS IsBulkCopy,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsDboOnly') AS IsDboOnly,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsDetached') AS IsDetached,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsEmergencyMode') AS IsEmergencyMode,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsInLoad') AS IsInLoad,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsInRecovery') AS IsInRecovery,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsAutoClose') AS IsAutoClose,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsInStandBy') AS IsInStandBy,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsLocalCursorsDefault') AS IsLocalCursorsDefault,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsNotRecovered') AS IsNotRecovered,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsNullConcat') AS IsNullConcat,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsOffline') AS IsOffline,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsQuotedIdentifiersEnabled') AS IsQuotedIdentifiersEnabled,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsReadOnly') AS IsReadOnly,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsRecursiveTriggersEnabled') AS IsRecursiveTriggersEnabled,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsShutDown') AS IsShutDown,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsSingleUser') AS IsSingleUser,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsSuspect') AS IsSuspect,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'IsTruncLog') AS IsTruncLog,
DATABASEPROPERTY(@v,'Version') AS Version

So what do all these values mean? Here is a list of all the properties

IsAnsiNullDefault
Database follows SQL-92 rules for allowing null values.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsAnsiNullsEnabled
All comparisons to a null evaluate to unknown.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsAnsiWarningsEnabled
Error or warning messages are issued when standard error conditions occur.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsAutoClose
Database shuts down cleanly and frees resources after the last user exits.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsAutoCreateStatistics
Existing statistics are automatically updated when the statistics become out-of-date because the data in the tables has changed.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsAutoShrink
Database files are candidates for automatic periodic shrinking.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsAutoUpdateStatistics
Auto update statistics database option is enabled.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsBulkCopy
Database allows nonlogged operations.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsCloseCursorsOnCommitEnabled
Cursors that are open when a transaction is committed are closed.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsDboOnly
Database is in DBO-only access mode.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsDetached
Database was detached by a detach operation.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsEmergencyMode
Emergency mode is enabled to allow suspect database to be usable.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsFulltextEnabled
Database is full-text enabled.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsInLoad
Database is loading.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsInRecovery
Database is recovering.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL1 = Invalid input

IsInStandBy
Database is online as read-only, with restore log allowed.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsLocalCursorsDefault
Cursor declarations default to LOCAL.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsNotRecovered
Database failed to recover.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsNullConcat
Null concatenation operand yields NULL.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsOffline
Database is offline.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsQuotedIdentifiersEnabled
Double quotation marks can be used on identifiers.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsReadOnly
Database is in a read-only access mode.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsRecursiveTriggersEnabled
Recursive firing of triggers is enabled.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsShutDown
Database encountered a problem at startup.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL1 = Invalid input

IsSingleUser
Database is in single-user access mode.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsSuspect
Database is suspect.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

IsTruncLog
Database truncates its logon checkpoints.
1 = TRUE
0 = FALSE
NULL = Invalid input

Version
Internal version number of the Microsoft® SQL Server™ code

SQL Server Doesn't Like Cheaters

I emailed a joke(see below) to some friends and one of them replied: "So what you're saying is that I should take a mistress?"

So that got me thinking, what would SQL say about this? Is mistress equal to mistrust. Well according to SQL server it is, run this in Query Analyzer

SELECT SOUNDEX('mistress'),SOUNDEX('mistrust'),DIFFERENCE('mistress','mistrust')

And here is the joke:

Two Ladies talking in heaven

1st woman: Hi! My name is Wanda.

2nd woman: Hi! I'm Sylvia. How'd you die?

1st woman: I Froze to Death.

2nd woman: How Horrible!

1st woman: It wasn't so bad. After I quit shaking from the cold, I
began to get warm & sleepy, and finally died a peaceful death. What
about you?

2nd woman: I died of a massive heart attack. I suspected that my
husband was cheating, so I came home early to catch him in the act.
But instead, I found him all by himself in the den watching TV.

1st woman: So, what happened?

2nd woman: I was so sure there was another woman there somewhere that I started running all over the house looking. I ran up into the attic and searched, and down into the basement. Then I went through every closet and checked under all the beds. I kept this up until I had looked everywhere,and finally I became so exhausted that I just keeled over with a heart attack and died.

1st woman: Too bad you didn't look in the freezer---we'd both
still be alive.


So what is the point of this all? Well it gives you a reason to run those barely used functions like SOUNDEX and DIFFERENCE ;>

A Witchbrew Of SQL Server News And Interesting Links

Since I have nothing interesting or fascinating to say I decided to put some links up to some posts of people who do have something interesting to say.
We will start with Hugo Kornelis who has two posts about why clustered index ordering is not guaranteed in SQL Server. The first article can be found here: http://sqlblog.com/blogs/hugo_kornelis/archive/2006/12/31/Beatles-vs-Stones.aspx
And the second article that explains the behaviour can be found here: Beatles vs Stones Explanation

Developer.com has announced their Database Tool or Add-in winner and the winner is......SQL Server 2005. You can read the whole article here http://www.developer.com/db/article.php/10920_3653956_1

Euan Garden has a post telling us that SQL Server Compact Edition launches (finally)

Tim O'Reilly posted his latest State of the Computer Book Market article and SQL server is still going strong. You can fnd that article here: State of the Computer Book Market, Q4 06, Part 1, Overall Market Trend

And we will end with Internet Maverick Marc Cuban who wrote an interesting article titled Why I Don't Wear a Suit and Can't Figure Out Why Anyone Does !
I don't wear a suit either, I actually wear jeans and sneakers most of the time. When i used to work in Silicon Alley (Broadway and 21st street in New York City) I actually came to work in shorts in the summer but then again what do you expect when you have 2 lizards and a cat roaming around the office?