This newsletter tackles three of what I'd consider to be the really "big" issues in database development – at least those that cause developers much pain (and subsequently the users, if they are not done properly).
- Security: establishing fine-grained control over database access via users, roles, permissions and so on and making sure all user can do what they need to do and (critically) no more.
- Error handling: notoriously weak in SQL 2000 but improved in SQL 2005 to the point where you can actually exert some real control over how errors are dealt with
- Testing and Revision Control: establishing the necessary test environments and carefully controlling the release through each stage.
If you were to compile a list of your top five pain points, would these three be on it? What else would be on there? I'd really like to hear your feedback on these three issues – especially any particular tricks and techniques you have to make sure you get them right. Join the forum debate. Simple-Talk goodie bags will be offered to the best contributions.
On a related note, I never quite realized the strict controls that were placed on some of the different testing environments, until I read this tale of a "quirky" bug that only occurred in a bank's UAT environment! The SQL Server cursor debate is still swinging to and fro. If you've got a scenario where you feel a cursor is the best or only approach, why not post it in the article comments – Robyn Page will come up with a set-based alternative solution, if she can.
Thanks to all who entered the jargon-busting competition. It was difficult to choose the winners, but for the passion invested in his dislike of "dynamic solutions" and for picking on one of my personal bugbears ("don't boil the ocean"), I award a book each to "AreEyeEkks" and "KirkB", respectively. Runner-up goodie bag winners are announced in the link above.
At Simple-Talk we're always looking to provide useful tools, workbenches, scripts and so on. For this newsletter's competition, I invite you to submit nominations for our "most useful user-defined function" competition. If there is a routine you wish someone would "invent" for you – something to remove some of the pain from a painstaking task - then let us know! We'll put our team of Simple-Talk experts on the case and see what we can come up with! Best nominations will receive a prize – visit our forum and submit your tool nominations!
In case you missed it, I leave you with a shameless plug for my recent Data Mining Dream guest editorial on Database Daily.
Cheers,
Tony.
Tony Davis
Simple-Talk editor-in-chief
editor@simple-talk.com
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