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Microsoft Streamlined Certification Paths

Microsoft is streamlining its expert-level certifications to provide more flexibility and a wider array of starting points towards certification. There will be Four new Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert (MCSE) certifications and One Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer (MCSD) certification. You will first need to earn a qualifying Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate…



October – IndyPass

Identifying and Fixing Parameter Sniffing (Tuesday October 18th, 2016 – 6:00 pm) Presenter: Brent Ozar from Brent Ozar Unlimited You swear nothing changed – but suddenly your SQL Server has ground to a halt. Queries are slow across the board. You restart the server, rebuild indexes, or update statistics, and…


Get Started with Query Store

One of the newest features that everyone is talking about with Azure SQL Database or SQL Server 2016 is the Query Store which provides a mechanism of capturing query performance over time and persisting it with the database. I’m still trying to figure it out myself, but a great place to start is from…


MCSA: Office 365

Seems like I like to take my certifications backwards, but I passed my 70-347 exam on Office 365 Services today. Going to take a day or two off and then start studying for the 70-346 exam to complete the MCSA on Office 365. It is really nice to be able…


Ignite Online Sessions

There were so many great session at Microsoft Ignite that I could not attend them all. Fortunately, we can catch all the videos online.  One session I did attend that I want to see again is the Exchange Online vs Exchange On-Premises debate.


MVP: Data Platform

I am deeply honored and extremely humbled to be joining the MVP community. This is not something you earn on your own and there are so many people to thank, which I will do individually when I see them. It is always nice to know that my passion for learning…


Ignite Attendee Celebration

Now that was a great party at Centennial Park. I had a nice view from atop the Ferris Wheel looking down on 23,000 of my closest techie friends. Not going to lie, I did eat two turkey legs. I mostly sat back and listened to the live band and enjoyed…


Ignite Hands On Learning Labs

It’s been a great week working in the Hands-on Labs Learning area. I even worked on a few labs myself. You can take a tour of the Lab area here. We have plenty of seats available so come on down to see us. Remember you can access the labs for 6…


The 2016 Krewe Photo

Every year, The Krewe gets together at noon on Tuesday in front of the New Horizons booth for our annual picture. And I have no idea why I am looking in a different direction than everyone else. New this year at the Ignite conference were the BeamBots, for people who…