TSQL Tue 64: Calling All Tuners and Gear Heads

It is month 64 of Adam Machanic’s monthly blog party known as TSQL Tuesday.  I’m very honored to be hosting this month.  Let’s get to it.  This is your official invite to the SQL Server Performance Grand National.  I want posts tackling “focused” performance tuning.

By “focused” I mean tackle something head on; the more secret sauce, tricks, code samples, operator costs, or demonstrable metrics against a defined problem the better.  This month is for the gear heads.  Don’t wimp out by avoiding hints, plans, or guides.  General practice is for wusses.  Write something that’ll either go BIG or flame out half-way down the track.  Drag racers aren’t grocery getters.  If your post begins with the phrase… should be implemented with caution – you’re doing it right.  If you’re an SSIS, SSDT, SSRS person – we’ve got a funny car division for you too.  Tell us edge cases where you’ve make your stuff scream.

Need some ideas?

• Tackle a non set based problem you’ve improved in the wild
• Discuss hardware settings or IO – anyone using a flash array?
• Got a solution to a niche wait type?
• Tackle indexing edges (good or bad)
• Columnstore !!!
• Hash buckets !!!
• Parallelism !!!
• Break down and improve a peculiar query plan operator

Remember the rules?  Your post must go live on Tuesday March 10th between 00:01 and 23:59 hours.  Once you’re post has gone up, drop a comment with a link on this page back to your post.  Finally, your post should contain the original TSQL Tuesday logo above and it should link back to here.

Ok, got your launch control settings ready?  I’m looking for engine noise that’ll scare children.  I want code blocks that’ll do a quarter mile in under nine seconds.  I want the irresistible smell of top fuel, rubber, nitrous, and IOPS in the air.

GO!!

Image credits: Super Charger used under Creative Commons – https://www.flickr.com/photos/k-ribou/8367209091