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The Heroes {Community} Launch for SQL Server 2008 was the event organized for the May 2008 SS SLUG meeting. The event comprised of three sessions on SQL Server 2008 by the three SQL Server MVPs of Sri Lanka. Attendance for the launch event was on a first mailed-first served basis, since we had only limited seats. We had loads of giveaways and naturally; a load of prize winners. (See photo gallery)
The sessions of the evening were:
An overview and discussion of the new features of SQL Server 2008 from various perspectives
A look at the new data types provided with SQL Server 2008
A session on how T-SQL has been enhanced in SQL Server 2008
Content from the event:
 
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The first year anniversary meeting of the SS SLUG was held on the 23rd of April, but did not go according to plan. Both the scheduled sessions along with the special segment on a selected redgate product were cancelled due to very unavoidable circumstances. It was upto MVP Dinesh Priyankara to come up with something at very short notice... and come up he did!
The meeting kicked off with a Q&A session by MVP Dinesh Priyankara on various SQL Server related topics. Preethi Kulasingham also stepped in to give further demos on the session he handled in the previous SS SLUG meeting, regarding stored procedure performance.
The session was an instant hit with the audience, which inspired Dinesh to compile an article of Q&As: Questionnaire I 
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The 12th consecutive meeting of the SS SLUG happened on the 19th of March at Microsoft Sri Lanka from 1800hrs onwards. The two (excellent) sessions of the day were:
- Performance Optimization of Stored Procedures by Preethiviraj Kulasingham
This session took an in-depth look at how to optimize the performance of a stored procedure.
- Know It Before Doing It: Database Creation by Dinesh Priyankara (MVP - SQL Server)
The Know It Before Doing It series is focussed on giving the audience knowledge on specific subjects which they should know before implementing it. This month's session was all about database creation.
Content from the session:
 
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The 11th consecutive meeting of the SS SLUG was held at the Microsoft Training Room on Thursday the 21st of February, since the usual third Wednesday was a public holiday. The day's sessions were on the topics of 'embedded' and 'data warehousing'. We also had the bi-monthly spotlight on a selected Red Gate.
The Sessions:
- SQL Server Compact by Fiqri Ismail (MVP - ASP.NET)
Microsoft SQL Server Compact Edition is a mobile database solution designed for developers who target Microsoft Windows mobile-based devices. MVP Fiqri Ismail took the audience on an insightful journey of this technology.
- Inmon vs. Kimball: The Great Debate by Gogula Aryalingam (MVP - SQL Server)
Bill Inmon and Ralph Kimball are considered the pioneers of Data warehousing. Each of their schools of thought are religiously followed and heatedly debated. This session took a novices' look at their concepts and ideas, and how they affect Data Warehousing.
- Red Gate SQL Multi Script by Dinesh Priyankara (MVP - SQL Server)
Designed to speed up database administration for DBAs and database developers, SQL Multi Script enables fast and easy execution of multiple scripts against multiple SQL Servers.
Photographs from the session can be accessed here: Photo Album
while, Content used at the session can be downloaded from here: Downloads
 
Prizes sponsored by SQL Server Universe.com and Red Gate Software. 
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The first meeting of the year and the 10th consecutive meeting of the SS SLUG was held at the Microsoft Training Room on the 16th of January at 1800hrs. The sessions from this meeting were themed on Database Administration.
The Sessions:
- Log Shipping with SQL Server 2005 by Dinesh Priyankara (MVP)
The session looked at the Log Shipping feature of SQL Server 2005 which has been enhanced a lot more mainly providing disaster recovery and non-obligatory high availability.
- Recovering database using proper Backup/Restore Strategy by Preethiviraj Kulasingham
The session dealt with the new dataase recovery features available with SQL Server 2005. IT also included new methods of backups and more specific backup/restore operations including restoration of a corrupted page, restoring the database at a specific date/time or transaction mark and using many more.
As usual there were several prizes up for grabs sponsored by Red Gate Software and Microsoft Sri Lanka. Refreshments were provided by Microsoft Sri Lanka.
 
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The 9th meeting of the SS SLUG took place on Dec-19-2007, at the Microsoft Sri Lanka Training Room (Yes, we were able to switch locations just before the meeting). Since it is Christmas, we decided on distributing extra prizes than before - So we doubled the number and added a few more! Below are the sessions that were held:
The Sessions:
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An Introduction on SQL Server 2005 Service Broker by Gogula Aryalingam
Service Broker provides queuing and reliable messaging for SQL Server. Using this technology developers can build asynchronous applications that are used by independent components to accomplish tasks. Service Broker is a component of the SQL Server 2005 Database Engine. The session gave an introductory tour of this new technology, including a couple of demos on creating Service Broker functionality.
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red-gate's SQL Data Compare by Dinesh Asanka
SQL Data Compare is used for automating data migrations, analyzing corrupted data, restoring row-level data from backups and compiling audit trails of missing or changed data. It is the industry standard tool for comparing and synchronizing the contents of two databases because it's very reliable and also very fast.
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SQL Pop Quiz
14 questions to the audience on topics previously covered in SS SLUG meetings.
It was like Santa without Santa where the giveaways were concerned. 9 prize winners... Prizes sponsored by Redgate Software, eCollege and SQLServerUniverse.com including mugs, pen drives and T-shirts... Nearly everyone was a winner, so to speak. Microsoft - Sri Lanka supported by letting us use their training room for the meeting.
 
December 21, 2007
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The November 2007 meeting of the SS SLUG, which incidently is the 8th consecutive meeting; got through on the 21st of November 2007 with sessions by the two Dinesh's.
The Sessions:
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Data Cleansing in SQL Server Integration Services by Dinesh Asanka
Data cleansing is the act of detecting and correcting or removing corrupt or inaccurate records from a record set. This session looked at how you can use SQL Server 2005 Integration Services to perform data cleansing.
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Introduction to Visual Studio 2005 Team Edition for Database Professionals by Dinesh Priyankara
Visual Studio 2005 Team Edition for Database Professionals (a.k.a. Data Dude) gives database professionals more control and flexibility in working with SQL Server. It contains a mass of features aimed at making a database guy's work much more simple and enjoyable. This session gave an introduction on this great product, its featues and more.
Several prizes were won by the attendees including T-Shirts, USB drives and more. A special gift was also presented to Buddhika Kalupahana as he was the 200th registered user on SQLServerUniverse.com.
 
November 21, 2007
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The SS SLUG met for the 7th consecutive time on the 17th of October, 2007. As customary we conducted two sessions and the special bimonthly session on a selected red-gate product. The sessions were as follows:
- Declarative Management Framework by Gogula Aryalingam: This session introduced the Declarative Management Framework to be released with SQL Server 2008. The DMF is a framework for administrators to manage SQL Server instances and objects using policies, much like what is used in Windows. Based on SQL Server "Katmai", this session introduced to the audience the concepts and how-tos of this feature
- Introduction to SQL Server 2005 Data Mining by Dinesh Priyankara: This session introduced to the audience the Data Mining capabilities of SQL Server 2005 Analysis Services. It brought to the participants the different data mining models and how and where they could be used in areas such as forecasting, trend analysis etc.
- red-gate SQL Compare by Dinesh Asanka: This month's selected red-gate product was SQL Compare. SQL Compare is the industry-standard tool for comparing and synchronizing SQL Server database schemas. It's used by over 150,000 developers, DBAs and test engineers worldwide because it's easy to use, it's fast, and it saves time.
Each session ended with a Q&A session where the participants were given chances to win from a set of fantastic and valuable gift items, including a 1GB USB drive, T-shirts, a mug and our star prize: a red-gate SQLCompare Pro License worth US$595!
 
October 18, 2007
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The September '07 edition of the user group meeting got underway with the Open Tech Forum. Despite the low number of attendees, several problems/issues submitted by members were discussed with enthusiasm. The session ended with a SQL Quiz where several prizes were given away. The second session, concerning SQL Server 2008 Management Framework had to be put off to the next meeting due to a technical situation that we tried best to avoid.
September 21, 2007
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The August 2007 meeting of the SS SLUG happened on the 15th of August, amid some new attendees and sans some regular ones.
Sessions conducted:
Session Summary:
The discussion on Table Partitioning saw Preethi discussing the benefits, pros & cons and the how-to's of table partitioning among other things. The discussion on the UDM, had Gogula discussing on how the UDM feature of SSAS enables the bringing forth of OLAP to the masses and the way it has changed reporting and analysis.
  
August 21, 2007
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The 4th meeting of the SS SLUG got through on the 18th of July at Microsoft Sri Lanka. This time we had two excellent sessions in the following:
Sessions conducted:
- SSIS Custom Component Development by Chamindu Munasinghe
- Implementing Transactions by Dinesh Priyankara
Session Summary
The discussion on SSIS Custom Component Development was quite invaluable and expertly shared by Chamindu without too much in-depth details, since most in the audience were new to SSIS, let alone SSIS Component Development.
The topic touched upon by Dinesh was something most of us know, yet do not know much about - Transactions. Of course most of us know how to BEGIN and COMMIT a transaction, but not most of us know the consequences of concurrency and how SQL Server performs locking etc.
To spice up the evening a little, we also had a flash card quiz with a tricky little question, and one of the lucky guys who answered the question correctly, received the star prize of the evening.
 
July 20, 2007
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The June '07 Meeting of the SS SLUG went off quite well, despite the lesser number of attendees. (Probably because of the new location that Microsoft Sri Lanka has moved to.) This month's discussions were on the topics of data warehousing and reporting.
Discussions:
The first discussion was DW - How (A straightforward How-to on desiging a data warehouse) by Gogula Aryalingam, which looked at a simple approach on building your first data warehouse along with tips and some best practices. The second session was SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services by Joy Rathnayake who discussed the architecture and concepts involved in Reporting Services, and how to create reports using Report Builder.
There was also a special session on Red Gate's SQL Backup©, a backup utilty for SQL Server conducted by Dinesh Priyankara.
 
June 26, 2007
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The second meeting of the SS SLUG happened on the 16th of May. This meeting saw two discussions namely Replication in SQL Server 2005 conducted by Dinesh Asanka and Overseeing Indexes conducted by Dinesh Priyankara. Unfortunately due to unavoidable situations as those who at the meeting would've known we could not conduct the special segment on the Red Gate product, SQL Refactor. But do not be disheartened, we will conduct this session in the next meeting and will make sure that those little anomalies would be kept at a minimum...
Apart from that the sessions were conducted with the usual gung-ho. Questions were asked, questions were answered and prizes were won. We also saw an increase in the number of participants which was quite a heart warmer.
We would be very happy if you guys would take the time and let us know how you felt about the Month of May Meeting, by putting your comments and votes here.
Thank you everyone for your support and just being there!
 
May 18, 2007
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The Big Bang (the inaugural meeting of the SQL Server Sri Lanka User Group) finally happened on the 5th of April 2007, with nearly 27 attendees. (We unfortunately lost the actual count along with the Excel file we used for the count taking).
Discussions held:
- Implementing ETL Solutions with SSIS by Dinesh Priyankara
- A Simple BI Case by Gogula Aryalingam
Thanks guys, for making it happen!
April 10, 2007 
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