SQLBits

Six days before the Last Minute price band kick in

MartinBell — Sat, 10 Sep 2011 11:00:00 GMT

There are now only 18 days to go before SQLBits 9 "Query Across the Mersey" kicks off at the Adelphi Hotel in Liverpool.

This is a quick reminder that you have until midnight on the 16th September to take advantage of the Standard price, after that time the price wil increase to the more expensive Last Minute price band.

Are you Packt for SQLBits?

MartinBell — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 21:06:00 GMT

It’s SQLBits o’clock!!! We are all frenetically busy making sure everything is right for the biggest SQLBits event we’ve organised. Over 900 people have registered for SQLBits 8 which is fantastic and we’re looking forward to seeing you all.

We’ve also managed an additional treat for you all this time around. Keep an eye out for a great offer in your SQLBits delegate bag from our friends at Packt Publishing. Packt have kindly offered every single delegate a complete 6 month subscription to their new online library of titles covering everything from AJAX to Web Services. The SQL Server section is well stocked with titles including Chris Webb’s “Expert Cube development with Microsoft SQL Server Analysis Services 2008”. Chris co-authored this book with fellow experts Marco Russo and Alberto Ferrari who will be joining us as speakers at SQLBits for the first time.

We think that a free 6 month subscription to this service is a great opportunity for all delegates so we’d urge you to make the most of this opportunity.

Packt have also kindly given us plenty of hard copies to give away as session prizes so make sure come to sessions armed with questions!

Here’s a selection of the books available as prizes

Learning SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services

Expert Cube Development with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services

Microsoft SQL Azure Enterprise Application Development

Microsoft SQL Server 2008 High Availability

We also have several copies of Applied Architecture Patterns on the Microsoft Platform which was co-authored by the UK’s first ever SQL CAT team member, Ewan Fairweather. Ewan will be hanging out at the Microsoft and SQL CAT stand so make sure you say hi to him.

However, don’t worry if you don’t win one – you will be able to access all of these titles using your new subscription to Packtlib.

See you beside the seaside…

SQLBits

SQLBits 8 is full

MartinBell — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 20:00:00 GMT

We have reached the limit for the number of delegates we can safely hold at the venue, so we can not take any new registrations.

To stop new registrations we have added a code that will mean you can not complete the registration process.

There are some more places available on the SQLBits training days

MartinBell — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 23:33:00 GMT

We’ve moved a few things around which has freed up some places on the Performance Monitoring and the Optimising BI Training Days at SQLBits 8.

SQL Server Performance Monitoring and Troubleshooting with Klaus Aschenbrenner

It's Monday, 10:30am. You are just receiving an email that informs you that your SQL Server has enormous performance problems! What can you do? How can you identify the problem and resolve it fast? Which tools provides you SQL Server for this task? In this workshop you will see you can do effective performance monitoring and troubleshooting with SQL Server. You will learn how to identify performance bottlenecks with tools and information provided by SQL Server and how to resolve the identified performance bottlenecks.Click To Register

Optimising Microsoft Business Intelligence with Thomas Kejser

Thinking about building a huge, TB sized cube? Loading millions of rows / second into your database? Maybe you just want to make your BI system run faster? In this pre-con session I will talk you through some interesting, high scale customer scenarios and the lessons learned from them. We will dig into both SSAS and SSIS, and show you how to get the most performance out of these products. Click To Register

SQLBits Insight - bring your boss!

MartinBell — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 10:00:00 GMT

SQLBits have taken pity on your boss! They are usually the ones left behind when all the SQL guys truck off to the largest SQL Server conference in Europe. They've listened to your praise of the high quality and unprecedented depth of the content delivered by the internationally renowned speakers and signed of the expenses for you to attend.

SQLBits Insight is now the chance for them to see for themselves what a great event SQLBits is. It's a day of sessions aimed at CIOs, architects and other technical decision makers who are interested in finding out what's new in the world of SQL Server and how it can benefit their businesses, and it will be taking place on Thursday 7th April at the Grand Hotel in Brighton, on the first day of SQLBits.

Speakers include Mark Souza, General Manager for SQL Server at Microsoft; Guy Lucchi, CTO of CSC; and IT industry legend Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple and Chief Scientist of Fusion-io. The agenda will cover hot topics such as the SQL Server Private Cloud infrastructure, handling multi-terabyte BI requirements with SQL Server Parallel Data Warehouse, and new developments in storage technology. There will also be a panel discussion featuring all the speakers and opportunities to network at an evening drinks reception hosted by our platinum sponsor, Fusion-io. For more details and to register, go to http://insight.sqlbits.com/

We'd like to point out that if you're the kind of person who normally goes to SQLBits, SQLBits Insight may not be your cup of tea - it's aimed at managers and decision makers and not the geeks.

We would really appreciate it if you could spread the word to any senior IT managers you may know who might be interested within your organisation or amongst your customers. It's a new event and we'd love to get your help to make it a success!

SQLBits By the Seaside Agenda Published

MartinBell — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 11:47:00 GMT

We have now published the agendas for both Friday and Saturday at http://sqlbits.com/information/agenda.aspx

The default page will display the Friday agenda, to see Saturday change the Conference Day drop down list.

You may notice that we have put added additional session in Kings East from 10:50 onwards. This means you have 6 sessions to choose from rather than the normal 5. We've also added some early sessions at 08:10 on Sturday for people staying overnight or arriving early and want to get the extra session in.

In addition to all these extra sessions we have introduced lightning talks, this allows new speakers to speak for 5 minutes on something they are passionate about without the need to prepare a whole hour long session.

If you aren’t registered yet you need to do so quick as we are quickly running out of places remember the early bird prices end at midnight on the 11th March 2011.

What are the "Crappy Code Games"

MartinBell — Mon, 14 Feb 2011 18:02:00 GMT

Simon has compiled a quick FAQ on what the "Crappy Code Games" are.

You can find it at http://sqlblogcasts.com/blogs/simons/archive/2011/02/14/what-are-the-crappy-code-games-what-are-the-prizes.aspx

SQLBits 8 - Voting Closing

MartinBell — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 22:30:00 GMT

We will be closing voting for SQLBits 8 on Friday 11th February, so if you want to have make sure your referred session are on the agenda for Saturday, login and vote now!

Platinum sponsor Fusion-IO bring Steve Wozniak and the 'The Crappy Code Games' to SQLBits

MartinBell — Mon, 07 Feb 2011 11:34:00 GMT

Today we announced some super-exciting news! A tie-up with our platinum sponsor, Fusion-io. Together we'll be running a series of events called "The Crappy Code Games" where SQL Server developers will compete to write the worst-performing code and win some very cool prizes including:

Gold: A hands-on, high performance flying day for two at Ultimate High plus Fusion-io flight jackets
Silver: One day racing experience at Palmer Sports where you will drive seven different high performance cars
Bronze: Pure Tech Racing 10 person package at PTR’s F1 racing facility includes FI tees, food and drinks.

…plus iPods, Windows Mobile phones, X-box 360s, t-shirts and much more.

There will be two qualifying events in Manchester on March 17^th and London on March 31^st, and the third qualifier as well as the grand finale will be held in the evening of Thursday April 7th at SQLBits. And if that isn’t cool enough, Fusion-io's Chief Scientist Steve Wozniak (yes, that Steve Wozniak, tech industry legend and co-founder of Apple) will be on hand in Brighton to hand out the prizes! If you'd like to take part you'll need to register, and since places are limited we recommend you do so right away. For more details and to register, go to http://www.crappycodegames.com/

SQLBits 8 Session Voting Opened

MartinBell — Sat, 05 Feb 2011 23:06:00 GMT

What do you want to learn about at SQLBits 8?

We've opened voting on the SQLBits website, so you can help us by choosing the sessions you'd like to see on our free Community Day on Saturday 9th April We have something for everyone, at all levels of ability of: DBAs, BI Consultants, Developers and the purely curious.

Head over to http://sqlbits.com/information/PublicSessions.aspx and, assuming you're logged on to the site, you'll be able to pick your ten prefered sessions.

Don't forget to register for the event if you haven't already, Over 329 people have signed up so we're filling up fast. Don't miss out and this chance to improve your skills.