Category: Architecture

Microsoft Fabric and SQL Community Conference 2026, the Barcelona edition

Last week was filled with talks about SQL Server and Fabric. A large portion of the community travelled to Barcelona to learn from community leaders and Microsoft on their favourite topics. I'll take you through my personal experiences and highlights. Day 0: the MVP day On Monday, you have three options, depending on your relationship … Continue reading Microsoft Fabric and SQL Community Conference 2026, the Barcelona edition →

Azure: Check your data platforms resiliency

Wait, what? Resiliency? Against what? Well. The cloud sounds like an amazing, magical place without limits. The truth is, it isn't. Maybe you've seen the funny T-shirts with the text "the cloud is just someone else's computer". And that's true. Instead of building and maintaining your own data centre, you're hiring a global corporation to … Continue reading Azure: Check your data platforms resiliency →

Power BI: the tale of migrating a report between two tenants

Before I get started, yes, I'm going to write about Power BI. If you're not familiar with my work, the long and short of it is that I tend to keep a healthy distance from anything involving semantic models and reports. Why? In one word, pie charts. Sorry if that triggered you. But every now … Continue reading Power BI: the tale of migrating a report between two tenants →

Fabric Copy Job: Find the staging!

This week, I worked for a client using the following setup. Setup They're using SQL Server databases to store their OLTP data. They use a variety of options to authenticate. Fabric isn't using private links or anything; it connects to the data through the on-premises data gateway. Inside Fabric, we chose the Copy Job activity … Continue reading Fabric Copy Job: Find the staging! →

250 blog posts

Last week, I noticed that I published my 250th blog post. I'm not sure if it's something to celebrate (I'm not really someone who celebrates things), but it is an extra reason to write a new post. Endurance I started writing in 2018 after Brent Ozar suggested I do this. He also told me that … Continue reading 250 blog posts →

DP-800 Exam Experiences

Earlier this year, Microsoft released a new certification that combines AI and SQL Server knowledge: the DP-800: Developing AI-Enabled Database Solutions. As I still deeply care about SQL Server and am convinced it has a very central place in any data architecture (cloud or on-premises), this one sparked a lot of interest. Today, I took … Continue reading DP-800 Exam Experiences →

Attending a Level 400 training at Microsoft.

This week, I was invited to the Microsoft office in London. The reason was a Level 400 training for Microsoft partners on Real-Time Intelligence. As I've been working with RTI on a large project for the last year, it felt natural to join this training. My objectives were not listed, but I wanted to see … Continue reading Attending a Level 400 training at Microsoft. →

DP-700 training: Choose between query acceleration for OneLake shortcuts and standard OneLake shortcuts in Real-Time Intelligence

A three-line title that promises a lot! So let's try to simplify this a bit. In essence, this blog will cover how to make OneLake data quicker in an Eventhouse using shortcuts. The process, at a high level, is quite simple. In your eventhouse, create a shortcut to a Lakehouse, for instance. Enable query acceleration, … Continue reading DP-700 training: Choose between query acceleration for OneLake shortcuts and standard OneLake shortcuts in Real-Time Intelligence →

T-SQL Tuesday #199: Back to on-prem?

This month, Koen Verbeeck invites the blogging community to write about their thoughts on returning to on-premises. What could be struggles, things we have to re-learn, etcetera. When I read the invite, it immediately sparked inspiration, because there are increasing rumours around cloud exits. People musing about 'what if'. Some clients reference these questions, but … Continue reading T-SQL Tuesday #199: Back to on-prem? →

DP-800: First Microsoft Learn experiences

The DP-800 training is new and was released to GA a few weeks ago. It now sits in the same family as DP-600 (Data Analytics using Microsoft Fabric), 700 (Data Engineering using Microsoft Fabric) and 750 (Data Engineering using Databricks). The full name of this training is "Develop AI-Enabled Database Solutions". This one sparked my … Continue reading DP-800: First Microsoft Learn experiences →