Maintenance

Quick Way to Check Which is the Active Node in a Failover Clustered Instance

If you have a SQL Server failover clustered instance, often you'll want to know which server is acting as the active node. This is easy since you can just check in Windows Cluster Failover Manager which node is the current owner. But what if you have multiple clusters and you want to check them all?… Continue reading Quick Way to Check Which is the Active Node in a Failover Clustered Instance

SQL Server Management Studio

How to Silently Install SQL Server Management Studio

If you find that you're installing SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS) often or on many servers, you might find that installing it silently, a.k.a. unattended, is more suitable than installing it through the usual method using the install wizard. First, you can download the latest SSMS installer from Microsoft's SSMS download page, or from this… Continue reading How to Silently Install SQL Server Management Studio

Server Configuration

Configure Database Mail and Test it – All using T-SQL

When configuring a new SQL Server instance, you probably want to configure Database Mail. As with all your post install configuration changes, it's better to do it using a script to save yourself a whole heap of time while ensuring all your SQL Server instances are standardised and consistent. Unfortunately it's not as easy to… Continue reading Configure Database Mail and Test it – All using T-SQL