The SQL Sentry forum for SQL Statement Tuning
Have you ever looked at our community site specifically dedicated to helping users tune their SQL queries, http://answers.SQLPerformance.com?
You can easily upload an execution plan directly from our free Plan Explorer tool or from good ol’ SQL Server Management Studio. Once uploaded, our internal team and forum members will provide plenty of tips and input on how to improve the plan and/or explain what the plan is actually doing. The renown SQL execution plan expert, Paul White (b|t), is the moderator of the site. But there are many other experts like our CEO, Greg Gonzalez (b | t), and Aaron Bertrand (b|t) on hand to provide additional insight. I pipe up from time to time as well.
Call to action – start posting your own execution plans, reading about the issues in other plans, and take part in the conversation!
You might not think of a discussion-based website as part of a product. But in this case, it truly is an integrated part of our Plan Explorer tools. You can upload an execution plan directly from our free Plan Explorer tool with a single click or you can use good ol’ SQL Server Management Studio to save and then manually upload your execution plan.
Fancy yourself as a SQL expert? Then help tune this monster query!
Take a look at this most recent posting that was our 2015 SQL Cruise Hairy Execution Plan winner at https://answers.sqlperformance.com/questions/2595/sqlcruise-carribean-2015-hairy-execution-plan-winn.html. I’m not sure if you can read the small print in the plan steps below, but those are TRILLIONS of records moving between plan operator steps!
Now, we don’t usually take pride in a really bad SQL query, but the entries in the Hairy Execution Plan contest are an exception to the rule. These are queries that are so horrific, they’re like a car wreck on the highway – you have to slow down to examine them in greater detail, and then breath a sigh of relief that it’s not your job to fix them. 🙂
Here are a couple early examples of what you can expect at Answers.SQLPerformance.com:
Paul White (b| t) gives a questioner a comprehensive analysis of a difficult execution plan. It’s well worth a read if for no other reason than to see in action Paul’s mastery of these difficult problems. It’s literally free consulting of the highest caliber!
How to tune a slow query using spatial indexes
Aaron and Bob Beauchemin (b|t) of SQLSkills.com give pointers on how to improve this long-running query which uses spatial indexes and data types.
Paul White (b| t) gives a highly-detailed exposition on how SQL Server uses the lazy spool operation in this query to achieve better performance. (Image above is from this entry).
Plan Explorer is so Free, We don’t even ask for an email address!
If you’re a user of Plan Explorer but are not familiar with http://answers.sqlperformance.com, be sure to read Aaron Bertrand’s post about these new features at http://www.sqlperformance.com/2013/02/t-sql-queries/plan-explorer-upload-feature.
And, if you haven’t already, download a copy of the free or PRO version of Plan Explorer at https://www.sqlsentry.com/products/plan-explorer/sql-server-query-view.
Do you have a Plan Explorer story to share? I’d love to hear it.
-Kev
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