January Review

The first month of 2012 was fairly busy. 

A lot of it was SQL Server work.  I worked on a script to merge a couple of databases together, another smaller SQL script to copy some data within the same database, and wrote a stored procedure and SSRS report for a management system.

Also did some work on a Maximo / Great Plains Dynamics interface, programming a means to let the user edit some of the data before it was copied over.

The plan for February was to work on a new project for a forestry client.  That's still the plan, but in the first three days of the month, four different clients sent me requests as well.  It's going to be a busy month.

Comment Spam

I've had this blog up for less than a month and I've gotten a couple comments on my original post.  I welcome comments, but these are obviously spam, complete with a link to another company's web site.

They're kind of funny as it's obvious they were written by someone with a poor grasp of the English language.  Check this one out:

Computer is world most used device of technologies. It provide well services in different way that known as IT solution work. It is one of the most effective device of technologies.

It's like they picked a bunch of keywords and randomly put them into a sentence without any regard to it making sense.

Use T-SQL to restore a database

Way quicker than using SQL Server Management Studio, especially if you have to repeat often.

RESTORE DATABASE [Database Name]
FROM DISK 'c:\data\client\project\backupfile.bak'
WITH FILE = 1

Happy New Year!

Hope everyone has a happy and prosperous 2012.

2011 was a good year for LCS.  I kept fairly busy, mostly through one mining client, but also various small jobs for other clients.  But it wasn't so busy I felt overwhelmed.  I like it when my workload is that nice happy medium between not enough and too much.

January and February look like they're going to be pretty busy, so time to get at it...

SQL Server Restore - Filestream feature is disabled

I was trying to restore a database in SQL Server 2008 and got the error: Restore failed... FILESTREAM feature is disabled.  It was annoying because I was able to restore another database no problem, but this particular one I couldn't restore.

After much Googling, I figured out how to enable the file stream.  There are two steps:

1. Open SQL Configuration Manager, click on SQL Server Services on the left hand pane, and then right-click SQL Server on the right hand pane.  Select properties.  On the FILESTREAM tab, check off all three options.  OK out of the dialog and restart SQL Server. (Right-click and select restart).
2. Run the following in SQL Management Studio:

EXEC sp_configure filestream_access_level, 2

RECONFIGURE

After that, I was able to restore the database.

Web Templates

I'm always on the lookout for good web templates.  A lot of the ones on the Internet I've found to be either really primative (the free ones), or way too busy (the expensive ones).  My current web site was a free template, though I don't recall where I found it.  It's not bad, and it's served me well for a while.  Even so, I think I'll be replacing it, mostly to get rid of the flash component in the header.  A lot more people are using Safari (via IPhones or IPads) and that browser doesn't support flash.

I recently found this site: http://andreasviklund.com/templates/.  It looks like it has some really nice templates.  The pages seem really 'clean' and also look professional.  And they're free.  What's not to like?

Combo box changing background colour

I had an odd thing happen in one of my Access databases.  On one of the forms, a bunch of the combo boxes were changing colour when they lost the focus.  It worked fine in Access 2003, but the problem appeared when running the program in Access 2007.

To fix, open the form in design view and view the properties of the detail section (assuming that's where the controls are).  There will be a property called 'Alternate Back Color'.  It's likely set to 'No Color'.  Set it to white, or whatever you want the colour of your combo box to be.  That should fix the problem.