t-sql for dba books?

staggerlee

Hi all,

With my 70-432 exam in coming, im doing a lot of exam tests, and one of my major failings is when anything shows up on screen in tsql.. Is there any books that are just for dba stuff.. Roberts resource list says about T-SQL Fundamentals but looking though the Amazon look inside, it seems to concentrate on the fundamentals on creating queries and formulate your code. Im hoping there's something that just covers in detail things like

DBCC
Permissions (in creating users and within things like SP)
Auditing
DMVs (Things ive seen on this just scare me, they sound great but I dont see how I could practise them with material i have.
Indexs
Compression/Encryption
Creating Roles etc
ALTER, DROP, etc for schema databases etc
DBMail

At the moment I have Administration in Action, Real World skills and the MS book for the exam.

Another reason id like it is, im about to set up a SQL Cluster and id like to do as much as possible from T-SQL for change control,

Thanks for any info

RobertKaucher

What really sucks is that there is a lack of books on this topic. The best option I have found is Google and compiling your own notes. The good thing is these topics tend to be lightly tested, meaning they expect you to know what they are and how you would use them but do not go into detail regarding syntax.

MCP Deep Dives and SQL Server Internals has some good stuff on this side. I also suggest you look at Glen Berry's DMV a Day blog posts.
A DMV a Day – Day 1 - Windows Live

For other forms of T-SQL I just suggest you drill it. Create a test DB and type your BACKUP DATABASE statement and RESTORE DATABASE statement untill it is second nature. Until I got to my current job I had actually forgotten how to do a backup via SSMS. It had become so easy for me to do it via T-SQL.

These types of queries are really just memorizing syntax and not a lot of theory, so drill them till you know 'em cold.

EDIT: I might have failed my upgrade exam or scored in the low 700s if not for Glen's blog!