Mike Walsh

Mike loves mentoring clients on the right Systems or High Availability architectures because he enjoys those lightbulb moments and loves watching the right design and setup come together for a client. He loves the architecture talks about the cloud - and he's enjoying building a Managed SQL Server DBA practice that is growing while maintaining values and culture. He started Straight Path in 2010 when he decided that after over a decade working with SQL Server in various roles, it was time to try and take his experience, passion, and knowledge to help clients of all shapes and sizes. Mike is a husband, and father to four great children and lives in the middle of nowhere NH.

You are Free: Career Lessons from a farm fence

October 10, 2023May 11, 2017 by Mike Walsh

When I put Database technology down, I run a 20-acre farm with my family. I love it. It’s fun watching the kids learn from the experience. Learning my life lessons and illustrations from the chores and animals is fun. A farm scare today made me think of you. There is a lesson for us all … Read more

SQL Server Security Basics

March 5, 2022February 15, 2017 by Mike Walsh

This isn’t the complete guide to securing a SQL Server, but these are some of the more common things I bump into and wish I wouldn’t when it comes to SQL Server Security. Read these practices, understand them by searching the web or come here and ask me for questions or advice. If it means … Read more

SQL Server Max Memory Best Practices

March 5, 2022February 8, 2017 by Mike Walsh

In this Straight Up SQL Server Tips series, we’re going back to basics, focusing in on SQL Server memory, specifically talking about setting SQL Server MAX memory. Many of these are findings in our SQL Server Health Checks or things I bump into on the forums and Q&A sites when I’m out answering questions. Today … Read more

How To Manage The SQL Server Transaction Log File

February 7, 2020February 4, 2017 by Mike Walsh

“Help! My SQL Server transaction log file has run out of space on my SQL Server!”, “Why is my SQL Server Log file so big?”, “How do I shrink my SQL LDF?” – I hear these questions all the time. I’ve been blogging since 2009 and way back then I wrote some posts about shrinking, … Read more

DevOps: Don’t Forget The Ops

February 7, 2020February 1, 2017 by Mike Walsh

I want to commend the team at GitLab.com – they had an issue that took down a key database and everything else with it effectively and when they came back, there was data not coming back. This happens. This happens in “Traditional” 1.0 IT companies (ask my usual airline, Delta, they’ll tell you two stories … Read more

Optimize For Ad Hoc Workloads – Enable or not?

February 7, 2020January 30, 2017 by Mike Walsh

With today’s Straight Up SQL Server tip, I want to talk about a setting I have so far only ever recommended to enable: Optimize for Ad Hoc Workloads. Rather than just make a suggestion, I want to keep in the spirit of the tips for beginner approach to the series and describe a little of … Read more

Dr. Cloud-Move or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Cloud

February 7, 2020January 27, 2017 by Mike Walsh

With apologies to Mr. Kubrick for my title, I’ll give you a little honest backstory. I’ve been working with SQL Server for 17 years now. Mostly in the box, on-premises. I’ve done all sorts of things with SQL Server. Always heading back to DBA, performance tuning, high availability, etc. My career owes a lot to … Read more