Expert Performance Indexing for SQL Server 2012 is a deep dive into perhaps the single-most important facet of good performance: indexes, and how to best use them. The book begins in the shallow waters with explanations of the types of indexes and how they are stored in databases. Moving deeper into the topic, and further into the book, you will look at the statistics that are accumulated both by indexes and on indexes. All of this will help you progress towards properly achieving your database performance goals. What you'll learn from Expert Performance Indexing for SQL Server 2012 will help you understand what indexes are doing in the database and what can be done to mitigate and improve their effects on performance. The final destination is a guided tour through a number of real-world scenarios and approaches that can be taken to investigate, mitigate, and improve the performance of your database.* Defines indexes and provides an understanding of their role * Uncovers and explains the statistics that are kept in indexes * Teaches strategies and approaches for indexing databases What you'll learn * Fully understand the index types at your disposal * Recognize and remove unnecessary indexes * Review statistics to understand indexing choices made by the optimizer * Properly apply strategies such as covering indexes, included columns, index intersections, and more * Write queries to make good use of the indexes already in place * Design effective indexes for full-text, spatial, and XML data types * Manage the big picture: Encompassing all indexes in a database, and all database instances on a server Who this book is for Expert Performance Indexing for SQL Server 2012 is intended for database administrators and developers who are ready to boost the performance of their environments without the need to go in blindly building indexes. Table of Contents * Index Fundamentals * Index Storage Fundamentals * Index Statistics * XML, Spatial and FULLTEXT * Index Myths and Best Practices * Index Maintenance * Indexing Tools * Index Strategies * Query Strategies * Index Analysis

We spend much of our working life trying to help people solve SQL Server-related performance problems, either hands-on, during consulting, or on various online community forums. Over the years, we've been exposed to a few weird-and-wonderful SQL Server issues but, mainly, we've seen the same problems and the same misconceptions about how SQL Server works crop up time-and-again. This book is our attempt to describe, diagnose, and solve some of the most common problems associated with the currently-supported versions of SQL Server: SQL Server 2005, 2008, and 2008 R2.