Recommended Books

I am slowly building a collection of SQL Server books that I have read. As I was compiling this list I realized how few books I have really read. Although I love to read, technical reading is completely different for me. When reading non-technical books, I tend to speed read. It’s a bad habit. I’ve never made the effort to stop, but I probably should. When I read technical books, I do read every word and try to absorb as much as I can, but it takes much more effort and it obviously takes me a lot longer to get through text. I also tend to skip around in technical reading, which means it is much harder for me to know whether I have really read an entire book. One of my goals for the second half of 2010 is to read one technical book, beginning to end.

The other reason I don’t have a huge bookshelf is because I follow a lot blogs and technical sites (e.g. MSSQLTips, SQLServerPedia) and get a lot of my information from the web and Books Online. I will work to build this list, it just may take me a while!

 

RECOMMENDED SQL SERVER BOOKS

Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Internals – I am pretty sure this book is in every DBA’s library. Kalen Delany’s Inside SQL Server 2000 was the very first SQL Server book I read.

Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Management and Administration – I haven’t read this one cover to cover, but I have found it to be one of the most thorough admin books out there.

DBA Survivor – Become a Rock Star DBA – A great book for new DBAs. I plan to recommend this to customers at our user conference.

 

SQL SERVER BOOKS I AM CURRENTLY READING

Professional SQL Server 2008 Internals and Troubleshooting

SQL Server MVP Deep Dives

SQL Server 2008 Query Performance Tuning Distilled