A relational database management system (RDBMS)—often referred to as a SQL database because of the Structured Query Language (SQL) used to interact with it—has long been the gold standard for storing transaction-based data. Since the 1970s, RDBMSs have been used to store bank transactions, stock trades, inventory management, and more.

As this fiscal year wraps up, many agencies are planning their response to compliance reporting requirements. Meeting these requirements—particularly in advance of an audit—can be incredibly time-consuming. While the Defense Department has made managing risk easier through Security Technical Implementation Guides (STIGs), it’s still dependent upon IT staff to help ensure their systems are continuously secure and compliant.

In the first post of this two-part series, we talked about the need to fully understand how users experience your website. Without understanding how your end users interact with your site’s pages—what’s working for them and what’s not—you’d be optimizing on a hunch without solid data to guide you.

SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) is a workflow orchestration service used mostly for data integration and transformation. It was first released as part of SQL Server 2005 and continues to receive updates and new features today. While SSIS can be installed and run on a server (on-premises or in the cloud), it’s also available in Azure Data Factory. SSIS is commonly used to perform tasks such as: While SSIS originally only ran on Windows, it has also been available for Linux since 2017.

In advance of this week’s Thanksgiving holiday in the U.S., the U.S. Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Agency (CISA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) issued a reminder for critical infrastructure to stay vigilant against cyber threats during holidays and weekends. This advisory is a reminder the holidays present a noted challenge for businesses and an opportunity for cyber adversaries.

Keeping your technology organized can be challenging. As you add new devices and phase out old ones, tracking each change can feel insurmountable. However, monitoring these updates is vital for most organizations, making the right network inventory tools indispensable. Finding your best fit might be easier than you think. By understanding your network inventory management options, you can find the most effective software to support your unique IT infrastructure.

The U.S. State Department has a global workforce of 69,000 across more than 270 diplomatic missions. To support the work of its “untethered diplomats,” State’s Bureau of Information Resource Management uses a multi-cloud approach that provides cost-effective, flexible, and reliable access to cloud-based resources, allowing staff to seamlessly collaborate, free from the limitations of VPNs and corporate networks.

In my previous post, Native SQL Server Backup Types and How-To Guide, I discussed the main types of native SQL Server backups and various backup options. Backups are critical to restoring databases quickly, but there isn’t much benefit to having backup files sitting around if you aren’t prepared and know when and how to perform the restores.