How to find database objects created with SQL default trace

How can you find information about SQL database objects created? We're talking about CREATE DATABASE,CREATE INDEX,CREATE PROCEDURE,CREATE DATABASE. There are common scenarios where you may require these details. For example: 1) It is the organisation's sql server security policy for any production database to progress through a change request and review process. Monitoring database objects added , can identify developers attempting to avoid the review process. 2) Attempting to identify rogue processes. For example - software added to manage the server introduces new database processes - such as database tables 3) Troubleshooting an outage. An unexpected service impact occurs and... Read more →

How to get user security changes with SQL default trace

Question: There were some recent user security changes on a SQL Server login user account. Is there a way to grab this information - via the default trace? I haven't got a dedicated Extended events monitor set up - so I'm relying on the default trace . Management want to understand the details related to this security change. Answer: It is possible to report on security changes administered on SQL Server via the default trace. In fact - it's excellent - except if the default trace configuration is set up to rollover the files. Recently I had to use the... Read more →

How to get the Active Directory groups membership for user with Powershell Get-ADPrincipalGroupMembership

Question: How can I get the Active Directory groups for a specific user using Powershell? I'm facing a problem where a user is getting a failed login to a SQL Server. This SQL Server has multiple Active Directory groups attached to it - but I don't have visibility to the members of the groups. I know I can use the Get-ADGroupMember powershell cmdlet , which would give the member list of a specified Active Directory group, but this would be time - consuming . Is there a Powershell based method to specify the domain user and return the list of... Read more →

How to list Windows users with Powershell

Question: How can I use Powershell to list out Windows users? Are there Powershell cmdlets which can report on Windows users ? Answer: There are "out of the box" Powershell cmdlets which will support the requirement . How you apply the powershell cmdlets will depend on how much detail is required. Here are some examples: --return local groups Get-localgroup --return all members of a group - in this example the Administrator group Get-LocalGroupMember -Group "Administrators" --Get the local users Get-Local User --SID of a local group (Get-Localgroup Administrators).SID These are some basic examples to extract Windows users information with Powershell.... Read more →

How to troubleshoot SPN and SQL Server Windows return code: 0x2098, state: 15

Question:I see this error in the SQL Server Error Logs . How can I troubleshoot this issue? The SQL Server Network Interface library could not register the Service Principal Name (SPN) [ MSSQLSvc/myserver.net:50234 ] for the SQL Server service.Windows return code: 0x2098, state: 15. The start up account for SQL Server is a dedicated start up account Answer: As a starting point let's look at what MSDN has to say " To use Kerberos authentication with SQL Server requires both the following conditions to be true: The client and server computers must be part of the same Windows domain, or... Read more →