Krehbiel Tech

At work, I've been playing with SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) for use in an upcoming project. ("Integration" is one of those fancy "enterprise" terms that means "getting information from different places and organizing it into something useful.") There's some value in SSIS, but overall I'm not terribly impressed. In fact, it's a bit of a pain. I can see using it for simple tasks like pulling data from one place and putting it into another place, but for anything more complex than that I'd prefer to use something else (like C#). It's not really a programming tool, in my mind. I'm currently on day 2 of trying to merge data from several different Access databases together into one SQL Server database, a process that might have taken a few hours to build in C#, but using this graphical "flowchart" interface to build code logic is a little nauseating. I suppose it looks pretty on the screen, and a programming n00b might be able to look at it and understand it, but it sure is slow to put together what should be fairly straightforward logic. Hurray for the newest buzzword technology from Microsoft!

Astute readers will notice that I am once again fiddling with the "look and feel" of the site, especially the blogs. It's really quite hard to come up with a scheme that works well both with long and short articles, especially when they're mixed together.

Astute observers will notice that the default content is now blog stuff, instead of the portal page. If you want the portal page back, you have to use http://uvtek.net?portal.

At work we're planning to use SQL Server 2005's Reporting Services for future reporting needs. (It's main attraction is the free-ness of it compared with Crystal Reports.) We can do everything the customers need with DataGrids on web pages, but everyone thinks Report Services are cool. I'm pretty indifferent about it. But I guess it'll be something good to put on my resume. ("Extensive experience with the latest buzzword technology that achieves the same goal as the previous buzzword technology, but requires learning something new.")

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Vanity Watch: I currently occupy 6 of the top 10 spots in a Google search for "Thomas Krehbiel." I also rank within the top 10 for "Tom Krehbiel," and in the top 20 for "Krehbiel." Woop!

Hurray, a technology post!

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