SQL Saturday in Charlotte, NC. Sessions I want to visit.

Usually, I do my blog posts after visiting SQL Saturday events, but I want to change that tradition and talk about them before the actual event.

In this post I want to talk about sessions I have personal interest in and I understand that it might drive people from other sessions. However, it will definitely drive some audience in and I hope those people will thank me for an additional information/suggestions/guidance.

So, will start:
SQL Saturday #560, Charlotte, NC

Event date: September 17th, 2016.
Session schedule: http://www.sqlsaturday.com/560/Sessions/Schedule.aspx

Slot #1. 9:00 A.M. - 10:00 A.M.

In that slot there is ONLY ONE session I'm going to visit. That is my own session "Inside of Indexes". I'll be talking about:
- What indexes are;
- How SQL Server is using different types of indexes to retrieve data in the best possible way;
- What are Page Split and how they impact performance;
and some more.
I hope my session will be very interesting, but I'm afraid that half of the people, interested in indexing, will split between my session and Jeffrey Garbus' session "Indexing for performance".

If I didn't have my session in the very first slot I'd definitely go to Aaron Nelson's session "Achieve More in Less Time by Using the New SQL PowerShell".

Slot #2. 10:15 A.M. - 11:15 A.M.

In the second slot, the winner, without a doubt is Adam Machanic's "SQL Server 2016 "Hidden Gems". The room has to be big enough to accommodate all attendees. If you desperately want to visit his session, I'd suggest to come to the previous session of Angela Henry's "Lightning Talks" to secure your space.

Even though Adam Machanic will be the shining star in that slot I won't go for his session because I've already attended it on another event.

The second session in the priority is  Rick Heiges' "Winning with Columnstore - A Customer Story". Since Microsoft nailed down Columnstores in SQL Server 2016 and because of Rick's HIP (High Influential Power) - that would be the session to visit.

Despite on all advantages of Rick's presentation I won't go there. The trick is: I want to visit his session two weeks later on SQL Saturday #545 in in Pittsburgh.
So, I'll have a tough  choice between Rushabh Mehta's "Mastering and Enhancing Company Data" and William Assaf's "SQL Server Permissions and Security Principals".

Slot #3. 11:30 A.M. - 12:30 P.M.

The Best and "Must Go" in the third slot is Geoff Hiten's session "What’s your Imperative doing in my Declarative?". The name is not very descriptive, but that session can do a Inventor's Light bulb  effect on any beginner SQL Developer, who just graduated college with most of the experience in Java and C#. I guarantee, there will be the "AHA! moment" during that session, which will shift a paradigm of your programming experience for life.

So, because I already know all of that I won't go to that session.
The next in the line is Tom Norman's "Encrypting Data within Sql Server". I'm from DC region and "Security" here is always #1 priority.

Slot #4. 1:45 P.M. - 2:45 P.M.

After lunch session. There will be a lot of other performance tuning topics I like, but my choice will be Brian Carrig's session "Managing Very Large Databases with SQL Server".

Slot #5. 3:00 P.M. - 4:00 P.M.

Very good session is supposed to be of Kevin Feasel's "APPLY Yourself" about the art of using "Apply" operator.
Wonderful session of Jonathan Buller: "Tips and Tricks for the SSIS Catalog" about new abilities of managing SSIS packages directly from SQL. That  topic is not fully covered in SQL community yet and I'm waiting the time when we will discuss parallel executions of multiple queries using SSIS catalog and SSIS packages addressing their own scheduling manipulating SSISDB.

Because it will be the last slot of sessions and everybody, including me, will fill pretty tired, I'd probably will go an relax listening to "Replication v. AlwaysOn, the great debate", hosted by Chris Skorlinski and Curt Mathews. They encourage to bring your own questions to that discussion, so, I assume there might be several of very good blog posts delivered only based on that conversation.

See you in Charlotte!
And not hesitate to show your smile when I'll make your picture.