I think one of the most helpful abilities to being an exceptional DBA is to be able to learn something new, fairly quickly and yet accurately.
I recently received a request to add an assembly to a SQL instance. I knew that functionality was there, it allows more flexibility within SQL, but I havent had any dealings with it yet. I was provided a script that had the hex value of the assembly and code to set the permissions equal to EXTERNAL_ACCESS.
Its going to sound weird, but I am glad that script threw an error because I have learned (and am still researching) much more about this. I learned that there are a lot of posts that provide code on how to set the trustworthy property of the database. Some of those posts point out that isnt the best method and explain why. Then, if you keep looking, there are a few posts which go into depth as to why.
In this case, I am having to work with the App Dev department to get the assembly signed. Since I like being able to feel confident in my responses to the developers, I need to understand more about what is going on than just the quick and easy answer. All this research has taken up part of my day today, and the testing will probably consume most of my tomorrow.
I point this out because earlier in my career, I would have stopped at the easy answer (which has the most posts). Now, though, I am looking to find those fewer posts which explain the why, in depth, so that I learn everything about what is going on, not just do something because its easy. I feel proud of my progression, and sometimes we need to recognize little wins like this. :)
This is just a quick post while SQL is installing. I am spinning up an instance of SQL in order to play around with installing an assembly, the different permission sets associated, and what is appropriate in the different environments (DEV and PROD) since the assembly already exists in one and not in the other. Back to the fun!