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Making friends with Red Gate

A red gateI’ve spent quite a bit of time writing about Red Gate products over the last year, particularly SQL Source Control which is simply the best damn way to finally get those pesky databases into VCS. The fact that it now plays nice with first cousins SQL Compare and SQL Data Compare means the dream of VCS sourced automated deployments of data and schema for the masses is finally a reality.

What I like about the Red Gate products in general is that they take traditionally laborious, low-value tasks and totally transform the way we approach them. Migrating a database? Just SQL Compare it in a few clicks rather than manually writing time consuming, error prone scripts. Load testing an app? Just SQL Data Generate millions of realistic records in an instant rather than manually constructing dummy data which is rarely a good reflection of typical transactions (or worse, just take a copy of production data – nasty!) How about tracking down that elusive .NET performance bottleneck? ANTS Performance Profiler needs to be seen to be believed.

But more than just great products, Red Gate has always offered fantastic service. Great support over email, constant engagement via Twitter and very approachable on the phone. They just want to help you get the job done and they do it in that very amiable English-gentleman way :)

Its reasons like this that I’ve been an avid Red Gate customer for going on eight years now. I’ve frequently written about them of my own volition and without incentive simply because I think its valuable knowledge for the developer community. Along with this blog site just here, I’ve also made a few contributions to the Simple-Talk newsletter which seem to have been well received (100% average rating so far!)

I’m now very pleased to be joining the Friends of Red Gate Program. In a nutshell, here’s what it’s about:

The Friends of Red Gate Program is aimed at active and influential community members (such as popular blog writers and community site owners) as well as SQL & .NET MVPs who are experts and gurus in their respective fields. These people have clear ideas and opinions about the technologies they work with and, over time, we hope that they come to know & enjoy Red Gate and our products.

Friend of Red Gate 2011Well I certainly have clear ideas and opinions! You can make up your own mind about the other criteria. The important thing is that this gives me a greater opportunity to experience a broader range of their products and continue to share that knowledge with the community. On the flip side, it also gives me another channel to voice opinion on the products and feed this back to Red Gate so that future versions continue to evolve in the direction the community really needs.

Like most passionate people in the software industry, I really enjoying exploring innovative products and discovering new ways to make the whole business of building applications more enjoyable, more productive and altogether more fulfilling for everyone involved. This resonates really well with what the Red Gate products set out to do so I’m very happy to now be a part of the program.

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Hi, I'm Troy Hunt, I write this blog, create courses for Pluralsight and am a Microsoft Regional Director and MVP who travels the world speaking at events and training technology professionals