If you’ve ever been a production DBA, or if you’ve worked on a mission-critical software application then you’ve come across a situation you don’t know how to handle…but you have to handle it five minutes ago and the clock is ticking. While most queries will turn up a slew of entries using Google (or another search engine to keep it fair), sometimes you just can’t find the answer you’re looking for, or you’re not sure if you can trust what’s been submitted to the forum you’ve landed on.

Enter the warchest: the collection of websites you know you turn to for definitive answers to even your most seemingly niche questions. Here are my favorites:

• SQLServerPedia (I’m not above shameless self-promotion)
• SQL Server Storage Engine
• PSS SQL Server Engineers (Troubleshooting)
  
• Kalen Delaney’s Blog (SQL Server Internals)
• Ken Henderson’s Blog (SQL Server Internals)
  
• Itzik Ben-Gan’s T-SQL Blackbelt SQLMag posts (T-SQL Programming)
• Tips, Tricks and Advice from the SQL Query Processing Team (Query Processing)

9 times out of 10, if you can at least narrow-down your question to one of the groups above (T-SQL, the Storage Engine, Troubleshooting, Internals), they’ll guide you to answers you can trust.