The Metropolis Marvels released wide receiver Antonio Bryant and signed wide receiver Mohammed Massoquai.  The K.C. Tarheels signed running back Felix Jones and released running back Ryan Moats.

It would be so nice if something made sense for a change. –Alice

Ever wondered why iostat(1M) shows bursts of I/O activity every now and then, in ZFS ? Well, wonder no more.

ZFS is a transactional file system and in this respect it bares some resemblances with database systems. There, several data manipulation operations (e.g., INSERTs) and queries can be grouped into transactions and committed conjointly. If an error occurs, the transaction is rolled back so that the system is always in a consistent state.

Similarly, ZFS packs write() calls into transactions (TXs) which in turn go into transaction groups (TXGs). At any given point in time there are three of them:

• one in an open state accepting new transactions
• one in a quiescence state ready & waiting for sync
• and one being synced to disk

(We are discussing only the async- case here. Synchronous writes involve ZIL – the ZFS Intent Log, which I’m not familiar with yet.)

I wanted to know how often transaction groups are syncing to disk and, therefore, I wrote this DTrace script:

BEGIN
{
      self->start = 0;
}

fbt:zfs:spa_sync:entry
/self->start != 0/
{
        @ = lquantize((timestamp - self->start)/1000000000, 0, 200, 1);
        self->start = 0;
}

fbt:zfs:spa_sync:entry
/self->start == 0/
{
        self->start = timestamp;
        printf("syncing txg = %u | quiesced txg = %u",
                        ((struct spa *)arg0)->spa_syncing_txg, arg1);
}

spa_sync() is responsible for instrumenting the sync process. The `spa’ prefix stands for Storage Pool Allocator and it’s one of the ZFS layers. Contrary to common belief, ZFS is a layered technology.

Running it:

git-repos/dtrace-scripts% pfexec ./spa_sync.d
dtrace: script './spa_sync.d' matched 3 probes
CPU     ID                    FUNCTION:NAME
  3  34099                   spa_sync:entry syncing txg = 148390 | quiesced txg = 148391
  0  34099                   spa_sync:entry syncing txg = 148434 | quiesced txg = 148435
  2  34099                   spa_sync:entry syncing txg = 148391 | quiesced txg = 148392
  0  34099                   spa_sync:entry syncing txg = 148435 | quiesced txg = 148436
  3  34099                   spa_sync:entry syncing txg = 148392 | quiesced txg = 148393
  0  34099                   spa_sync:entry syncing txg = 148436 | quiesced txg = 148437
  0  34099                   spa_sync:entry syncing txg = 148393 | quiesced txg = 148394
...

  3  34099                   spa_sync:entry syncing txg = 148473 | quiesced txg = 148474
^C

           value  ------------- Distribution ------------- count   
              28 |                                         0       
              29 |@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@   74      
              30 |@@                                       4       
              31 |                                         0

So, syncing happens with a period of ~30secs, which can be verified here.
Also, look how nicely ZFS consumes the quiesced transaction group, which becomes the syncing group and the counters keep increasing monotonically.

Cheers,
Stathis

Riverside CA: Novo Signs purchased the industrial facility at 6251 Box Springs Blvd. in Riverside, CA, for $1.2 million, or $26 per square foot, from private investors.

Built in 1966, the industrial building totals 45,645 square feet. The property is located at the northwest corner of Box Springs Boulevard and River Crest Drive.

Grady Liu with MacroReal Investment Group represented the buyer and Ian DeVries with Colliers International represented the seller.

Source: CoStar Group

Radhames Liz has been claimed off waivers by the San Diego Padres.

Liz getting claimed is not much of a loss. The Orioles tried to sneak him through waivers and the Padres decided to take a chance on him. He was behind a number of arms on the Orioles depth chart so theres no telling when he would’ve got another chance on the big league club. He has a live arm, but not much control as he falls off towards first base at the end of his delivery. San Diego has a pitchers park so maybe he can become a successful power arm out of the bullpen. With Liz claimed, the 40 man roster now sits at 39.

Washington DC: Oliff & Berridge, a law firm, renewed its lease and expanded to 91,958 square feet at 277 S. Washington St. in Alexandria, VA. The firm signed a 15-year deal. Known as the Atrium Building, the five-story office structure totals 138,507 square feet and is in Old Town Alexandria. Carr Properties owns the building. Meredith LaPier, Pat Marr and Sally Wilson of CB Richard Ellis represented the law firm. Spencer Stouffer and Christopher Sowick of Cassidy Pinkard Colliers represented the landlord.

Shortly after an injury cut Ronnie Browns season short the team cut ties with him, sendign the running back to the unemployment line.  To take his place the team signed Ladell Betts who was injured in his very first game this Sunday.The team placed him on IR and signed running back Rock Cartwright for depth.

The Twins 40-man roster is once again full after the Twins made 6 additions — and a subtraction — before the deadline to protect players from the upcoming Rule 5 Draft.  Earlier this off-season, I posted my thoughts on who I thought the Twins might protect.  Aside from my blunder on Anthony Slama (namely, forgetting about the draft-and-follow process that used to exist) and my confusion over Rene Tosoni (which was also pondered in a previous post), I didn’t do too badly.

First, the addition of third baseman Danny Valencia was never really in doubt.  Whether or not the Twins decide to sign a third baseman on the market, Valencia will get a long look in Spring Training.  Having added him to the 40-man roster, the Twins now have several years (if necessary) to evaluate him further.  I would personally bet against his being on the opening day roster in 2010 — I think there’s some work ahead for him in Rochester — but there was absolutely no reason to expose him to the Rule 5 Draft.

The biggest surprise of the list for me was the other infielder added by the team — middle infielder Estarlin De Los Santos.  For me, this selection is at least a year premature.  De Los Santos spent his 2009 season in Ft. Myers, hitting .290/727 in 262 AB’s with 11 steals in 15 attempts.  Those are nice numbers in somewhat limited action, sure — but to me, it just doesn’t seem likely that a team would draft De Los Santos and find a way to keep him on the big league roster for a whole season.  Admittedly, I don’t know a lot about De Los Santos and have never seen him play — maybe there’s something special there that just isn’t immediately apparent from the numbers.  If I were in Bill Smith’s position, though, I probably would have protected someone else this year and waited to see what De Los Santos did in 2010.

The Twins also added four pitchers.  For me, there was very little surprise in the addition of either Alex Burnett or Rob Delaney, both of whom I included in my second tier of candidates for protection.  I felt there were a couple of niggling issues with both that made it at least possible that they wouldn’t be added (unlike Valencia, who I thought was a sure thing), but that both were likely additions because of their past performance.

The other two additions were more interesting.  I had Deolis Guerra, the last direct link in the organization to the Johan Santana trade, in a category all his own during my prediction post, listing him as a Wild Card.  We keep hearing about Guerra’s potential, and there are reasons to think that he may be starting to put things together.  It’s more likely to me that a team like Washington or Pittsburgh would take a guy like Guerra and stash him away in a dark corner of the bullpen for a summer — much like the Twins did with Johan Santana — than it would be with a middle infielder.  As a result, I agree with the decision to protect Guerra, and hopefully he will continue to improve next season.

Finally, the Twins decided to protect Loek Van Mil — the 7′1″ Nederlander.  This was always a possibility — with his physical tools, he could be an imposing presence in a future Twins bullpen.  I would still argue that he’s still a project.  He needs to improve his K-BB rate a bit, for one thing.  But in terms of sure intrigue, this move was at the top of this year’s Rule 5 moves.

The Twins also had to remove a player from the roster in order to make room for these additions.  The short straw was drawn by Deibinson Romero, who was added last year and who spent this year flailing away in the Florida State League with the Ft. Myers Miracle.  Romero took a significant step back in 2009 and he was a clear choice for removal.  I would imagine another year in the FSL is on tap for 2010.

With the roster now full, the Twins could not add a free agent without removing someone.  Three names stand out to me:  Jason Pridie, Bobby Keppel, and Alexi Casilla.  The Twins will probably NOT cut Casilla to make room for a free agent, but I think they should.  He’s out of options, and as I’ve said before I don’t see him making the 25-man roster next year with Nick Punto returning, J.J. Hardy at SS, and Matt Tolbert being around.  The Twins should cut ties with him now rather than having him take up a roster spot.  The Twins can also do better than Keppel in the bullpen, and if they sign a free agent reliever Keppel would be the clear choice to be removed.  Pridie simply seems dispensable at this point, and since the Twins didn’t bother to call him up in September I’m not sure what they think his role is.  Since Carlos Gomez is no longer around, Pridie might be in the mix for a roster spot as the backup outfielder (I’m not really sure who the Twins expect to play in CF if Denard Span is injured, for instance) — but I put him on this list because the Twins just don’t seem to be all that interested in him.

When we get closer to December 10 I’ll post my thoughts on which Twins players I think are in danger of being taken in the Rule 5 draft.  Maybe by then the Twins will have added a free agent — although I’m not holding my breath!

I had simple requirement to import data from xml file and populate highly normalized structure. I am calling it highly normalized structure as they used all forms to break a simple table in multiple tables. So even it was too much complex to fetch a single unit of information you require to make n number of joins. Does it really worth, I can not comment on it as Database design is complex part and designer has to make call upto what level he want to go. My task seem pretty complex not due to nature of work but due to this normalization and data we are getting. So I decide to go with transaction to keep integrity of data in master and derived tables.
Here my problem start as soon as I thought to use transaction based on my theoretical knowledge It started trouble for me. As I tried with multiple option and every time it throws me error.

Error: The AcquireConnection method call to the connection manager “OLEDB.X” failed with error code 0xC001A004.

I start thinking why it’s happening I came on following conclusion.
This SSIS Error might be due to:
1. Do I need to change some setting in DTC?
2. It is due to fact I am using cross database in my query like
          DB1.Table1 INNR JOIN DB2.Table2
3. It’s due to DTC is not enable on server
4. It’s due to we are using different connections in ssis.
5. It’s due to we are invoking multiple child packages inside master package in sequential way.
6. It’s due to we have multiple parallel data flow task and each child package contains 4-5 data flow task.
 
what ever I tried to do every thing, by disabling all parallel task. Make SSIS very simple, Execute only 1 task.
Make Retain connection Property true, make simple one line execution.

Finally I found problem in DTC service and I just reset that service.
Control Panel->Administration Tools->Component Services -> Distributed Transactions -> Property tab

But it only helped me to execute my simple transactions which I created to rectify problem, but my original tasks were still showing problem but with different error.

Error: The SSIS Runtime has failed to enlist the OLE DB connection in a distributed transaction with error 0×8004D00A “Unable to enlist in the transaction.”.

Humm that was bad as I can run simple Data Flow Task with transaction option required, I did lot of goggling on Microsoft and found that. It may be due to a known bug with SSIS, and Microsoft has released a patch in service pack. So if you guys face same problem install latest service pack.
 
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/914375 Service Pack 2
 
 But it seems it was not end of my problem still some of my packages was throwing following error.
 
[OLE_DES - Derived table [11056]] Error: SSIS Error Code DTS_E_OLEDBERROR.  An OLE DB error has occurred. Error code: 0×80004005. An OLE DB record is available.  Source: “Microsoft SQL Native Client”  Hresult: 0×80004005  Description: “This operation conflicts with another pending operation on this transaction. The operation failed.”.

It tells me that do not run parallel task, so time to work on package to re-arrange all. So Instead of running parallel task in 20 different data flow task, I decided to run them in sequential.
Finally I couple of hours effort I resolved that problem.

The Orioles claimed C Craig Tatum off waivers from the Cincinnati Reds and designated LHP Chris Waters for assignment to make room on the 40 man roster. The reason we needed to clear room on the 40 is because we filled it up by adding RHP Brandon Erbe, RHP Luis Lebron, 3B Josh Bell, SS Pedro Florimon, 1B Rhyne Hughes, and 1B Brandon Snyder to the roster.

Grade: C

Tatum is just another candidate for the back up catchers job. He’ll compete with Michel Hernandez and whoever else the Orioles bring in for the roster spot. In AAA Louisville he batted .239/.300/.338 with 12 doubles, 3 HR, and 21 RBI over 213 at bats. He also had 68 at bats with the Reds to the tune of .162/.250/.221 with 1 double and 1 HR. Hes not going to give you much with the bat, but he was rated as the best defensive catcher in Cincinnati’s minor league system by Baseball America. Theres a good chance the Orioles will try to pass him through waivers themselves at some point in the offseason if we need to make room on the 40 man roster after a signing, a trade, or another claim.

Erbe, Lebron, Bell, Florimon, Hughes, and Snyder needed to be added to the 40 man roster to protect them from being selected in the Rule V draft at the winter meetings. There were a couple other players that I thought might’ve been protected but weren’t, most notably RHP Steve Johnson. Andy MacPhail doesn’t think he will be selected because he pitched mostly at A ball last year and he doesn’t have great stuff. Even if he was selected, I don’t see him lasting an entire year in an MLB bullpen. Maybe in another year.

The Mean Machine released wide receiver Malcom Floyed and brought back wide receiver Steve Smith.  Team Punishment released wide receiver Dwayne Bowe and signed receiver Chris Chambers