Even though there is no SQL Client tooling installed on a machine, PowerShell can be used to execute SQL. I recently had to verify that I had been granted Dbo rights on a database that was on a server only reachable from a web server. The web server of course had no SQL tooling whatsoever installed. To do that I created a small Powershell script that only relies on the .NET Framework.
The typical recommendation for executing SQL commands from powershell is to use the Invoke-Sqlcmd cmdlet. I’m sure its a good tool, but unfortunately it isn’t installed by default. Sometimes installing extra software is not an option, so instead I’ve used PowerShell’s built in capability to create and use .NET objects. The Sql client objects are included in the default .NET framework installation, so this should work on any Windows machine.
A few days ago I saw a tweet about a new font called Hack. It’s a font that’s designed specifically for programming. No more doubts if it’s an O or a 0. Clear, enlarged punctuation for ; . ,. It’s just brilliant.