SSIS Talk

Here are some highlights of things that will be offered with SQL Server 2008:

• Activity Monitor for the DBA: Finally a way to see, in an easy to use UI, information related to active sessions, wait states, file I/O, long running queries, etc… Oh, and you can launch Profiler from here as well.
• Object Search: Users can now enter full or partial search strings to match on in the current database and results will be displayed in the new Object Explorer Details pane.
• Intellisense: We all know what this is… It’s coming to Management Studio to aid in writing queries with the red squiggles and all!
• Customizable Tabs: The query editor’s results can now have their tabs set with customized names
• Launch Profiler: The option is now available to launch Profiler from within a query editor results window and it will automatically tie Profiler to the SPID of the query.
• Permissions editing: The screens have been reworked to reduce the amount of clicks to set permissions
• Performance Studio: A new offering that tracks historical performance metrics from SQL Server and the operating system by storing results in a repository that offers drill-through reporting.
• Register servers once in a central location
• Management Studio adds a new GUI to manage/create table partitions.
• And finally (as far as my list and this article is concerned)….. A T-SQL Debugger in Management Studio.

Microsoft has communicated a bug in all CTPs of SQL Server 2008 that is caused by “today”, February 29th, 2008:

From Microsoft:
We have recently discovered an issue with SQL Server 2008 CTPs that result
in SQL Server 2008 not starting or installing on Feb 29 GMT only. We
recommend that you do not run, install or upgrade this CTP on Feb 29 GMT to
minimize any impact in your environment. You can install starting on March 1
GMT. If you have an immediate issue that cannot wait until march 1st GMT
contact sqlbeta@microsoft.com before taking any further steps.

UPDATE: This bug is no longer in effect as we are now onto March 1st, 2008. For what it’s worth, the SQL team have checked the bug fix into the SQL Server 2008 code stream.

The latest and greatest public CTP of SQL Server 2008 has been released. Visit http://connect.microsoft.com/sqlserver to get it.

Also, when visiting, please enroll in the Bug Bash contest for your chance to win, among other prizes, an Xbox 360.

The November CTP (CTP5) has been released. Go get it and start looking into some major new features added to this release.

Officially, the only change for SSIS are to the lookup components. I’ll have to get my hands dirty to see if there are any other changes that they didn’t comment on. One thing to note, is that C# is the default language type for SSIS Script Tasks/Components in SQL Server 2008.

I’m looking forward to some non-SSIS changes, though, like T-SQL IntelliSense, Transparent Data Encryption, and FILESTREAM support.

The July CTP for SQL Server 2008 (Katmai) has been released.

At the moment, in the upper-right hand corner it states that the June CTP is the current version, but if you click on it, you’ll get to the July release.

Looks like the tentative release launch date for SQL Server 2008 is February 27th, 2008. Along with this three-punch release launch is Visual Studio 2008 and Windows Server 2008.

Note that per the comment below and other official sources, Feb 28th, 2008 is a launch date, meaning that Microsoft will start a heavy marketing campaign (giving away free copies, perhaps, at trade shows, advertising, etc…).

Just wanted to post a quick note to let everyone know that the CTP release (for June) has been released by Microsoft. Stay tuned for my take on things related to this new release as I get time to evaluate it.

http://www.microsoft.com/sql/2008/default.mspx

Also, keep an eye on Matt Masson’s (SSIS Dev Team) blog. He’s been pretty active with comments about the new version and how it relates to SSIS.