Torsten Schuessler

New Master Data Services white papers are available on MSDN.

This series of technical articles describes Organizational Approaches to Master Data Management, for SQL Server 2008 R2.

• Master Data Management from a Business Perspective
• Master Data Management from a Technical Perspective
• Bringing Master Data Management to the Stakeholders
• Implementing a Phased Approach to Master Data Management

I wish you a nice day,
tosc

On April 13, 2010 the Microsoft lifecycle team is announcing a change to the Service Pack Support policy and have blogged about it, here: http://blogs.technet.com/lifecycle/archive/2010/04/13/end-of-support-for-windows-vista-rtm-and-recent-service-pack-support-policy-updates.aspx

And official: http://support.microsoft.com/gp/newsplifecycle

I wish you a nice day,
tosc

Sanjay Mishra has published a interesting technical note at SQLCAT.

hhttp://sqlcat.com/technicalnotes/archive/2010/02/10/mirroring-a-large-number-of-databases-in-a-single-sql-server-instance.aspx

CU
tosc

Link: http://www.insidesql.org/aktuelles/treffen-der-regionalgruppe-franken-am-dienstag-den-13-april-2010

Below script will query registry settings to return folder informations (SQL Root, Data, Log and Backup).

I use this script to determine the default locations, put it in variables an use it for creating databases or backups.


DECLARE @SQLDataRoot nvarchar(512)
DECLARE @DefaultData nvarchar(512)
DECLARE @DefaultLog nvarchar(512)
DECLARE @BackupDirectory nvarchar(512)

-- check defaults
-- installation directory

-- sql server root
EXEC master.dbo.xp_instance_regread
N'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE',
N'Software\Microsoft\MSSQLServer\Setup',
N'SQLDataRoot',
@SQLDataRoot OUTPUT
-- 'data' directory
EXEC master.dbo.xp_instance_regread
N'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE',
N'Software\Microsoft\MSSQLServer\MSSQLServer',
N'DefaultData',
@DefaultData OUTPUT
-- 'log' directory
EXEC master.dbo.xp_instance_regread
N'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE',
N'Software\Microsoft\MSSQLServer\MSSQLServer',
N'DefaultLog',
@DefaultLog OUTPUT
-- 'backup' directory
EXEC master.dbo.xp_instance_regread
N'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE',
N'Software\Microsoft\MSSQLServer\MSSQLServer',
N'BackupDirectory',
@BackupDirectory OUTPUT

-- default locations set?
IF LEFT(REVERSE(@SQLDataRoot), 1) <> N'\'
SET @SQLDataRoot = @SQLDataRoot + N'\'
-- regkey = 0 then default root
SET @DefaultData = ISNULL(@DefaultData, @SQLDataRoot + 'DATA')
SET @DefaultLog = ISNULL(@DefaultLog, @SQLDataRoot + 'DATA')

--
PRINT '''Data'' - Directory : ' + @DefaultData
PRINT '''Log'' - Directory : ' + @DefaultLog
PRINT '''Backup'' - Directory : ' + @BackupDirectory


CU
tosc

In a earlier previous post - Which service pack do I have installed? - based on How to identify your SQL Server version and edition and using

EXEC xp_msver;

for a deep dive to SQL Server version information, the guys of http://sqlserverbuilds. blogspot. com
gives you an  unofficial build chart lists all of the known KB articles, hotfixes and other builds of MS SQL Server 2008, 2005, 2000 and 7.0 that have been released.

CU
tosc

Yes, it is Pi-Day!

The origninal song by Ken Ferrier and Antoni Chan: Mathematical Pi Song

Animation of the act of unrolling a circle's circumference, illustrating the ratio π.

CU
tosc

They will do it! Here is the statement of Matthias Berndt, Group Program Manager Microsoft SQL Server:

SQL Server Servicing plans

Hello Community, we appreciate your recent comments regarding the servicing needs of your current SQL Server configurations. We want to assure you that we are fully committed to our existing customer base, hence hereby clarification around our near term servicing deliverables:

* SQL Server 2008 SP2. Microsoft targets release in Q3/CY2010.
* SQL Server 2005 SP4. You overwhelmingly requested another servicing release for SQL Server 2005. Given your feedback Microsoft targets now such release in Q4/CY2010. Based on current support volume as well as the fact that SQL Server 2005 will enter into extended support on 4/13/2011 we anticipate this to be the last Service Pack release for this SQL Server version. Extended support for SQL Server 2005 will be available through 4/12/2016. Please see http://support.microsoft.com/lifecycle/ for specifics. As always, the SQL Server team will carefully monitor customer feedback as well as support volume to re-assess our decisions based on your needs.

SQL Server 2008 Service Pack 2 - Vote for

Service Pack 4 for SQL Server 2005 - Vote for

CU
tosc

Link: http://www.insidesql.org/aktuelles/treffen-der-regionalgruppe-franken-am-dienstag-den-9-februar-2010

Mention, the CSS SQL Server Engineers blog listed a note that some end of support dates were coming up.

SQL Server 2008 RTM support ends on April 13, 2010. You should make plans to upgrade to SQL Server 2008 SP1 soon.

So I think, it is definitely time to start thinking about upgrading your instances to SQL Server 2008 SP1!

Cumulative Update 6 for SQL Server 2008 SP1 (KB #977443)
The SQL Server 2008 builds that were released after SQL Server 2008 Service Pack 1 was released

Cumulative Update 9 for SQL Server 2008 RTM (KB #977444)
The SQL Server 2008 builds that were released after SQL Server 2008 was released

AND I think It's time to vote at MS-Connect for Service Pack 2 for SQL Server 2008!

CU
tosc