Free SQL Server Community November Training

Head over to Pragmatic Works site and take a look at some training that is available this month.  Yesterday Jamie Thomson did an SSIS performance webinar and Chris Webb and Brian Knight are doing ones this month as well (tomorrow is the one being done by Chris).  Can’t beat the price either, FREE, plus you are getting the information from the pros (MVPs!), and they are broadcasted, so you can connect from work, home, or any place you have an Internet connection.

• November 16, Jamie Thomson – SSIS Dataflow – Designing for performance
• November 18, Chris Webb – Introduction to Performance Tuning Analysis Services 2008
• November 23, Brian Knight – Building calculations in SSAS 2008

If you miss a session they record them and you can check them out later on-demand in the webinar resource area.

Enjoy!

SQL Server ‘Denali’ SQL11 CTP1 Install Experience

Nothing really new with install compared to the SQL Server 2008 R2 install, but I wanted to share my experience installing the product.  I installed this on a Windows 7 32 bit OS to test out and take a look at some of the new features that are available in the CTP1 release.

The please wait message you will see periodically throughout the process during some validation checks of your system.	Installation menu page	The ‘Denali’ CTP1 logo
Setup Support Rules check – passed with flying colors	Installing the Enterprise Evaluation edition of the product	License agreement terms
Ready to install support files	Support Support Rules check again – just a warning that the firewall is enabled	Setup Role – going to perform the feature installation
Going to install everything that is available	Installation Rules check – passed with flying colors again	Instance Configuration screen – just going with a default instance
Disk space required for the full install – 6076 MB compared to the 6102 MB required for the R2 install	Server configuration – time to setup the accounts for running the services	Database Engine configuration screen and account provisioning setup
Don’t forget to setup filestream if you want to install the latest Adventure Works sample database	Analysis Service configuration screen and account provisioning setup	Reporting Services configuration screen – just doing a native install
Error Reporting option to help out Microsoft	Install configuration rules check – all systems clear	Ready to go ahead with the install
Installation progress – here we go	Error message referencing a file during install – not everything will be installed during Round 1 (at least for me)	Install issue prevented the Management Tools from being installed
Time to send the install issues to Microsoft	Install Round 2 – add features to existing install	Need to install Management Tools
Okay, all set for Round 2	Success!	Shortcut menus available after installation
SQL Management Studio splash screen – powered by Visual Studio…	Rounded corners	BIDS is still using Visual Studio 2008 for now
CTP1 only has changes for SSIS (at least for the BI side of the world which is my focus)	Some new icons to get at parameters (new item) and variables Window along with SSIS Toolbox	Control Flow toolbox items
New Zoom item available on design surface and rounded corners for the items	Data Flow Task toolbox items – new assistants (wizards) for source and destinations	Initial source assistant Window

Well that is it for now.  If you are interested in the new SSIS enhancements and want to give the CTP1 release a test drive there are some cool new features.  I plan on doing a couple of follow up postings going over some of these.  If you can’t wait and have an hour to check out a video you can take a look at a recent presentation done at TechEd Europe What’s Coming Next In SSIS.

If you want you can check out some of the BOL items for ‘Denali’ here to get some more details on what is available in the new release:

• Books Online for SQL Server “Denali”
• What’s New (SQL Server “Denali”)

The build number for the CTP1 release is 11.0.1103.9

That is it for now.  Time to start diving into the SSIS changes.