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The Voice of the DBA

The Ideal IDE

When I started working with SQL Server, I spent a lot of time in Query Analyzer and isql.exe. Those were my two main tools, using those to query a database instance in a lightweight manner. At some point Microsoft released Enterprise Manager, which was more useful for some tasks, but overall, I preferred Query Analyzer. Eventually that died away, and we got stuck with Management Studio, which most of us now use. Along the way, I also used DBArtisan, RapidSQL, and a few other IDEs for writing code against a SQL Server.

These days we have a few choices for doing development and administration on the Microsoft data platform. There is still SSMS, but Visual Studio has gotten quite a few upgrades and extensions to allow work with everything from a local SQL Server to a cloud database to data lakes and more. Microsoft built a lightweight IDE in Visual Studio Code, and released a SQL Server extension for that tool. In the last year, we also saw a preview release of SQL Operations Studio (SOS) from Microsoft, and perhaps this is the direction that Microsoft is moving in the future. There are also other IDEs, such as DataGrip, that some people are using.

I'm still stuck in the the SSMS mode. Even when I use Visual Studio for SQL Server work, with something like SQL Change Automation, I often switch back to SSMS for lots of my work. I've done some work in SOS, but I don't love the experience overall. Since I have SSMS running most of the time, the speed of SOS isn't helpful. If I were shutting down and restarting SSMS often, I might feel differently.

Today I'm curious. I'm sure you all have preferences, but if you could choose only one IDE, what would it be? Let's imagine that we're not looking at the current state of the tools, but for whatever functionality you need, whether that's database development tools, AG management tools, scheduling tools, etc., all of the functionality would be added to VS, VSCode, SSMS, SOS, DataGrip, etc. In that case, what do you prefer?

I think I'd lean towards keeping SSMS, though I wish it were more open and extensible. Since that's not likely to happen, I think SOS might be my next choice as an IDE if it has lots of extensions, and I have the ability to enable or disable them for the functionality I need. 

Steve Jones from SQLServerCentral.com

Join the debate, and respond to today's editorial on the forums


The Voice of the DBA Podcast

Listen to the MP3 Audio ( 3.7MB) podcast or subscribe to the feed at iTunes and Libsyn. feed

The Voice of the DBA podcast features music by Everyday Jones. No relation, but I stumbled on to them and really like the music.

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Featured Contents

 

Representing XML data in SQL Server

Diogo Castro from SQLServerCentral.com

In this article, we will see how to use the FOR XML statement in SQL Server to represent the result of queries in XML format. More »


 

Steps to Migrate Oracle Database to Azure SQL Database

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In the world of paradigm shifts, many organizations are looking at the prospect of a technology migration, where capabilities are moved to a new set of technologies, supporting and enabling the business for the future. On other hand, a technology or platform may reach the end of its life for other business reasons, like ease of use, increased cost, etc. More »


 

Join Redgate’s SQL data catalog early access program

Redgate wants your help to develop a product for SQL Server data classification that meets today’s compliance and DevOps needs. If you’re interested in taking part in research and providing feedback on new releases, please register for the early access program. More »


 

From the SQLServerCentral Blogs - Power BI Custom Visuals Class (Module 113 – Small Multiple Line Chart)

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Question of the Day

Today's Question (by Steve Jones):

In SQL Server 2017, I have this table:

 CREATE TABLE OrderHeader ( OrderKey INT IDENTITY(1, 1) NOT NULL CONSTRAINT OrderHeaderPK PRIMARY KEY , OrderDate DATE , OrderTotal NUMERIC(10, 2) , CustomerKey INT ); 

I decide to insert some values with this code:

 INSERT dbo.OrderHeader ( OrderDate , OrderTotal , CustomerKey ) <***> VALUES ('2018-08-01', 500, 1), ('2018-08-02', 300, 2) 

What should I replace the <***> with to get the identity values returned to the calling application?

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Yesterday's Question of the Day

Yesterday's Question (by Steve Jones):

I create this trigger:

 CREATE TRIGGER StopAlter ON DATABASE FOR ALTER_TABLE AS ROLLBACK; 

Now I want to drop it. How do I do this?

Answer: DROP TRIGGER StopAlter ON DATABASE;

Explanation:

If a DDL trigger is created on database actions, it needs to be dropped with the DROP TRIGGER <trigger name> ON DATABASE command.

Ref: DROP TRIGGER - click here


» Discuss this question and answer on the forums

Featured Script

Table Space Used in DB

Luis Chiriff from SQLServerCentral.com

So I was looking for a script that I wrote to sort tables by size years ago, it was 3am and I remember how fiddly it was in that old script where I had to change the script for the sort that I wanted to do. Because I couldn't find this script right away, I decided to write it from scratch. I also work with a lot of multi-schema databases and without cloning the sp_spaceused for schema output I decided to also add that info to the output. I tried making this really simple, I've tested this in 2008, 2012 & 2014

And I'm so glad I did, I decided to try out a sort concept I thought of that works quite well and all you need to change is just 1 character. 

More »

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