If you missed the live stream of the SQL Server 2014 launch event in San Francisco earlier this week, it is now available for on-demand viewing on Microsoft's Accelerate Your Insights page. Great overview of the new data platform and BI updates that are all part of this new release of SQL Server and other platform updates. Interesting news that came out of this event was the re-branding of PDW (Parallel Data Warehouse) as APS (Analytics Platform System) as it now is not limited to just hosting a PDW region on the appliance but also a Hadoop region on the same appliance. This should help to sell these appliances even more as you can use the same appliance for both "un-structured" and structured data and be able to do analysis across both regions using the same tools we are used to including Excel.
The biggest feature that is being focused on for SQL Server 2014 is having In-Memory available on the entire platform and the huge performance improvements that brings. In-Memory was first introduced in SQL Server 2012 but was a read-only index, now it can be clustered and fully update-able, which makes it a huge change to how you can access the data in the databases. Looking forward to working with clients to enable these features as it really does push SQL Server to the forefront of enterprise databases.
Note: If you have any issues with the videos not streaming smoothly (as I had) you can just right click on the video window and save the MPEG-4 video files locally.
Showing posts with label SQL Server 2014. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SQL Server 2014. Show all posts
Friday, April 18, 2014
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
SSDT-BI for Visual Studio 2013
Microsoft quietly released SSDT-BI for Visual Studio 2013 as a separate download a couple of days ago: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=42313. No blog post or anything yet that goes through all of the features, so my assumption is it just adds the same functions that SSDT-BI for Visual Studio 2012 does for the latest version of Visual Studio (at least until later this year when Visual Studio 2014 is released). I also assume that this adds support for SQL Server 2014 BI, same as the previous updates for SSDT have done now for Visual Studio 2012 and 2013.
Just for review, SSDT-BI is for SSAS, SSIS and SSRS development. For database projects, they have now built that functionality back into all versions of Visual Studio 2013 (available as a separate download for Visual Studio 2012) and can be updated via Visual Studio 2013 directly. For more updates on SSDT, make sure you follow the SQL Server Data Tools Team blog.
Just for review, SSDT-BI is for SSAS, SSIS and SSRS development. For database projects, they have now built that functionality back into all versions of Visual Studio 2013 (available as a separate download for Visual Studio 2012) and can be updated via Visual Studio 2013 directly. For more updates on SSDT, make sure you follow the SQL Server Data Tools Team blog.
Update: At about the same time I posted this Kasper de Jonge posted about SSDT-BI for Visual Studio 2013. Biggest disappointment is that there is NO backwards compatibility with SSIS 2012 or SSIS 2008R2 projects, so if you are only doing SSIS development on previous versions of SQL Server, don't jump on this upgrade just yet. No explanation was given for this incompatibility or if it will be fixed in a future update. Just keeps getting more and more complicated.
Wednesday, March 26, 2014
SSDT SQL Server 2014 Update
Microsoft has announced that a new version of SSDT for Visual Studio 2012 is now available for download and that an update for Visual Studio 2013 will be released through the update tools built into VS 2013. This new version adds support for SQL Server 2014, which will be available next Tuesday (April 1st). Along with support for SQL Server 2014 there are some new features in SSDT, including:
There are few other new features that I have not mentioned, make to check out the SQL Server Data Tools Team blog for more details!
This release is for the data tools portion of SSDT only, SSDT-BI for SSAS, SSIS and SSRS development will be released separately at a later date.
- Filtering Data when using View Data - filter the rows shown and even hide columns along with applying aliases to columns and sorting the data by columns
- Azure Integration - Add and connect to Azure databases without needing to setup firewall rules or other complicated network setup
- Change T-SQL Query Connections - Change the database that the query window is current attached to so that you can execute the same query against another database without having to disconnect and connect
There are few other new features that I have not mentioned, make to check out the SQL Server Data Tools Team blog for more details!
This release is for the data tools portion of SSDT only, SSDT-BI for SSAS, SSIS and SSRS development will be released separately at a later date.
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
SQL Server 2014 RTM Announced
Microsoft officially announced today on the SQL Server Blog that SQL Server 2014 will be released on April 1st! Always find it funny that Microsoft will release products on April Fools Day, but to them I guess it is just the beginning of another month and quarter for them. For those that are just getting upgraded to SQL Server 2012, now you will already be one version down after April 1st.
In past years this release would have been called SQL Server 2012 R2, but thankfully they have decided to drop the R2 (Release 2) naming on SQL Server products (it is still being used on Windows Server and other server products). See the official blog entry for a list of the new features, mostly just enhancements to the features added in SQL Server 2012. The best new feature that I see is the enhancement to In-Memory ColumnStore Indexes making them updatable! There is also the feature of being able to backup right to Azure, which is great for providing instant off-site backups for your databases.
If you want to be notified of the official release, click here and fill out the form.
In past years this release would have been called SQL Server 2012 R2, but thankfully they have decided to drop the R2 (Release 2) naming on SQL Server products (it is still being used on Windows Server and other server products). See the official blog entry for a list of the new features, mostly just enhancements to the features added in SQL Server 2012. The best new feature that I see is the enhancement to In-Memory ColumnStore Indexes making them updatable! There is also the feature of being able to backup right to Azure, which is great for providing instant off-site backups for your databases.
If you want to be notified of the official release, click here and fill out the form.
Wednesday, November 20, 2013
More SSDT Changes
I just realized after an exchange on Twitter that I had not posted about the recent announcements about the recent changes to SSDT!
Previously I posted about the split of the Business Intelligence projects from SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT) into SSDT-BI when CTP1 of SQL Server 2014 was released in June. As I mentioned back then I thought this was a strange idea that SSDT needed to be split up this way since we had BIDS (Business Intelligence Development Studio) back in the SQL Server 2005/2008 days and when SQL Server 2012 was coming out they changed that name to SSDT and added the database projects to it as well as all of the BI projects (SSAS, SSIS and SSRS). Now, with SQL Server 2014 it looks like the teams at Microsoft have again decided that these tools need to be split up even with some of the database project functions being included with Visual Studio 2013 at release.
I don't know about any of the behind the scenes stuff that might be going on at Microsoft related to this, but just be aware with SQL Server 2014 there are 2 separate tools and neither of them will be included in the installer (at least as of the last few weeks of posts that I have seen on the Microsoft blogs). You will have to download SSDT and/or SSDT-BI separately from the web. Also there is even more confusion over what you are able to have integrated into the different versions of Visual Studio with Visual Studio 2013 now available.
To help clear up the picture a bit, check out this blog post from Matt Masson from the Microsoft SSIS team: http://www.mattmasson.com/2013/10/sql-server-data-tools-business-intelligence-downloads/. This picture should get much clearer in the next months as SQL Server 2014 is finally released. Also, here is a good post from the SQL Server Blog that also gives all of the download links for SSDT and SSDT-BI as it stands right now: http://blogs.technet.com/b/dataplatforminsider/archive/2013/11/13/microsoft-sql-server-data-tools-update.aspx.
As always I will keep up with all of the news around SSDT and SSDT-BI as I use those tools a lot today and I'm very curious how it will all work with SQL Server 2014 and on.
Previously I posted about the split of the Business Intelligence projects from SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT) into SSDT-BI when CTP1 of SQL Server 2014 was released in June. As I mentioned back then I thought this was a strange idea that SSDT needed to be split up this way since we had BIDS (Business Intelligence Development Studio) back in the SQL Server 2005/2008 days and when SQL Server 2012 was coming out they changed that name to SSDT and added the database projects to it as well as all of the BI projects (SSAS, SSIS and SSRS). Now, with SQL Server 2014 it looks like the teams at Microsoft have again decided that these tools need to be split up even with some of the database project functions being included with Visual Studio 2013 at release.
I don't know about any of the behind the scenes stuff that might be going on at Microsoft related to this, but just be aware with SQL Server 2014 there are 2 separate tools and neither of them will be included in the installer (at least as of the last few weeks of posts that I have seen on the Microsoft blogs). You will have to download SSDT and/or SSDT-BI separately from the web. Also there is even more confusion over what you are able to have integrated into the different versions of Visual Studio with Visual Studio 2013 now available.
To help clear up the picture a bit, check out this blog post from Matt Masson from the Microsoft SSIS team: http://www.mattmasson.com/2013/10/sql-server-data-tools-business-intelligence-downloads/. This picture should get much clearer in the next months as SQL Server 2014 is finally released. Also, here is a good post from the SQL Server Blog that also gives all of the download links for SSDT and SSDT-BI as it stands right now: http://blogs.technet.com/b/dataplatforminsider/archive/2013/11/13/microsoft-sql-server-data-tools-update.aspx.
As always I will keep up with all of the news around SSDT and SSDT-BI as I use those tools a lot today and I'm very curious how it will all work with SQL Server 2014 and on.
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
SQL Server 2014 CTP1 & SQL Server Data Tools June 2013 Update
At the beginning of the month I posted about the next version of SQL Server being called SQL Server 2014, well now the first publicly available build of it is available for download! You can download it from this link along with a post about the new features included. To download it you will need to have a TechNet or MSDN subscription, which I have recommended for anyone that works with the Microsoft server technologies before to keep up with the latest versions.
There is also a good blog posts about getting started with the new in-memory OLTP in SQL Server 2014 (previously called Hekaton) by the SQL Server database team. I'm sure that there will be more of these posts for the other new features in SQL Server 2014 over time. If you have access to an Azure account you can now also create a VM with SQL Server 2014 CTP1 via a template, which is a really quick way to get a new server setup to test out.
And for those that are using SQL Server 2012 a new update to SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT) has also been updated with the new June 2013 update. New features added include Data Compare, Extensibility and Build & Deployment Contributors and a few others. When you go to the download page you will also notice that there is a separate download for what is now being called SSDT-BI for Visual Studio 2012. Not sure why Microsoft is doing this, but yet again the BI functions look like they are being separated out into separate downloads. This goes against everything that I thought SSDT was going to fix with it being a single tool, but I'm guessing the different groups in Microsoft are having issues working together to provide a single download for all functions in SSDT, which is too bad.
Monday, June 3, 2013
BIG SQL Server Updates!
Wow, take a vacation for a week and all kinds of great things get announced for SQL Server!
For those that missed it, with SQL Server 2012 SP1 Cumulative Update 4 included changes that allow for Power View to now access Multidimensional cubes! Previously Power View was only able to use the newer Tabular Data Models, but now you can use your existing Multidimensional cubes built in SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS). This change also makes it so that you can write the same DAX queries in your Power View reports against those same Multidimensional cubes without requiring you to use MDX (MultiDimensional eXpressions). The only downside is that it only works with the Power View integrated into SharePoint 2010/2013. Eventually the Power View that is built into Excel 2013 should be able to do this as well, but at this time that update is not yet available (keep your eye on my blog I will make sure to mention it as soon as it is available).
The other big news came out of TechEdNA 2013 in New Orleans today, the next release of SQL Server is going to be named SQL Server 2014! I heard rumours that the SQL Server team was moving away from the R2 name that they used to use for the in-between release (Windows Server teams are still using R2 as they announced Windows Server 2012 R2 as well). The biggest new feature of SQL Server 2014 will be the previously announced "Hekaton" project or In-Memory OLTP as they are calling it now. Should help to provide some amazing performance for databases. Along with that there are many more updates to futher add more cloud/Azure functionality and make it easier to transition to that from traditional on-prem servers. For more details, see this post from the Microsoft SQL Server team and keep you eyes here as I will keep you updated on what I hear as well!
More exciting times ahead with SQL Server, glad I got those SQL Server 2012 certifications out of the way, so that I can be ready for the 2014 versions next year!
For those that missed it, with SQL Server 2012 SP1 Cumulative Update 4 included changes that allow for Power View to now access Multidimensional cubes! Previously Power View was only able to use the newer Tabular Data Models, but now you can use your existing Multidimensional cubes built in SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS). This change also makes it so that you can write the same DAX queries in your Power View reports against those same Multidimensional cubes without requiring you to use MDX (MultiDimensional eXpressions). The only downside is that it only works with the Power View integrated into SharePoint 2010/2013. Eventually the Power View that is built into Excel 2013 should be able to do this as well, but at this time that update is not yet available (keep your eye on my blog I will make sure to mention it as soon as it is available).
The other big news came out of TechEdNA 2013 in New Orleans today, the next release of SQL Server is going to be named SQL Server 2014! I heard rumours that the SQL Server team was moving away from the R2 name that they used to use for the in-between release (Windows Server teams are still using R2 as they announced Windows Server 2012 R2 as well). The biggest new feature of SQL Server 2014 will be the previously announced "Hekaton" project or In-Memory OLTP as they are calling it now. Should help to provide some amazing performance for databases. Along with that there are many more updates to futher add more cloud/Azure functionality and make it easier to transition to that from traditional on-prem servers. For more details, see this post from the Microsoft SQL Server team and keep you eyes here as I will keep you updated on what I hear as well!
More exciting times ahead with SQL Server, glad I got those SQL Server 2012 certifications out of the way, so that I can be ready for the 2014 versions next year!
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