This is the third edition of this book and I think this is a must have for SQL Serve
DBAs out there. Kalen Delaney wrote the second edition for SQL Server 7 and she has once
again written a great book on the interal workings of SQL Server. I highly recommend this book
for anyone working with SQL Server. It is a great desktop reference and has answered some "how
does it work" questions for me.
I would not sit down and read this entire book cover to cover, and actually have not read the entire
book. I have read a substantial portion of it as research in understanding how some proceses work in
SQL Server 2000. Once very interesting thing I learned about cached execution plans is that they are not
reused if you do not specify the owner of a table. If the server must make the implicit conversion to "dbo"
then the execution plan will be recompiled to verify the ownsership chain.
Overall, I found this book, like the version before it, to be easy to read and explain most
SQL Server behavior in a straightforward and easy to understand manner. I read mostly the second half
of the book as the beginning sections would not really help me. I was very impressed with the locking
and query processor chapters. This is a great complement to Books Online and one that I purchased for home,
even though we have a copy at work. If you have to get just one general SQL Server 2000 book, this should be
it.
Steve Jones
January 2001
This page will contain reviews of technical books, though if you are
interested in seeing what else I read, I have been tracking the books I read on my web site,dkRanch.net.
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