Monitoring SQL database

  • I've got a database in production, which is growing on it's own about 1 GB an hour. The database is in Simple Recovery mode, so the actual .mdf file grows, not the log. I am trying to figure out which table is growing exactly, but that's rather difficult, because there are hundreds of tables in there. Yesterday I took the database offline, moved it to a different hard drive, and then reattached it to server. Even though the database was idle, and no one was connected to it, it still continued to grow. My question is, are there any free tools that I can use to monitor that database, and see which tables change, and which statements get executed in the background, other than doing a SQL trace?

  • How much detail do you want to get into for your trace? If you want to just look at table sizes you could run something like this

    select OBJECT_NAME(object_id), row_count, GETDATE()

    from sys.dm_db_partition_stats

    where index_id in (0,1)

    order by OBJECT_NAME(object_id)

    and run that periodically to see which tables are growing (by row count), if it's growing as quickly as you say it should be pretty obvious which tables are the culprits.

    Apart from that, do you have the MDW configured and running?

  • Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't think there is an MDW database. This data warehouse database was installed by the vendor who also did our Dynamics GP install. I'll keep an eye out on what the figures look like as far as row count goes.

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