I hate replication. And I do my best to avoid it if at all possible.

Back in 2002 It was my responsibility to build a DR plan for our SQL servers at our offsite 50 miles away connected by 4 T-1s. So I started the first effort try to use transactional replication to a set of standby databases. It failed the first test and then a month later failed the retest. So it was back to square one.

Then I come to my current company and they built the software to have a master DB at the headquarters and supposedly replicate "universal" data like suppliers and standard codes down to the individual faacility DBs. It would only work on a facility that had at least two solid T-1 connections. Otherwise the facilities had to be co-located on servers at HA and then would RDP into facility or terminal servers. They finally shut it down for lack of customers.

So onto the next SW we produced. It had a master DB and then two they had built two silos of data to try and load balance the customers. They used replication to move data down hill in the individual silos. But they never differentiated the replication so it was duplicating the data in both silos. And taking up the space.

Now when someone says replication it takes all my personal skills not to shudder. If I can avoid it -- I will. I'd rather build everything by had to transfer data from DB to DB.