Paul Clancy (9/6/2010)
I'm mildly horrified at the notion that anyone might think that I was suggesting HTML-via-mail-via-SSIS as the best or only way to serve this functional problem. My starting point was quite different, much more like, "look, you can do this with SSIS too". Not just simple data pumping from A to B, say. The XML/HTML demo was a means to this end, not a recommendation.
Heh... please pardon those of us who were mildly horrified 😛 at the notion that it looked that way especially since the following was in the article...
... so I went about figuring out if it was possible to automatically notify users that these records had not been deleted via e-mail. They needed to get full details in a user-friendly format so they could take further action, so HTML mail was the desired means of delivery.
The package I came up with to achieve this can be used to mail any suitable SQL result set and [font="Arial Black"]proves once again the flexibility of SSIS and the different ways it can be used to solve a variety of problems beyond its everyday use as an ETL tool[/font].
It's probably just me, but that looks like a recommendation for doing this in SSIS. 😉
Anyway, please take no offense. Whether I agree with the complexity of the method or not, the concept does work and it's a very well written article with graphics and examples in all the right spots. Well done, Paul. 🙂
--Jeff Moden
Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.