SSMS or SSDT

  • SSMS

  • Never even heard of SSDT. I use SSMS.

  • SSMS for the most part.

    I have, and use, Visual Studio for a few things, but find its memory footprint heavy, and the interface is not as responsive sometimes.

    And, yes, I remember Enterprise Manager.

    Mark
    Just a cog in the wheel.

  • I use SSDT on business intelligence projects. If I'm writing stored procedures, designing new databases or modifying existing ones, I am more comfortable in SSMS. However, SSDT has matured relative to the database design experience especially in Studio 2013.

  • hakim.ali (3/27/2015)


    We are a Microsoft shop, and our developers live in Visual Studio. They also do a lot of DB development. This happens in Visual Studio SSDT. We tie it to TFS for source control and also use it for automated deployments. Prod DBAs heavily use SSMS for administration and management. Us Dev DBAs live in both tools/worlds. I'm a big fan SSMS.

    As an aside, now SSMS really is a Visual Studio IDE/extension/development/tool/thingy, so if you work in SSMS you are indirectly working in Visual Studio.

    You actually can point SQL Source Control at an SSDT project and it will work, there are just pieces, and I can't remember what that don't work well. Two reasons I prefer SSDT over SQL Source Control are:

    1. SSDT has database settings in addition to schema

    2. SSDT has T4 support now so I can autogen any crud procedures, auditing triggers/tables, or views and SQL Source Control doesn't handle the T4 template generated code or at least it didn't.

  • Appreciate the pointer on T4 support, Jack. I've know about the concept for a while, but adding that to my toolkit now. It looks pretty cool, if still "an opportunity for developers" out of the box. 🙂

    And a link for more info for those just hitting this for the first time:

    http://www.hanselman.com/blog/T4TextTemplateTransformationToolkitCodeGenerationBestKeptVisualStudioSecret.aspx

  • As a multi-tier developer (DB, BL, UI) who works primarily on data-management applications, I switch back and forth between SSMS and VS frequently.

    I have done a good bit of work with SSDT and like it, but don't have all of my habits down pat. I often add a database project to the applications that I work on, and import the pertinent database code into it; I can use Git to manage changes, and I can refer to the database code without having to switch over to SSMS. In a previous job I developed and deployed a large database entirely from Visual Studio; I haven't had the opportunity to do so recently.

    However, working with SQL Server data in Visual Studio is cumbersome. Querying data in VS is not as smooth as in SSMS. I'm really disappointed that after this many years, Microsoft still doesn't quite "get" that some developers develop both .Net applications and SQL Server databases.

    Jay Bienvenu | http://bienv.com | http://twitter.com/jbnv

  • As others have mentioned, I use both. SSMS for ad-hoc queries and SSDT for development, source control (TFS), schema compares, and deployment script building.

    You can create solutions and projects in SSMS too, but they are different that the SQL Projects created in SSDT...just a repository of scripts.

    Thanks...Chris

  • Vague recollection of Data Dude, I'd never heard of SSDT and will check it out. I really need to work with source control, and if DT integrates it well that would be definite bonus.

    SSMS 2014 and SQL Query Analyzer 2000 are open from Monday 8am to Friday 5pm. Our PCs have a scheduled shutdown Friday at 7pm, otherwise they would be open 24/7.

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    [font="Arial"]Knowledge is of two kinds. We know a subject ourselves or we know where we can find information upon it. --Samuel Johnson[/font]

  • Hands down, I prefer SSMS. This past month had no choice, but to use SSDT for source control and schema compare through SSDT and I didn't care for it. It was slower than working the Red Gate tools in SSMS.

    Mickey Stuewe
    Sr Database Developer
    My blog
    Follow me on twitter: @SQLMickey
    Connect with me on LinkedIn
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    I laugh loudly and I laugh often. Just ask anyone who knows me.

  • SSMS for T-SQL, schema development and admin work, DT for ETL. I'm a C#/ASP.NET dev by background lately transferred into DW/BI dev.

  • Peter Schott (3/27/2015)


    Appreciate the pointer on T4 support, Jack. I've know about the concept for a while, but adding that to my toolkit now. It looks pretty cool, if still "an opportunity for developers" out of the box. 🙂

    And a link for more info for those just hitting this for the first time:

    http://www.hanselman.com/blog/T4TextTemplateTransformationToolkitCodeGenerationBestKeptVisualStudioSecret.aspx

    There is actually a specific T-SQL T4 template available for Database Projects. The only post/article I know of on it is by Dave Ballantyne, http://dataidol.com/davebally/2014/03/29/t4-support-in-ssdt/, and I have looked. There is a decent presentation available on it from last year's SQLBITS as well, www.sqlbits.com/Sessions/Event12/T4_Templating_within_SSDT_using_SQL_Server_2014. I also have a presentation I do on it, that I did submit to the PASS Summit this year, so hopefully I'll be speaking on it there.

  • I use SSMS for ad-hoc querying and testing various solutions.

    But, I maintain databases using SSDT projects. For source control, deployment, comparison, finding references, it's great.

  • SSMS exclusively, with SSMS Tools. We use TFS for source control, and for that I use the TeamFoundation Power Tools so I can check in/out/compare right from explorer. I try to avoid VS if I can.

  • trboyden (3/27/2015)


    Pretty much live in SSMS and code T-SQL in my sleep. However if writing a .NET app, I'd be curious why the discussion is SSDT versus using the Entity Framework which seems to be the way to go for data persistence strategies in the current ORM world? Personally, I prefer the Grails Framework for doing ORM-based applications, but I digress.

    I suspect that anyone who understands what the relatinal model is and has read the third paragraph of the wikipedia page on ORM would do almost anything to avoid going anywhere near an ORM-based approach. That's perhaps why the discussion doesn't go there.

    Tom

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