I guess it can be less flexible, but it's more reliable. What flexibility do you need?

Both Idera, and Red Gate (I work for Red Gate), have options to help with recovery with their Virtual Database and Virtual Restore (respectively) products.

Keep in mind that your dev/QA environments will need to change as well. Pulling a copy of production back to check things can be much more difficult.

You'll also likely not...

First, there are no rows in SQL Server as in numbered rows. Any row can occur in any order and without an ORDER BY in your query, no order is...

Just a quick note, if you're handling relationships in code, you're building a relational database. Just not declaring RI in the database.

Deciding on relational or non-relational seems to be a...

Deletes and failed inserts are the issues. If you have some rollback, broken connection, etc. that doesn't complete, you'll have gaps.

It shouldn't be a problem. The identity isn't a row...

If you set to simple, then Gail is correct. But if you have it in full recovery for any reason, you need those log backups. Not necessarily for recovery, but...

I'm in, got the pwd from Simon and team in the league.

I'll likely auto-draft as I'm busy too many nights, but if I can join in, I will.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms177410.aspx

I agree with Gail. I would run a log daily just to clear out the changes from that day.

Asking for a pwd for the league as well. Or is this a public league?

I agree with the idea that you rebuild what needs to be rebuilt. If you do each one individually, it will need log space for that index, but then it...

You could potentially build something, but it would be very cumbersome. The safest way is for you to track the old and new columns. I wouldn't do this in one...

Hugo is correct, a varchar(1) or nvarchar(1), doesn't make sense. It uses more space. Not much, but more.

I have typically gone with char(4) or less. When I get to 5,...

We have an iMac, and lots of Win machines here. I think building a machine can be fun, if you want to do that. Many techies like that, but many...