Technical Article

Building Reports Based On Stored Procedures

Usually developers like having full control over their reports but what happens if you have someone designated to build reports who does not quite know the backend schema. A good way to separate the building of the data for the report and the report design could be stored procedures. Now I consume stored procedures using Oracle which is not much different consuming stored procedures with SQL Server, however building the procedures is much different between the two. Even though I mention and show examples of stored procedures this is not an article for building them, just a guide for consuming a stored procedure within a Reporting Services Report.

SQLServerCentral Article

DTS Standards

SQL Server 2000 brought us DTS, a new way of working with data movement for SQL Server DBAs. However, unlike Integration Services and Project REAL, there weren't any great standards for working with this tool and building portable solutions was hard. Jonathan Stokes brings us a great article on how you can create a standard structure for your packages and make them more portable.

SQLServerCentral Article

Starting and Stopping SQL Server Part 1

I'm sure most DBAs don't give a second thought to starting and stopping their SQL Server 2000 servers. But do you know the different ways to do this and some of the impacts and expectations you should have? Especially with hardware growing, it's not always as simple and straightforward as it should be. Andy Warren recently had to deal with some issues and starts a new series looking at the various ways of starting and stopping SQL Server.

Technical Article

SQL Server 2005 Learning Guide

It's been five years since Microsoft released a new DBMS, but both experts and users agree that this one was worth the wait. SQL Server 2005's enhancements and new features have made the system a much more attractive attractive option to both large and small shops. Nonetheless, upgrading to SQL Server 2005 is a serious undertaking, requiring extensive training, planning and testing. In this Learning Guide, you will find news, technical tips and expert advice to help address your questions and concerns regarding SQL Server 2005 and put you on the road to a successful upgrade.

External Article

Dynamic Management Views

The dynamic management views (DMVs) in SQL Server 2005 are designed to give you a window into what's going on inside SQL Server. They can provide information on what's currently happening inside the server as well as the objects it's storing. They are designed to be used instead of system tables and the various functions provided in SQL Server 2000. This article provides an introduction to DMVs and covers a few of the basic views and functions.

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Question of the Day

Adding and Dropping Columns I

I have this table in my SQL Server 2022 database: 

CREATE TABLE [dbo].[CityList]
(
[CityNameID] [int] NOT NULL IDENTITY(1, 1),
[CityName] [varchar] (30) COLLATE SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS NULL
) ON [PRIMARY]
GO
I decide to add two new columns for the StateProvince and Country. What code should I use?

See possible answers