Category: SQL Server Management Studio

Slava Murygin shows how to update shortcuts in Management Studio:

A lot of people in the Internet complain about their version of SSMS “forgot” some hot-key combinations. The oldest complain I remember was about the most useful combination “Ctrl-R”.

The reason why SSMS “forgets” is within code sharing and reusability with other Microsoft development products.
If you have that problem, most probably I have (or had in the past) installed something else from Microsoft, such as Development Studio, Data Tools etc.

It can get annoying when another tool clobbers your expected shortcuts.

Andy Mallon shows how to close a tab in SSMS and change the shortcut value:

CTRL + F4

Huzzah! This will close your query tab! Easy as pie. Also, note that CTRL+F4 is a pretty universal shortcut that works to close tabs/windows in other applications, too–including your favorite web browser. If you can switch your muscle memory away from CTRL+W to CTRL+F4, you can use that shortcut pretty much everywhere.

Click through for more information on changing shortcuts.

Kendra Little shows off a really cool feature in SQL Server 2016 & 2014 SP2:

SQL Server now shows Actual Elapsed CPU Time and Actual Elapsed Time (duration) for each operator in an Actual Execution Plan

For SQL Server 2016 and 2014 SP2 and higher, actual execution plans contain a bunch of new information on each operator, including how much CPU they burn, how long it takes, and how much IO is done by that operator. This was a little hard to use for a while because the information was only visible in the XML of the execution plan.

Check out Kendra’s post for more details, including a couple caveats.

Andrew Peterson troubleshoots an error after installing SSMS vNext:

After installing SQL Server Management Studio for vNext, the Configuration Manager no longer opens, with a message similar to the following:

Cannot connect to WMI provider. You do not have permission or the server is unreachable. Note that you can only manage SQL Server 2005 and later servers with SQL Server Configuration Manager.
Invalid namespace [0x8004100e]

Read on for the solution.

Denis Gobo shows how to specify a database when connecting to an instance using Management Studio:

One of our database on the development went in suspect mode today. This database was the default for a bunch of logins.  These people could not login now. Someone needed to use a different database but he couldn’t login because the database that was in suspect mode was the default database for the login he was using.

I told this person to click on the Options button in the connection dialog and specify another database. I guess there was an misunderstanding because this person couldn’t get it to work. This means it is time for a blog post.

Connecting to the default database is usually fine, but sometimes you need to specify one.  Fortunately, Management Studio makes it pretty easy.

Jay Robinson has a couple Visual Studio Settings files to change Management Studio font sizes:

I present technical sessions now and then – my local PASS group, SQL Saturdays, internal groups at my workplace, etc. I frequently find myself adjusting the fonts inside SQL Server Management Studio to make sure my material is readable on the big screen. I’ve also been in the audience plenty of times, watching with sympathy as one of my cohorts agonizingly navigates this problem.

Usually, it goes something like this. They first find the [100%] tucked away in the lower left corner of the text window, and blow that up to 150 or 200 percent. Then they run their query to find that the results are still at 100%. So then they eventually find the Options dialog under the Tools menu, find the Fonts and Colors branch of the tree, and then groan when they realize they have to figure out which three or four of the 30 different fonts they need to change. Sometimes, they’ll give up there and just go use ZoomIt (which any good technical presenter should have available anyway), but constantly bouncing around with ZoomIt will get old quickly over the course of an hour-long session.

Having VSSettings files is a good idea, although I’ve noticed oddities when also trying to change colors (e.g., darker theme for regular development but a lighter theme for presentations), so test out any settings files you want to use and make sure you can swap back and forth without seeing weird behavior.