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Category: Versions

New No-Longer-Features In SQL Server 2016

Published 2016-06-23 by Kevin Feasel

Bob Pusateri acts as SQL grim reaper:

32-bit SQL Server. SQL Server 2016 is 64-bit only. If for whatever reason you’re running on a 32-bit architecture, sadly you’re now out of luck – 2014 is the end of the road. On the bright side, there’s probably some new hardware in your future!

Compatibility Level 90. If you’re using compatibility level for backwards compatibility, the oldest available version in SQL Server 2016 is 100, which corresponds to SQL Server 2008. Compatibility level 90, SQL Server 2005, is no longer an option.

Bob also covers a few deprecated features, none of which (hopefully) are in regular use in your environment.

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Waiting For SP1

Published 2016-06-15 by Kevin Feasel

Guy Glantser hates “wait for SP1” advice:

Historical Facts

Throughout my career I have never seen an RTM version that was substantially less stable then the following SP1. Sure, there were bugs and issues. Sometimes there were critical bugs and issues. But there were just as much bugs and issues in SP1 and in SP2, and so on. I haven’t conducted a thorough research, so I don’t have a statistical proof, but these are the facts, at least from my experience.

I’d add one more thing:  pre-release versions of SQL Server run in production as part of Microsoft TAP (older link, and I think RDP and TAP have merged together at this point, but I don’t have those inside details).  These are real companies with real workloads running pre-RTM versions of SQL Server.  I work for a company which is in the program, and we were running our data warehouse on CTP 3 and then RCs.  By the time RTM hits the shelves, there’s already been a good deal of burn-in.

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Choose Your Edition

Published 2016-06-15 by Kevin Feasel

Grant Fritchey explains the differences between different editions of SQL Server:

SQL Server Enterprise Edition is the high end. Here is where you need to go to multi-terrabytes in size and you have massive transaction loads. You’re looking at very sophisticated availability and disaster recovery. Again, the name gives it away. You’re generally only going to this edition when you’re working at an enterprise level of scale and architecture. Since you’re just getting started, don’t worry about this.

My version of the story is, “Buy Enterprise Edition.  Don’t cheap out because you’ll regret it later.”  Grant’s version is much more thorough.

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Launch Event Thoughts

Published 2016-06-14 by Kevin Feasel

Patrick Keisler sums up his thoughts on the Raleigh-Durham SQL Server 2016 Launch Discovery Day:

Your solution must be completed in 3 hours.

On paper this all sounds pretty easy, but in practice it was quite hard. I am no BI developer and the other members of my team did not have any expertise in that area either, but we still managed to create a solution and have fun doing so.

The first issue was had was how to combine our development work on the same database. This one was easy…just use Azure. In the span of about 30 minutes, I spun up a new Azure VM with SQL Server 2016 pre-installed, uploaded the database, setup logins, and opened the appropriate ports. I then gave my team members the URL and credentials so they each could connect from their laptops.

These are good thoughts, and I completely agree with the point that better data definition would have made for a better event.  Each one of the teams had to spend a lot of time cleaning up data, and I think that limited the teams’ ability to do really cool things.  I’d love to put something like this on again, but if that happens, I’m going to make sure we start with a good data model so people can do fun things on top of that rather than spend all their time scrubbing data (unless that’s the point of the exercise).

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More Licensing Notes

Published 2016-06-09 by Kevin Feasel

Joey D’Antoni has additional information on licensing for SQL Server 2016:

SQL Server 2016 launched last week to great reviews and with a ton of great new features. I have been working with this version for well over a year now and extremely happy to see it hit RTM and be broadly adopted. So as DBAs it always sucks when you get excited about new features, only to find out the price changed, or vendor “O” made that feature a cost option. So what’s new with SQL Server 2016 licensing? (you won’t this as a session title at any upcoming SQL Server events).  Well first the good news—SQL Server 2016 is the same price and 2012 and 2014 (roughly $6800 core for Enterprise Edition). That’s definitely good news—Microsoft gave us a bunch of new functionality and didn’t raise the price. Additionally, if you see my below post on what is in Standard Edition, they added a lot of functionality there, too.

But we know finance and marketing employees have jobs to do as well, and there is no way they were letting a major version release happen without some changes. So let’s take a look at the one’s Denny Cherry (b|t) and I could glean out of the licensing guide. Please download and read for yourself.

There are a couple of interesting nuances that you’ll want to read up on.

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T-SQL Tuesday: SQL 2016

Published 2016-06-08 by Kevin Feasel

Michael J. Swart is hosting this month’s T-SQL Tuesday:

SQL Server 2016 went RTM this week and so naturally, we’re going to write about it. Here are a few writing prompts for you:

  • Check out what’s new. Microsoft has written a lot about their new features. Thomas Larock has written a really nice landing page for those posts, SQL Server 2016: It Just Runs Faster – Thomas Larock. Look through those links. Do you feel optimistic about 2016? Or maybe a bit disappointed? Let us know either way

  • Haven’t had time to download the bits, install them, explore and form thoughts on 2016 yet? Have no fear, check out Microsoft’s Virtual Labs. It lets you explore features without worrying about all the setup. In minutes you’ll be typing SELECT 'hello world';

Get writing!

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Downloading SQL Express 2016

Published 2016-06-07 by Kevin Feasel

Dave Mason tries out SQL Server Express 2016:

I’m not a fan of the filename “SQLEXPRADV_x64_ENU.exe”. It’s not very descriptive IMO. But if you hover your mouse over the file, there’s a helpful file description tool tip. I’ll probably rename the file anyway.

The download process has changed significantly and I have to admit I’m surprised that I like it so much. I can be set in my ways and averse to change. But once I launched that initial “SQLServer2016-SSEI-Expr.exe” download, everything made sense.

Think back to SQL Server 2012 Express. Remember the “Choose the download you want” dialog? Those file names aren’t very intuitive. I had to Google them every time to make sure I picked the right one. It was slightly better for SQL Server 2014 Express. But still. Yuck!

Sounds like they’ve improved the download experience for Express edition.

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Converting SSIS Solution Versions

Published 2016-06-06 by Kevin Feasel

Andy Leonard shows how to convert a SQL Server Integration Services solution from one version of SQL Server to another:

Note the “(SQL Server 2014)” beside the project name in Solution Explorer.

If I want to deploy this project to an SSIS Catalog on a SQL Server 2016 instance, I should update the project to SSIS 2016. How do I do this? In Solution Explorer, right-click the project name and click Properties

There are some nice screen shots to walk you through this.  I’m happy that SSIS is moving in a multi-version direction.  That makes it easier for me as a developer to upgrade my tools without needing three versions of Visual Studio (or SSDT).

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Upgrading To RTM

Published 2016-06-02 by Kevin Feasel

John Sterrett walks us through upgrading an RC of SQL Server 2016 to RTM:

Please read the release notes. There actually might be a few things you need to complete before upgrading to GA especially if you are using Stretch Databases.

Everyone, should validate if they need to apply KB 3138367. msvcr120.dll should be version 12.0.40649.5 or higher.

This is a nice walkthrough with a lot of screen shots, making it easy to follow.

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