SQL Server Integration Services to simplify database maintenance

Compared to the SQLMaint black box, the new interface will be easier to understand and less intimidating for DBAs. Therefore, database maintenance will be conducted on a more regular basis and overall performance will improve; a little SQL Server care and attention can go along way in improving performance.

That is not to say that DBAs following sophisticated maintenance regimens should abandon them; they should just leverage SSIS' new functionality to simplify the maintenance process. I wholeheartedly praise database administrators who have built such maintenance plans, but I have also worked with DBAs who have no procedures in place. I believe the SSIS interface offers a key stepping stone toward performing regularly scheduled maintenance. In turn, this plan should ensure that overall SQL Server performance is at a consistently high level to suit the organization.

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RELATED GLOSSARY TERMS Terms from Whatis.com − the technology online dictionary ACID  (SearchSQLServer.com) commit  (SearchSQLServer.com) DAO  (SearchSQLServer.com) fetch  (SearchSQLServer.com) OLE DB  (SearchSQLServer.com) query  (SearchSQLServer.com) SQL  (SearchSQLServer.com) T-SQL  (SearchSQLServer.com)

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SSIS has caught the eye of many individuals. Feel free to check out these books that are currently available:

For more information, visit Microsoft's Integration Services Web site. Or download the latest version of SQL Server 2005 Books Online.

Conclusion

If anything can bring excitement to database maintenance it is SSIS. The improvements from SQL Server 2000 to 2005 are very beneficial just from a pure ETL perspective. With the extension of SSIS to database maintenance, the point-and-click capabilities are vastly improved and will hopefully ease the maintenance burden.

About the author: Jeremy Kadlec is the principal database engineer at Edgewood Solutions, a technology services company delivering professional services and product solutions for Microsoft SQL Server. He has authored numerous articles and delivers frequent presentations at regional SQL Server users groups and nationally at SQL PASS. Kadlec is the SearchSQLServer.com Performance Tuning expert. Ask him a question here.

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