In November 26th, Microsoft Cyprus will be hosting "Momentum 2009", this year's biggest event in Cyprus.
The event features two tracks; (i) A track for IT Professionals, and (ii) A track for Developers.
On the IT Professionals track, attendees can learn on how to increase productivity using innovations in Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2 and Microsoft Exchange Server 2010.
On the Developers track, attendees can learn about Windows 7 application development, IE 8 tips and tricks for developers, Self-service BI with SQL Server 2008 R2, SharePoint 2010 Developer Platform and the Microsoft Azure Cloud application platform.
Cyprus .NET User Group (CDNUG) is actively participating to this event with three of its members presenting sessions on the Developers track!
To this end, I am happy to be participating by presenting the session with topic "Self-Service Business Intelligence with SQL Server 2008 R2".
In my session I will talk about SQL Server PowerPivot for Excel 2010 (formerly codenamed “Gemini”) and show how business users can take advantage of this great feature and fulfill their analytical requirements efficiently and iteratively, without the need to be based on a predefined model. During the session, many live demonstrations will take place in order to see PowerPivot in action!
Looking forward to seeing you all at the event!
Read more on this article...
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Friday, November 6, 2009
Product Review: SQL Object Level Recovery Native
One of the many privileges of being a Friend of Red Gate, is that you have the chance to evaluate the company's products and provide feedback and suggestions. In this post, I provide my review for one of Red Gate's latest tools; SQL Object Level Recovery Native.
SQL Object Level Recovery Native enables you to recover individual database objects from a native SQL Server backup file. Yes, that’s right! You do not have to restore the entire database, but you can just restore individual objects you select when “browsing” the backup files using the tool.
I am sharing the experience I had with using the tool through several screenshots along with explanation of the steps involved in my test case scenario. OK, let's start!
On the first screen by clicking on the “Select backup source” hyperlink, you are presented with a screen where you can select one or more SQL Server native backup files to be included in the backup sources:
On this screen by clicking on the “Add Files” button you can select the SQL Server native backup files for choosing objects to restore from:
In my test case scenario I used the “master” and “bikes” database backup files, as you can see on the next screen. After adding the backup files you want, in the “Available Backups” table you are presented with the backups you can use and which exist within the selected native SQL Server backup files (more than one backup may exist in the backup file as you might have appended more than one within the same backup file).
At this point you have to note that you can only select a single backup at-a-time for restoring objects from. In my example, I chose the bikes backup taken on October 1, 2009:
Then, it is the most important screen of all; selecting the objects for recovery! In this example I selected the “Category” table. On the right of the screen, you are presented with schema and data (where available) previews for each object you focus on. This helps you easily understand what object you are looking for (if you do not know already! :)
So as said, I chose the “Category” table. This screen shows the schema preview for this table:
And this screen shows the data preview for the same table:
At the bottom of the above screen there are two buttons. If you click on the “View Recovery Script” button you will be provided with a generated script which creates a DDL script for the object(s) you selected for recovery and also a DML script for recovering the data contained within the object (in the case the selected object is a table).
If you click on the “Recover Objects” button, you are presented with the following screen. The screen contains the object(s) to be recovered (you can select more than one object), and the necessary fields for specifying the destination database. To this end, you have to complete the SQL Server/Instance name, the authentication method/credentials, and the destination database. In this example I am using an instance of SQL Server 2008 on my localhost named “SQL2008”, windows authentication and I chose to restore the “Category” table into the “SampleDB” database.
When clicking on the “Recover” button, the object recovery process takes place and after it finishes, you are presented with a summary of the process outcome (note: if the specific object already exists on the destination you will get a relevant error message).
OK, it is time to check within SQL Server Management Studio to see if the object exists on the database and it is operational. As you can see on the following screenshot, of course it is! :)
Remarks
I am quite sure that many times in the life of a DBA or Database Developer, specific objects were needed to be restored from a backup file. SQL Object Level Recovery Native allows recovering individual database objects without needing to restore the entire database backup.
I find this useful and cool!
The SQL Server native backup files supported by the tool are these of SQL Server 2000, 2005 and 2008.
For more information on SQL Object Level Recovery Native please visit this link.
I hope you find this review useful!
Read more on this article...
SQL Object Level Recovery Native enables you to recover individual database objects from a native SQL Server backup file. Yes, that’s right! You do not have to restore the entire database, but you can just restore individual objects you select when “browsing” the backup files using the tool.
I am sharing the experience I had with using the tool through several screenshots along with explanation of the steps involved in my test case scenario. OK, let's start!
On the first screen by clicking on the “Select backup source” hyperlink, you are presented with a screen where you can select one or more SQL Server native backup files to be included in the backup sources:
On this screen by clicking on the “Add Files” button you can select the SQL Server native backup files for choosing objects to restore from:
In my test case scenario I used the “master” and “bikes” database backup files, as you can see on the next screen. After adding the backup files you want, in the “Available Backups” table you are presented with the backups you can use and which exist within the selected native SQL Server backup files (more than one backup may exist in the backup file as you might have appended more than one within the same backup file).
At this point you have to note that you can only select a single backup at-a-time for restoring objects from. In my example, I chose the bikes backup taken on October 1, 2009:
Then, it is the most important screen of all; selecting the objects for recovery! In this example I selected the “Category” table. On the right of the screen, you are presented with schema and data (where available) previews for each object you focus on. This helps you easily understand what object you are looking for (if you do not know already! :)
So as said, I chose the “Category” table. This screen shows the schema preview for this table:
And this screen shows the data preview for the same table:
At the bottom of the above screen there are two buttons. If you click on the “View Recovery Script” button you will be provided with a generated script which creates a DDL script for the object(s) you selected for recovery and also a DML script for recovering the data contained within the object (in the case the selected object is a table).
If you click on the “Recover Objects” button, you are presented with the following screen. The screen contains the object(s) to be recovered (you can select more than one object), and the necessary fields for specifying the destination database. To this end, you have to complete the SQL Server/Instance name, the authentication method/credentials, and the destination database. In this example I am using an instance of SQL Server 2008 on my localhost named “SQL2008”, windows authentication and I chose to restore the “Category” table into the “SampleDB” database.
When clicking on the “Recover” button, the object recovery process takes place and after it finishes, you are presented with a summary of the process outcome (note: if the specific object already exists on the destination you will get a relevant error message).
OK, it is time to check within SQL Server Management Studio to see if the object exists on the database and it is operational. As you can see on the following screenshot, of course it is! :)
Remarks
I am quite sure that many times in the life of a DBA or Database Developer, specific objects were needed to be restored from a backup file. SQL Object Level Recovery Native allows recovering individual database objects without needing to restore the entire database backup.
I find this useful and cool!
The SQL Server native backup files supported by the tool are these of SQL Server 2000, 2005 and 2008.
For more information on SQL Object Level Recovery Native please visit this link.
I hope you find this review useful!
Read more on this article...
Sunday, November 1, 2009
CDNUG Event Review - October 27, 2009 - Visual Studio 2010 Beta / Windows Azure Platform
Another great CDNUG event took place last Tuesday, October 27, 2009 at Microsoft-Cyprus.
This event was "celebratory" as it was the first offline event after summer holidays.
Of course summer was not an idle time. It was rather a great period of online events, and more specifically Live Webcasts!
Among other, in July 29, I delivered a talk on the new Programmability features in SQL Server 2008 and more specifically about the T-SQL Enhancements (Review).
Additionally I had the pleasure to participate to the 24 Hours of PASS, and MY-TG SQL Server Community Series as a speaker, delivering Live Webcasts on ADO .NET Data Services (Review) and Sync Framework respectively (Review) and thus representing Cyprus .NET User Group (CDNUG)!
Due to the nature of this event, we had two great sessions delivered by two great speakers! In the first session, Karl Davies-Barrett, Developer Platform Evangelist at Microsoft Malta & Cyprus and great friend of CDNUG, talked about Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Beta 2 and demonstrated many of its great new features. In the second session, Luka Debeljak, CEE DPE Regional Technical Lead at Microsoft Corporation, introduced to us the Microsoft Windows Azure Platform from a developer’s perspective.
Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 provides the .NET developer with a huge variety of new enhancements in areas such as: Application Lifecycle Management, Developer Experience, Cloud Development, Web Development and last but not least, Parallel Programming.
In his session, Karl talked about all these features and with the use of some really interesting demos, showed us how the developer can take advantage of these features and thus, have a fantastic development experience!
Right after Karl's session, we moved on with the introduction to the Windows Azure Platform by Luka!
Windows Azure is a new, cloud services Microsoft Operating System that serves as the development, service hosting and service management environment for the Windows Azure platform. The Windows Azure platform offers an intuitive, reliable and powerful platform for the creation of web applications and services. The Windows Azure platform is comprised of Windows Azure: an operating system as a service; SQL Azure: a fully relational database in the cloud; and .NET Services: consumable web-based services that provide both secure connectivity and federated access control for applications.
Luka talked about the Microsoft Windows Azure Platform and also provided information regarding all the services currently offered for hosting/management on the platform. To this end, we were presented many live demos of SQL Azure and .NET Services. Luka also demonstrated how we can develop .NET applications for hosting on the Windows Azure Platform using the Windows Azure tools for Visual Studio. The development environment for the demos was Microsoft Visual 2010 something which proved that it was a really great idea hosting these two sessions within a single event!
A BIG thank you to Karl Davies-Barrett and Luka Debeljak for delivering these two really interesting sessions to our User Group. Thanks for supporting CDNUG!
For event pics and other information please visit CDNUG website!
Read more on this article...
This event was "celebratory" as it was the first offline event after summer holidays.
Of course summer was not an idle time. It was rather a great period of online events, and more specifically Live Webcasts!
Among other, in July 29, I delivered a talk on the new Programmability features in SQL Server 2008 and more specifically about the T-SQL Enhancements (Review).
Additionally I had the pleasure to participate to the 24 Hours of PASS, and MY-TG SQL Server Community Series as a speaker, delivering Live Webcasts on ADO .NET Data Services (Review) and Sync Framework respectively (Review) and thus representing Cyprus .NET User Group (CDNUG)!
Due to the nature of this event, we had two great sessions delivered by two great speakers! In the first session, Karl Davies-Barrett, Developer Platform Evangelist at Microsoft Malta & Cyprus and great friend of CDNUG, talked about Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Beta 2 and demonstrated many of its great new features. In the second session, Luka Debeljak, CEE DPE Regional Technical Lead at Microsoft Corporation, introduced to us the Microsoft Windows Azure Platform from a developer’s perspective.
Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 provides the .NET developer with a huge variety of new enhancements in areas such as: Application Lifecycle Management, Developer Experience, Cloud Development, Web Development and last but not least, Parallel Programming.
In his session, Karl talked about all these features and with the use of some really interesting demos, showed us how the developer can take advantage of these features and thus, have a fantastic development experience!
Right after Karl's session, we moved on with the introduction to the Windows Azure Platform by Luka!
Windows Azure is a new, cloud services Microsoft Operating System that serves as the development, service hosting and service management environment for the Windows Azure platform. The Windows Azure platform offers an intuitive, reliable and powerful platform for the creation of web applications and services. The Windows Azure platform is comprised of Windows Azure: an operating system as a service; SQL Azure: a fully relational database in the cloud; and .NET Services: consumable web-based services that provide both secure connectivity and federated access control for applications.
Luka talked about the Microsoft Windows Azure Platform and also provided information regarding all the services currently offered for hosting/management on the platform. To this end, we were presented many live demos of SQL Azure and .NET Services. Luka also demonstrated how we can develop .NET applications for hosting on the Windows Azure Platform using the Windows Azure tools for Visual Studio. The development environment for the demos was Microsoft Visual 2010 something which proved that it was a really great idea hosting these two sessions within a single event!
A BIG thank you to Karl Davies-Barrett and Luka Debeljak for delivering these two really interesting sessions to our User Group. Thanks for supporting CDNUG!
For event pics and other information please visit CDNUG website!
Read more on this article...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
