professional microsoft sql server 2008 programming

Professional SQL Server 2008 Reporting ServicesProfessional Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services shows readers how to build data warehouses and multidimensional databases, query

Professional SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services

Professional Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Analysis Services shows readers how to

build data warehouses and multidimensional databases, query databases, and use Analysis Services and other components of SQL Server to provide end-to-end solutions

Professional Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Programming

978-0-470-25702-9

This updated new edition of Wrox’s best-selling SQL Server book has been expanded

to include coverage of SQL Server 2008’s new datatypes, new indexing structures, manageability features, and advanced time-zone handling

Professional Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Administration

978-0-470-24796-9

A how-to guide for experienced database administrators, this book is loaded with unique tips, tricks, and workarounds for handling the most difficult SQL Server administration issues The authors discuss data capture, performance studio, Query Governor, and new techniques for monitoring and policy management

Beginning Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Programming

Beginning T-SQL with Microsoft SQL Server 2005 and 2008 provides a comprehensive introduction to the T-SQL programming language, with

concrete examples showing how T-SQL works with both SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server 2008

Beginning Database Design Solutions

978-0-470-38549-4

Beginning Database Design Solutions introduces IT professionals—both DBAs and database developers—to database design It explains what

databases are, their goals, and why proper design is necessary to achieve those goals It tells how to decide what should be in a database to meet the application’s requirements It tells how to structure the database so it gives good performance while minimizing the chance for error

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Introduction xxxv

Chapter 1: Being Objective: Re-Examining Objects in SQL Server 1

Chapter 2: Tool Time 19

Chapter 3: Asking a Better Question: Advanced Queries 37

Chapter 4: XML Integration 67

Chapter 5: Daring to Design 113

Chapter 6: Core Storage and Index Structure 147

Chapter 7: More Advanced Index Structures 189

Chapter 8: Views 237

Chapter 9: Scripts and Batches 255

Chapter 10: Advanced Programmability 283

Chapter 11: Transactions and Locks 335

Chapter 12: Triggers 367

Chapter 13: SQL Cursors 399

Chapter 14: Reporting Services 435

Chapter 15: Buying in Bulk: The Bulk Copy Program (BCP) and Other Basic Bulk Operations 473

Chapter 16: Getting Integrated 493

Chapter 17: Replication 513

Chapter 18: Looking at Things in Full: Full-Text Search 555

Chapter 19: Feeling Security 579

Chapter 20: A Grand Performance: Designing a Database That Performs Well 617

Chapter 21: What Comes After: Forensic Performance Tuning 637

Chapter 22: Administration 655

Chapter 23: SMO: SQL Management Objects 705

Chapter 24: Data Warehousing 727

Chapter 25: Being Well Connected 751

Appendix A: System Functions 753

Appendix B: Going Meta: Getting Data About Your Data 815

Appendix C: The Basics 841

Index 861

Professional

Professional Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Programming

Copyright © 2009 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana

Published simultaneously in Canada

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by

any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permitted under

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should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030,

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Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty:The publisher and the author make no representations or warranties

with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this work and specifically disclaim all warranties,

including without limitation warranties of fitness for a particular purpose No warranty may be created or extended

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are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc and/or its affiliates, in the United States and other

countries, and may not be used without written permission Microsoft and SQL Server are registered trademarks of

Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries All other trademarks are the property of their

respective owners Wiley Publishing, Inc., is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book.

Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats Some content that appears in print may not be

available in electronic books.

This book is dedicated with all my heart to Ashley, Addy, and Anna It’s hard to believe that Ashley was still in

elementary school when I wrote my first book (she’ll graduate from college later this year) and didn’t have to share this dedication with other kids (heck, she isn’t much of a kid anymore — eeek!) Then there’s Addy, who literally dreads me writing, yet continues to put up with me ‘‘disappearing’’ into my home office during the lengthy period

of time I work on a book Finally, there’s Anna, who came in the middle of this round of writing, and didn’t have

any real history on what to expect from my writing disappearances.

A dedication of this book would most certainly not be complete without a particularly special thank you to Deb,

who has leveraged my efforts in this and my recent Beginning title to redefine for me what the terms ‘‘love’’ and

‘‘support’’ mean.

As I’ve said for many releases now, I wish Wrox would let me print a picture of the women in my life on the cover

of this book rather than my ugly mug — I’m certain that you, the reader, would appreciate it too!

About the Author

Experiencing his first infection with computing fever in 1978, Rob Vieira knew right away that this

was something ‘‘really cool.’’ In 1980 he began immersing himself into the computing world more

fully — splitting time between building and repairing computer kits, and programming in BASIC as

well as Z80 and 6502 assembly In 1983, he began studies for a degree in Computer Information Systems,but found the professional mainframe environment too rigid for his tastes and dropped out in 1985 topursue other interests Later that year, he caught the ‘‘PC bug’’ and began the long road of programming

in database languages from dBase to SQL Server Rob completed a degree in business administration in

1990 and since has typically worked in roles that allow him to combine his unique knowledge of ness and computing Beyond his bachelor’s degree, he has been certified as a Certified Management

busi-Accountant (CMA); Microsoft Certified as a Solutions Developer (MCSD), Trainer (MCT), and DatabaseAdministrator (MCDBA); and even had a brief stint certified as an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT)

Rob is currently the Database Team Lead for Stockamp, a Huron Consulting Group practice He has

published six books on SQL Server development

He resides in Vancouver, Washington, where he does his best to take care of ‘‘his girls,’’ and even takeshis best shot at letting Deb take care of him some too

Nearly a decade has gone by since I finished my first book on SQL Server, and the list of those deservingsome credit continues to grow

As always, I’ll start with my kids They are the ones who most sacrifice time when a new release comes

along and I spend so much time writing

Deb— This was the first time she had to deal with one of my writing cycles, and she couldn’t have doneanything more to make me feel more supported Deb has helped me redefine the meaning of the wordsupport She is my rock

You— the readers You continue to write me mail and tell me how I helped you out in some way Thatcontinues to be the number one reason I find the strength to write another book The continued support

of my Professional series titles has been amazing We struck a chord — I’m glad Here’s to hoping we help

make your SQL Server experience a little less frustrating and a lot more successful

As always, I want to pay special thanks to several people past and present Some of these are at the oldWrox Press, but they remain so much of who I am as a writer that I need to continue to remember them.Others are new players for me, but have added their own stamp to the mix — sometimes just by showing

a little patience:

somehow guided me through the edit process to build a better book each time I have long since fallenout of touch with Kate, but she will always be the most special to me as someone who really helped shape

my writing career I will likely always hold this first ‘‘professional’’ dedication spot for her Whereveryou are Kate, I hope you are doing splendidly

bottom — that didn’t seem quite right for Syd Syd first appeared to me as one of a cast of seeminglythousands (it was less than that, but it seemed like a constantly changing set of people), but has evolvedinto one of the constants in my last few titles Syd has done a great job of finding some balance between

upholding the notion of ‘‘Wiley standards’’ versus allowing my books to be my books It’s beyond time

that she got her due — here is at least a little bit of it

where everything is’’ person of the book She has a way of displaying a kind of ‘‘peace’’ in most thingsI’ve seen her do — I need to learn that

writing instead of sleep lately, maybe it’s not thanks I owe him) I’ve had the pleasure of re-establishingcontact with Dominic recently, and it’s great to see him doing well

central to round two Catherine was much like Kate in the sense she had a significant influence on the

shape and success of my first two titles I’ve also recently managed to be in touch with ‘‘Cath’’ again, and

am glad she also seems to be doing well

myself, and it’s not the easiest job to notice the little details that were missed or are, in some fashion,

wrong It’s even harder to read someone else’s writing style and pick the right times to say, ‘‘You might

want to approach this differently’’ and the right times to let it be John did a terrific job on both counts

John faced an especially trying time during the latter stages of this book’s development, and did an

amazing job of holding it all together I wish he and his wife Rebecca great fortunes and good health in

the year ahead

is one of the true ‘‘nice guys’’ who isn’t just nice — he just plain ‘‘gets it’’ when it comes to SQL Server

Richard has provided the answer to many a question over the years

This book has been in development for so long and touched enough people that I’m sure I’ve missed one

or two — if you’re among those missed, please accept my humblest apologies and my assurance that

your help was appreciated

Contents

Getting Started 27

SQL Server Business Intelligence Development Studio 33

Nested Queries Using Single Value SELECT Statements 39

Nested Queries Using Subqueries That Return Multiple Values 40

Comparing EXCEPT and INTERSECT with Their EXISTS and NOT EXISTS Equivalents 51

Creating, Altering, and Dropping XML Schema Collections 71

XML Data Type Methods 73

Dealing with File-Based Information Via Classic BLOBs 126

Chapter 6: Core Storage and Index Structure 147

Choosing Wisely: Deciding What Index Goes Where and When 174

Understanding Depth Versus Fanout 200

Working with HierarchyID Values — HierarchyID Methods 202

Using a View to Change Data — Before INSTEAD OF Triggers 242

Making Your View Look Like a Table with VIEW_METADATA 248

Dynamic SQL: Generating Your Code on the Fly with the EXEC Command 263

Control-of-Flow Statements 268

Understanding the SQLCLR and NET Programming in SQL Server 307

Creating Scalar User-Defined Functions from Assemblies 314

At a Change of Database Options 345

When Recovery Time Would Exceed the Recovery Interval Option Setting 345

Dealing with Requirements Sourced from Other Tables 374

Feeding Data into De-normalized Tables for Reporting 379

Triggers Can Be Nested 383

Triggers Don’t Get in the Way of Architecture Changes 384

Triggers Don’t Have Concurrency Issues with the Process That Fires Them 396

Types of Cursors and Extended Declaration Syntax 405

Other Means of Accessing Reporting Services 437

Chapter 15: Buying in Bulk: The Bulk Copy Program (BCP)

Creating, Altering, Dropping, and Manipulating a Full-Text Catalog 558

Creating, Altering, Dropping, and Manipulating Full-Text Indexes 561

Don’t Forget Views, Stored Procedures, and UDFs as Security Tools 613

Chapter 20: A Grand Performance:

Check the Index Tuning Tool in the Database Engine Tuning Advisor 620

Using the Least Restrictive Transaction Isolation Level Possible 623

Using Temp Tables to Allow Indexing on Working Data 625

Chapter 22: Administration 655

The History of SQL Server Management Object Models 706

Chapter 24: Data Warehousing 727

Legacy System Functions (a.k.a Global Variables) 754

sys.user_token 830

I n t r o d u c t i o n

And so we begin anew While the wait for SQL Server 2005 took a ghastly five years, Microsoft has

blessed us (and, no, I’m not being sarcastic!) with SQL Server 2008 in just three short years

It probably shouldn’t be surprising to me that SQL Server 2008 comes up short in terms of marquee

features — the flash and glitz stuff Yet, what I am surprised by is just how many ‘‘little things’’ havemade it into this release While there are some key feature areas (Policy Based Management, for example)that Microsoft can hang their marketing hat on, the most striking new features in SQL Server 2008 are farmore subtle in nature

SQL Server 2008 is jam-packed with a host of seemingly small, but extremely useful smaller additionssuch as:

❑ New, very useful data types (discrete date and time data types as well as support for geospatialdata and hierarchical data representation)

❑ The newMERGEcommand (combining the options ofINSERT,UPDATE, andDELETEall into one

statement, this is sometimes referred to as anUPSERTin other products)

❑ A revamping of Reporting Services to allow for far more elegant reports

❑ Tracking and availability of ‘‘missing’’ index information (noticing at time of optimization that anon-existent index would have been useful had it been there)

And these are just for starters

For those of you that have read the 2005 versions of my books, the change toward the separation of

beginning and professional level content continues The real ‘‘beginning’’ level discussion is now almost

completely moved into its own book (Beginning SQL Server 2008 Programming) There are some topics that

I consider borderline in terms of whether they are a beginner, intermediate, or professional level topicthat I have continued to provide some degree of coverage on, but, with this edition, most all genuinely

beginner content exists solely in the Beginning title (a new appendix has been added at the end of the

book to give extremely short syntax listings and a few examples, but what was hundreds of pages is now

in the tens of pages)

There is, however, good news that has continued to free up even more space, and this has allowed the

Professional title to return to more broad coverage of a wider range of topics This allows me to get closer

to the original goal I had for the Professional book: to give you enough grounding in most of the product

that, even if you couldn’t write at an expert level in each area, you would understand SQL Server as awhole and build a better system, knowing what’s involved in the many areas where SQL Server offersfunctionality, and being prepared to go get even more information if need be

Other than that, this book maintains most of the style it has always had We cover most of the

add-on services, as well as advanced programming cadd-onstructs (such as NET assemblies) and some of the

supporting object models (which allow for management of your SQL Server and its various engines)

Version Issues

This book is written for SQL Server 2008 It does, however, maintain roots going back a few versions and

keeps a sharp eye out for backward compatibility issues with SQL Server 2005 and even SQL Server 2000

Prior versions are old enough now where little to no time is spent on them except in passing (in short,

few remain that have even seen SQL Server 6.5 and SQL Server 7.0 was just shy of a decade old at release

of SQL Server 2008)

Who This Book Is For

This book assumes that you have some existing experience with SQL Server and are at an intermediate

to advanced level Furthermore, the orientation of the book is highly developer focused

Aside from a quick reference-oriented appendix, very little coverage is given to beginner level topics It

is assumed you already have experience with data manipulation language (DML) statements, and know

the basics of all the mainstream SQL Server objects (views, stored procedures, user defined functions

and, to a much lesser extent, triggers) If you feel you are ready for more advanced topics, but also feel

that brushing up on the basics can’t hurt, I highly encourage you to check out Beginning SQL Server 2008

Programming, as the two books are now much more designed to work as a pair with some, but relatively

limited, overlap

What This Book Covers

This book is about SQL Server More specifically, it is oriented around developing on SQL Server Most

of the concepts are agnostic to what client language you use, though the examples that leverage a client

language generally do so in C# (A few are shown in more than one language.)

For those of you migrating from earlier versions of SQL Server, some of the ‘‘gotchas’’ that inevitably

exist any time a product has versions are discussed to the extent that they seem to be a genuinely relevant

issue

How This Book Is Str uctured

As is the case for all my books, this book takes something of a lassez faire writing style We roam around a

bit within a relatively loose structure Each chapter begins with an explanation of the things to be covered

in that chapter, and then we go through those items Within each topic covered, some background is

provided, and then we work through an example if appropriate Examples are generally created to be

short, and yet still quickly get at several of the concepts you need for whatever topic is being covered at

the time

In terms of ‘‘what to cover next,’’ there is a logical progression We review tools and data types early on(since there are changes there), but move on very fast to topics that assume you are already comfortablewith the product.

To make reasonable use of this book, you will need administrative access to a computer that is capable

of running SQL Server 2008 While I highly recommend using the Developer Edition, the vast majority

of samples and advice applies to virtually all editions of SQL Server I do, however, recommend stayingwith a full version of SQL Server rather than using the Express Edition

Conventions

To help you get the most from the text and keep track of what’s happening, we’ve used a number ofconventions throughout the book

Boxes like this one hold important, not-to-be forgotten information that is directly

relevant to the surrounding text.

Notes, tips, hints, tricks, and asides to the current discussion are offset and placed in italics like this.

As for styles in the text:

❑ We highlight new terms and important words when we introduce them.

❑ We show keyboard strokes like this: Ctrl+A

❑ We show file names, URLs, and code within the text like so:persistence.properties

❑ We present code in two different ways:

We use a monofont type with no highlighting for most code examples

We use gray highlighting to emphasize code that’s particularly important in the

present context

Source Code

As you work through the examples in this book, you may choose either to type in all the code manually or

to use the source code files that accompany the book All of the source code used in this book is availablefor download athttp://www.wrox.com Once at the site, simply locate the book’s title (either by usingthe Search box or by using one of the title lists) and click the Download Code link on the book’s detailpage to obtain all the source code for the book

Because many books have similar titles, you may find it easiest to search by ISBN; this book’s ISBN is

We make every effort to ensure that there are no errors in the text or in the code However, no one is

perfect, and mistakes do occur If you find an error in one of our books, like a spelling mistake or faulty

piece of code, we would be very grateful for your feedback By sending in errata you may save another

reader hours of frustration and at the same time you will be helping us provide even higher quality

information

To find the errata page for this book, go tohttp://www.wrox.comand locate the title using the Search

box or one of the title lists Then, on the book details page, click the Book Errata link On this page you

can view all errata that has been submitted for this book and posted by Wrox editors A complete book

list including links to each book’s errata is also available atwww.wrox.com/misc-pages/booklist.shtml

If you don’t spot ‘‘your’’ error on the Book Errata page, go towww.wrox.com/contact/techsupport

.shtmland complete the form there to send us the error you have found We’ll check the information

and, if appropriate, post a message to the book’s errata page and fix the problem in subsequent editions

of the book

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