Hello again. and SQL Server 200x wish list part 1

It's just a few weeks until the launch of SQL Server 2005. I'm been hiding under a rock since returning from Hong Kong. TechEd there was a great time, biggest attendence they've ever had. Security and SQL Server 2005 were the hot topics. Yes, even after PDC in September.

It's been over three years since I got my first look at SQL Server 2005, in September 2002. I knew then it was a major undertaking; kudos to everyone who worked on it so hard for so long. I've been teaching developer topics (its hard to make a hard distinction, for example, is snapshot isolation a developer or administrator topics?) for over 2 years, since the first class of 45-or-so Microsoft folks up in Redmond. Everyone I've presented features too has been really excited. Or pretended to be excited because I was.

They're already talking about the next version and Micheal Rys (of XQuery and XML data type fame) was asking what folks would like in the next version. Thought I'd take a shot at it, at least from the developer perspective. No better time…so here goes. I'll do multiple blog entires, starting with infrastructure. It's a big WISH list, I don't expect all of them. Or even most of them. Mostly, they are customer wishes, but some are mine too.

In this arena, we could use Row-level security. It was in beta 1 for a while, and folks always asked about it. Certain business sectors require it.

Next, true ANSI DATE and TIME data types. We had them too, for a while, but they were written using SQLCLR. Some folks didn't appreciate that, they were cut. They're needed to provide a conversion path from databases that use them. Like [main competitors names go here]. Frankly it didn't bother me as much as most *how* they were implemented just that we had them. I'm still looking for the promised source code so we could compile 'em and use 'em ourselves. Whatever happened to that? You could implement them yourself using SQLCLR, but a supported version would be better.

A hint/set of options so you could keep the default READ COMMITTED locking behavior, but use READ COMMITTED versioning (aka statement level snapshot) through a hint. Oh, and while we're at it, a separate “rollback database“ instead of using TEMPDB for old versions when using versioning.

Finally, some folks asked about DML event notifications (using Broker), FILESTREAM data type, higher capacity MAX data types, and there's a set of people who always ask about bitmapped indexes. You know who you are…

XML/XQuery wishes are next.

3 thoughts on “Hello again. and SQL Server 200x wish list part 1

  1. Please, please, please a true DATE type. I am so tired of stripping times off datetime types, etc. It is invariably a source of bugs.

    FILESTREAM was also one of the ones I was very bummed to see go…

  2. That’s an even better thought, Adam. Worth considering. But then, I’d have to create or destroy this data area on a per-database basis whenever I turned the options ON or OFF. Hmmm… it’s do-able of course. Because MSDB and MASTER use snapshot, if you only have one data area, you’re guarenteed to need it. But your idea IS more flexible.

  3. I would prefer, instead of a single rollback database, a rollback area in each database (or dedicated to each database), that I could segregate onto filegroups / across physical disks as necessary. I don’t think a centralized rollback area (tempdb or otherwise) is a highly scalable option.

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