Over the past couple of months, I've been asked repeatedly about non-logged and minimally logged operations... In fact, I've been asked, "is xyz feature supported by database mirroring - because I've heard xyz operation is a "non-logged" operation?" I think some of these questions stem from confusion around the terminology and the freedom to use the wrong adjectives. So - here I start. I'd like to try and clear up some of the confusion related to logging, log operation "types" and what affects logging.

If you're interested in scale-out improvements for reporting and read-only scenarios...check this out: KB 910378. This KB is actually a feature release KB and describes a new feature of SQL Server 2005 which allows multiple servers to simultaneously share the same database files on a SAN. This is NOT possible for read/write databases, only read-only databases; however, it does allow you to leverage multiple server's hardware to perform complex reporting locally - using that node's memory, tempdb, etc.

If you implement this - report back (no pun intended) as I'd love to hear your good/bad experiences!

Have fun,
kt

Many of you have probably already downloaded the refreshed Books Online but if not - you should! LOTS AND LOTS of updates/good stuff in there.

Check it out: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/sql/2005/downloads/books.mspx

That should keep you busy for a bit!

Happy New Year!
kt