In Recovery... - Paul S. Randal on SQL Server

Friday, October 12, 2007

SQL Server 2008: What's been removed in this version? BACKUP LOG WITH NO_LOG for one!

All the razzamatazz about new releases go on about what's new but hardly ever is there discussion of what's been removed. So that's the topic of this short post.

In the Books Online that comes with the July CTP of SS2008 (here's a link to the download page), the topic Discontinued Database Engine Functionality in SQL Server 2008 lists the following:

Category	Discontinued feature	Replacement
Aliases	sp_addalias	Replace aliases with a combination of user accounts and database roles. For more information, see CREATE USER (Transact-SQL) and CREATE ROLE (Transact-SQL). Remove aliases in upgraded databases by using sp_dropalias (Transact-SQL).
Backup and restore	DUMP statement	BACKUP
Backup and restore	LOAD statement	RESTORE
Backup and restore	BACKUP LOG WITH NO_LOG	None. The transaction log is automatically truncated when the database is using the simple recovery model. If you must remove the log backup chain from a database, switch to the simple recovery model.
Backup and restore	BACKUP LOG WITH TRUNCATE_ONLY	None. The transaction log is automatically truncated when the database is using the simple recovery model. If you must remove the log backup chain from a database, switch to the simple recovery model.
Backup and restore	BACKUP TRANSACTION	BACKUP LOG
Backup and restore	sp_helpdevice	Query the sys.backup_devices catalog view.
Compatibility level	60, 65, and 70 compatibility levels	Databases must be set to at least compatibility level 80.
DBCC	DBCC CONCURRENCYVIOLATION	None
Groups	sp_addgroup	Use roles.
Groups	sp_changegroup	Use roles.
Groups	sp_dropgroup	Use roles.
Groups	sp_helpgroup	Use roles.
Sample databases	Northwind and pubs	Use AdventureWorks. Northwind and pubs are available as downloads, or can be copied from a previous installation of SQL Server. For more information, see AdventureWorks Sample Databases.

Most of these aren't going to bother people much I would guess but removing BACKUP LOG WITH NO_LOG is going to cause problems. Don't get me wrong, I think it's great that it's being removed (see my previous post for why I think it's evil) but it's going to break a lot of people who rely on it now for managing their transaction logs instead of taking log backups or switching to SIMPLE recovery mode.