SQL Pass Day #2

[James Beresford]

So, on to day 2 of SQL Pass, and a very SSIS focused one – mainly because I attended Matt Masson’s SSIS session and learned about a whole new bunch of nice features that have made it in to the next version.

I took away the following interesting points from that session:

1. CDC (Change Data Capture) is supported more effectively through some new components – a CDC Control, CDC Source and CDC Splitter
2. ODBC improvements mean improved performance for non SQL Server databases
3. Connection Managers get a few new features – Offline, Expression and Project indicators. Also Offline Connection Managers are picked out through a timeout and importantly now halt validation of any related components (so you no longer get those drags as SSIS tries to validate components and flows hooked to dead connections)
4. File Connection Manager can now handle variable numbers of columns (i.e. it won’t crash)
5. Pivot gets a UI – hurrah! (Note: SCD still sucks)
6. Project Parameters can be configured at design time though Visual Studio Configurations
7. Breakpoints are now in the Script Component so we can see what data is causing or components to blow up
8. Data Taps – data viewers for live execution that dump out to .csv files
9. Package Execution via PowerShell or even T-SQL!

Matt also gave a preview of Barcelona in action, and it looks pretty neat.

I also attended a DQS session that showed a few new features on the UI. Elad Ziklik highlighted that the CTP3 release should be viewed more as a capability preview rather than a test drive of a functional product – so looking forward to a new CTP.

One more day down – one to go…!



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