I'm happy to announce we've opened the Maestro beta program so customers and partners can self nominate themselves to the program and get early access to the bits. This is to allow people, not involved with the TAP, to get hold of the beta to experiment...

This post is for two purposes: firstly to point to a comprehensive blog post covering the transfer of data between Oracle and SQL Server using SQL Server 2005 Integration Services - which answers a recuring question from customers and partners with insight...

As SQL server 2005 gets closer more and more people are asking how much faster is it than SQL Server 2000. Thanks to Rog Garrison here's one of the first tests I've seen http://www.sqljunkies.com/Tutorial/077C7BEB-EB31-4A07-923D-BE309F59D0F8.scuk ...

Following on from my previous two blogcasts looking at the SQL Server 2005 Management Studio (SMS), here’s another blogcast (5m55s) looking at the Solution Explorer in SMS.

I’m grateful to Cristian Petculescu for this Top Tip: How to use the same dimension twice on one fact table with SQL Server 2000 Analysis Services. To use the same dimension twice, against one fact table, you essentially use the same dimension table...

Following on from my last blogcast here’s a blogcast (8m57s) that introduces the Object Explorer in the new SQL Server 2005 Management Studio.

I’ve just done a short (4m47s) blogcast giving a first glimpse at the new SQL Server 2005 Management Studio

If you were unable to connct to our webcast with Proclarity last month then please have another go, here is the corresponding missive from marketing: Last month you registered to attend the TechNet Webcast ‘Analysing and Presenting SQL Server Data...

Thank heavens – Microsoft is going to charge for its next version of its business scorecard solution code named Maestro, beta 1 of which has just been announced. Why is this charge a good thing? Because if people have to pay for this product then it will...

Here's an invitation from the TechEd crew, note the early bird offer!. I'm really looking forward to it; Amsterdam - top venue! Welcome to Tech·Ed 2005 Europe - Microsoft’s flagship European technical education conference for developers and IT professionals...

Improve the performance, serviceability, and enhance the security of your SQL Server 2000 installations with SQL Server 2000 Service Pack 4. SP4 will be released to the web and be available for customer download on Friday, May 6, 2005 at 9am PST. ...

A question that crops up from time to time with SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services is 'how do I dynamically change the data source used buy a report - from within a report?' To do this is quite straight forward in SQL 2005 Reporting Services but not so...

Industry Insiders is the term given to a community activity that my team (Microsoft's IT Pro Evangelists in the UK) have recently started. The idea is to help bring together technical experts in the ITPro Community by providing a high visibility forum...

The marketing people here at Microsoft, have asked me to advertise a new series of BI webcasts using SQL Server 2005. So, to oblige, here is their spiel: “ Your business intelligence (BI) applications need to integrate seamlessly into your overall...

For those of you interested in implementing fuzzy logic in SQL Server Integration Services Jamie Thomson's Blog has a very good blog post on the subject with an interesting real world example that overcomes a challenging performance problem. Thanks Jamie...

After taking a customer query regarding securing report parameters I found this blog entry from Tudor Trufinescu – I thought I would share it with you. The moral of the story is – don’t pass sensitive parameters. http://blogs.msdn.com/tudortr/archive...

For 3 or 4 years I’ve been telling people how Microsoft has made security and privacy the number one priority. From this Yankee Group article (excerpt below) – it’s good to see perception change and that change based on customer experience. " In...

I'm grateful to Chris Hayes for this top tip. Reporting Services doesn't like you using data fields in its headers and footers - here are two ways to work around the problem Add a parameter to the report without a prompt (so the user doesn’t...

Microsoft and SAP are to release a joint product to bring Office, Exchange and SAP together - code named 'Mendocino'; harnessing Web Services and Services-Oriented Architecture to Ease Integration You can find more info here http://uk.news.moneycentral...

I have extracted the following from a useful article: SQL Server 2005 Integration Services: Lessons from Project REAL, http://msdn.microsoft.com/sql/default.aspx?pull=/library/en-us/dnsql90/html/SQL05InSrREAL.asp SQL Server 2005 Integration Services...

You can find which editons of SQL Server 2005 have which feature @ http://www.microsoft.com/sql/2005/productinfo/sql2005features.asp Essentially as you move from SQL 2005 Express edition through to SQL 2005 Enterprise edition you gain the features...

Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition: Community Technology Preview April 2005 Download the Community Technology Preview (CTP) of Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition. Unlike beta releases that receive a much higher level of testing and feature...

The Reporting Services team has just released Service Pack 2 of SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services! The service pack is available for download from the Microsoft Download Center: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=502C0D89-1308-4662...

Additional code samples based on the Business Intelligence Portal for the developer community...

I want to share with you a letter from Paul Flessner that has been sent to 'Testers of SQL Server 2005'. Why? Because if this is news to you, you are not a tester and if you’re reading this you are most likely interested in what’s going on with SQL Server...