A Few Links to SQL Server 2008 Resources - Carpe Datum - Site Home

As I was presenting at TechReady yesterday on the new SQL Server 2008 features that will directly affect Microsoft System Center, I was asked a few times about some resources where people could go to learn more about it. I thought I would share that here.

By the way – I know some of you are on 2005, and have no intention to move yet. I spoke with a couple of our folks from the Paris (France) office, and they were asking how to respond when someone said “I don’t think I want to upgrade”. I hear you – I used to have the same quandary for my production systems. You’re loath to change something that is working. What I used to do in that situation was to get at least one of the new versions installed on my system so I could do two things: I could use the new management features, and I could evaluate the new features to see if they would truly solve a need I had. Over time I would “fold in” the new version for new apps or when I replaced a system. That worked out pretty well for me.

The best place to look for the new features is Books Online – but you don’t have to install it locally to read it –it’s available on the web. I usually go to the “What’s New” section to find out the big plays from Microsoft and read about the new features. Here’s that link:

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb500435(SQL.100).aspx

Only the major features get documented at this location, however. You can read through Books Online to find the rest, but I normally rely on a lot of “Most Valuable Professionals” or MVP’s, who are experts on Microsoft technologies that don’t work for Microsoft. There’s a few of those links here, as well as some hands-on articles, which I also like a lot.

http://technorati.com/tag/sql%20server%202008

http://www.microsoft.com/sql/2008/learning/default.mspx

http://sqlblog.com/blogs/erin_welker/archive/2008/01/20/my-top-10-list-for-sql-server-2008.aspx

http://www.mssqltips.com/tip.asp?tip=1418

https://www.microsoftelearning.com/utilities/refresh.aspx?fu=%2feLearning%2fofferDetail.aspx%3fofferPriceId%3d139087

Enjoy!