SQL Server 2014

Some weeks ago I had to wipe my machine and reinstall everything from scratch, SQL Server included. For some reason that I still don’t understand, SQL Server Management Studio installed fine, but I couldn’t install Books Online from the online help repository. Unfortunately, installing from offline is not an option with SQL Server 2014, because the installation media doesn’t include the Language Reference documentation. The issue is well known: Aaron Bertrand blogged about it back in april when SQL Server 2014 came out and he updated his post in august when the documentation was finally completely published. [Read More]

Now that my SQL Server 2014 CTP1 virtual machine is ready, I started to play with it and some new features and differences with the previous versions are starting to appear. What I want to write about today is a T-SQL enhancement to DDL statements that brings in some new interesting considerations. SQL Server 2014 now supports a new T-SQL syntax that allows defining an index in the CREATE TABLE statement without having to issue separate CREATE INDEX statements. [Read More]

The day has come at last! SQL Server 2014 CTP1 is available for download! You can now start playing with Hekaton and all the exciting features included in this version. Mi suggestion is to create a new virtual machine for your playground: this CTP version won’t install on a machine with other installations of SQL Server. If you prefer it and you have a subscription, you can also try SQL Server 2014 on Windows Azure. [Read More]