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SQL Server Express Announcements

I have always been a very big fan and proponent of MSDE and now SQL Server 2005 Express - it is a great way to start building production quality applications, without having to shell out alot of money for a full version of SQL Server (until you really need it).  It also means that you can avoid of the pain of starting your app with Access, because it is free, and then having to rewrite large parts of it when it is successfull and you need to upgrade to SQL Server.

With SQL Server Express, we are seeing more and more limitations being removed or relaxed and more and more features being added:
(1) Back at TechEd, Paul Flessner announced that (a version of ) SQL  Server Reporting Services would be available for SQL Express.   
(2) Last week on my .NET Rocks appearance, I was able to announce that Full Text search would be available for SQL Express.
(3) Yesterday at the PDC,  Paul Flessner announced that the current (and frankly, rather useless) Express Manager would be replaced by a scaled-down version of SQL Server Management Studio (the SQL Server 2005 replacement for Enterprise Manager).

While SQL Server 2005 Express will be fully functional at the November launch, the addional features/tools will be made available sometime after that date.

 

5 Comments

  • The problem Jackie is to not forget that a lot of companies will still stick to SQL 2000 (even SQL 7) for at least the next two years! So I wonder if you can spread to Microsoft that they have to continue supporting and writing resources to link .Net 2.0 and SQL 2000. I see too many times the pair .Net 2.0 SQL 2005 all together ignoring this basic fact: we're living in a real world far from the PDC (even if it's always cool to have news from the future) and the reality is hard. I am lucky enough to choose what RDBMS I want to use, but you have a lot of companies separating the DBAs and the developers, so I believe a lot of us will still work against SQL 2000 for long time.

  • And I thought it was just me that thought the Sql Server Express Manager was useless. its fine for running queries, but I haven't seen it do anything else.

  • Paschal,



    I think that the reasons you see VS 2005 and SQL 2005 paired up together is mainly because they are the latest and greatest versions of their respective tool/technology. Also, there is a synergy designed into them to make developing with them more effective.



    On the other hand, you can take advantage of almost all of the new VS 2005 data features when working against SQL 2000. Have you run into any specific issues ? I think that VS2005 and SQL 2000 is also a very compelling combination!

  • Wally,



    What can I say - we are a violent agreement!

    There are just some things that cannot be denied or spun differently. The current Express Manager was basically an early beta whose development was suddenly stopped and never progressed beyond its bare functionality.



    Jackie

  • On a related note, I've just heard that Access 12 will still have JET as the default DB engine (although a revised version of JET) rather than SSE. I am incredibly disappointed about this! It’s a pain having to keep up to date with two similar but different technologies.



    I’m sure that the Office group will point out the differences between the two and the different users of the technology, but to me it seems a typical example of ‘not invented here’. (I.e. developing similar technology rather than using an existing one developed by someone else.)



    As I stated earlier, there are enough technologies that I need to keep up to date with without adding an unnecessary one!

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