First Look at Microsoft's SQL Azure Database CTP
















First Look at Microsoft's SQL Azure Database CTP
by Brian Prince
SQL Azure in the Cloud
Microsoft recently made the first community technology preview of SQL Azure Database, a cloud-based relational database service built on SQL Server technologies, generally available last week.
Migrating Databases to SQL Azure
This image shows a user migrating a database to SQL Azure.
SQL Azure Queries
This slide shows a user leveraging SSMS to optimize queries in SQL Azure.
SQL Server 2008 R2 Improves Application and Server Management
To help DBAs deal with the challenge of managing multiserver environments, Microsoft has added new wizards to help provide administrators with central visibility into resource utilization and to streamline consolidation and upgrades across the application life cycle.
SQL Server 2008 R2 Improves Application and Server Management
To monitor resource utilization, users can have view dashboards like this.
Report Builder Bolstered with New Capabilities
In SQL Server 2008 R2, Microsoft made a point to enhance the reporting capabilities of Report Builder. Users will now find new data visualization capabilities in Report Builder 3.0. Here is an example of the types of charts users can produce.
Report Builder Features Continued
In addition to the charting capabilities, Report Builder now also supports geospatial visualization (maps) to allow users to display information in new ways.