Dan English's BI Blog

SSAS Deployment Wizard Retaining Permissions

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 13:37:12 GMT

Had a great question last week at the MNPASS SQL Server User Group in regards to using the Analysis Services Deployment Wizard and I just wanted to post the follow-up. I have read about the wizard, but actually have never used it (but you need to know about it for the MCTS test 70-445 or 70-448). I have just always deployed my databases through BIDS and have always had the roles and permissions defined in the solution. This provided me a great opportunity to explore the wizard. What I needed to find out was if the issue of losing the database permissions had been fixed in 2008 (refer to this MS KB article for the current issue here – basically the permissions do not get pulled into the XMLA script using the ‘Retain roles and members. The roles and members will not be deployed.’ option).

So first I tested this out in 2005 to verify that this was an issue and there wasn’t a hidden checkbox somewhere to resolve the issue. I generated the script and reviewed it and it did pull in the roles and members, but no permissions (database, dimensions, etc.). So whatever permissions were setup on the server would be wiped out once the script was executed. Here is a snippet of the script and if you performed a search in the file you would see that no permissions were included.

I then setup a project in BIDS 2008 (VS 2008) and performed the same steps as with 2005 and everything was pulled into the script properly (cube, database, and dimension permissions) this time

The one thing is though if you are trying to separate the security control and permissions from the developers and DBAs this really won’t fix that problem because the wizard needs to extract the permissions and include them in the file to be executed against the SSAS database. This means that the developers will be able to view and modify the permissions prior to executing the script. I suppose this would mean that the DBAs would need to take over the responsibilities of using the deployment wizard or at least have a backup script of the existing Roles setup on the server prior to deployment.

Quick Feedback on the 71-448 (70-448) Beta Exam

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 01:58:39 GMT

I took the beta exam 71-448 for the MCTS Microsoft SQL Server 2008 – Business Intelligence Development and Maintenance (70-448). I would definitely check out the prep guide prior to going into the test to prepare yourself for what will be on the test and that is available on Microsoft’s site here. In an earlier posting I posted the link stating that you can take this test for free until July 31st if you can get a spot.

I was a little surprised that there was 70 questions. I didn’t think there were that many on the SQL Server 2005 exam (70-445), but I could be mistaken. I thought there were only around 54 or so, but it was over a year ago that I took it. You definitely need to know SSRS inside and out. As you can see in the prep guide at least 30% is focused just on this topic. The rest is pretty much a split between SSIS and SSAS with a handful of Data Mining questions.

The other thing was that even though it states it is SQL Server 2008 you wouldn’t have known it. A little surprised that none of the new features were brought up and a little disappointed. Seems like they did a search and replace on 2005 with 2008. If you took the 2005 exam (70-445) or have the Transcender prep tests you are all set.

If you have the time before the end of the month I would definitely recommend taking it now for free In eight weeks I will find out if I passed or not, so until then I just have to wait patiently.

Did you know? SQL Server 2008 includes Dimension Designer Enhancements

Sun, 20 Jul 2008 01:35:29 GMT

SQL Server 2008 includes Dimension Designer Enhancements, new attribute relationships designer, and additional Best Practice Alerts:)

The Dimension Wizard within BIDS 2008 (VS 2008) for Analysis Service Projects has been simplified and introduces a new attribute relationship designer.

The wizard has reduced the number of screens and includes an auto-detection for parent-child hierarchies.

There have also been modifications to the Best Practice Alerts and there are now 57 alerts integrated into the designer along with a new option to add comments to them and disable them if desired.

Check out a screencast about the Dimension Designer Enhancements in SQL Server 2008 here.

Read more about this in the SQL Server 2008 BOL ‘Dimension Designer (Analysis Services - Multidimensional Data) ’.

Video: Did you know? SQL Server 2008 includes Dimension Designer Enhancements (SSAS)

I had to put this screencast up on MSN videos because of the 10 minute YouTube limit enforcement now and I didn’t want to redo the screencast again. I will have to see about getting the Director account on YouTube. I had to put my Tech Night recording on MSN videos too. On YouTube or MSN videos you can perform a search on Magenic and you will get all of my videos and some additional ones. Can’t complain about either of these services though, they are free.

SQL Server 2008 Beta Exams Extended, Open Invitation

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 02:36:44 GMT

Check out the details here - http://blogs.msdn.com/gerryo/archive/2008/07/01/sql-server-beta-exams-extended-open-invitation.aspx

Only good through the end of July, so try and register before it is completely booked.

SQL Server 2008 DBA 71-432 and SQL Server 2008 BI 71-448.

MN PASS SQL Server User Group - ‘Ask the Experts’ panel discussion

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 02:32:11 GMT

Tomorrow, July 15, from 2 to 4 p.m. I will be participating in a local SQL Server User Group ‘Ask the Experts’ panel discussion. I look forward to discussion SQL Server and MS BI with everyone and hearing everyone’s questions. It should be a very enjoyable time and I hope we get a great turnout. Please bring your questions and I will be sure to stay around afterwards if anyone wants to talk more or if you need further explanation or information

I would love to talk about the new release of SQL Server 2008 coming out…will it be later this month, in August, or September. It sounds like it is extremely close and I have been reading blogs that the pricing has already been released (apparently it hasn’t gone up).

You can register for the MN SQL Server User Group event here or visit www.mnssug.org.

Magenic National Webinar Recording - ‘Make Better Decisions with your Data’

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 02:21:59 GMT

Aaron and I did our webinar last month and it went fairly well. I don’t quite have the speaker phone deal worked out yet and talking to a monitor can be a little tough, but we did it. I would have much rather been able to see everyone face-to-face, but it was a chance to evangelize and spread the good word of the MS BI Platform and talk about the BI Maturity Model.

You can check out the recording of this webinar here and if you want to download the presentation you can pull it down from my SkyDrive account here.

Microsoft purchasing Zoomix

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 02:08:46 GMT

I read Jamie Thomson’s blog here this afternoon and read the article on Zoomix’s site and Microsoft is adding more to its MDM arsenal. Zoomix will add more MDM capabilities and add some great data quality portions. Is this more of a move for the MDM portion or SQL Server Platform or both? I hope that this gets incorporated into the BI Platform and adds some more to the already existing fuzzy logic and data profiling portions in SSIS. Data quality is extremely important and there never seems to be enough time allocated to it, so having tools to help streamline the process is very helpful.

Magenic Technology Council (MTC) Summit 2008 Follow-up

Tue, 15 Jul 2008 01:59:14 GMT

Last month Magenic held its first ever MTC Summit in Chicago. I helped check people in and I was able to watch some of the great presentations by Jay Schmelzer, Rocky Lohtka, Whitney Weaver, Jason Bock, Kirstin Juhl, Michael Cummings, and Anthony Handley. I wasn’t able to check them all out, but there was some excellent content provided and I want to thank everyone who attended and helped to make this a great event.

If you were not able to attend I have placed the presentations in my SkyDrive account here. I would definitely recommend checking out Whitney’s presentation and T-SQL examples for accessing information with the SQL Server 2005 DMVs. Whitney is one of our SQL Server gurus in Atlanta.

The one thing that I really enjoyed was being able to meet and get together with the MTC members and talk about technology. It was really great to finally meet some of the other Magenicons face-to-face.

SQL Server 2008 (RC0) Report Designer == Report Builder 2.0

Thu, 12 Jun 2008 16:34:55 GMT

Okay, so maybe I didn’t pick-up on it right away when I saw Teo’s blog posting here about the new Feature Pack (June 2008) which is located here, but the standalone Report Designer is no longer part of the SQL Server 2008 installation I went into the start menu after installing the RC0 of SQL Server 2008 and I was confused Where is Report Designer? Then I fired up BIDS (VS 2008) and started up a new Report Server project thinking that it was just integrated into BIDS now. Well first of all I received an error message when I created a new Report Server project (maybe I need to reboot my VPC to resolve this, not sure)

What I did notice though was the the designer within BIDS now is the actual designer that is in Report Designer (maybe this was in CTP6, not sure…I only used the Report Designer to get familiar with the new tool).

So the designer is incorporated into BIDS minus the Office 2007 Ribbon, but still was not what I was looking for. So I fired up the Report Manager web application and launched Report Builder thinking that maybe this is how I access the new Report Designer. Nope, this is still Report Builder 1.0, nothing has changed So now I was on a quest and I remembered Teo’s blog posting, so I downloaded the Report Builder 2.0 install from here and installed that on my VPC.

This provided a new item in my start menu for Report Builder 2.0, separate form the SQL Server 2008 start menu items.

And after I fired up this application I had a winner

The one thing that I am not crazy about, but maybe it is just me and being used to working with the whole project concept (or I am missing something within the product) is that you don’t have the ability to work with a group of reports. I guess this is how all of the other Office products work, so I can’t complain too much. I just like the whole project aspect and being able to work with a whole set of related reports a little more easily.

The one nice thing is that this is an MSI file, so IT will now be able to schedule and distribute this application install throughout the organization as needed without having to install the SQL Server client tools for end-users now

SQL Server 2008 (RC0) Intellisense Enhancements

Thu, 12 Jun 2008 10:42:16 GMT

I looked into a few items in regards to intellisense with the new release to follow-up on my previous two postings SQL Server 2008 Intellisense (CTP5) vs Red Gate SQL Prompt and

SQL Server Intellisense (CTP6) vs Red Gate SQL Prompt - Part II. The only things that I could see that have really changed was some additional support for DELETE, INSERT, and UPDATE statements and some additional metadata (which is great).

DELETE Screenshot	INSERT Screenshot	UPDATE Screenshot

You can also see in the screenshots that some metadata information is being displayed too, I don’t believe this was in CTP6, but I could be mistaken. So now when you are on an item in the drop down list it shows the object type and data type information if it is a column. That is nice, not quite as nice as the metadata information provided with SQL Prompt, but I guess they can’t take all of Red-Gate’s ideas.

Red-Gate SQL Prompt Intellisense

I didn’t really see any other changes other than the additional support and some metadata information but these are all good changes. I did notice that the metadata in the query window tab changed a bit now, so you can see some additional connection information (user and spid) for the query window.

SQL 2008 RC0 Query Tab	SQL 2005 Query Tab

SQL Server 2008 RC0 Object Explorer Details Search

Wed, 11 Jun 2008 23:12:51 GMT

Okay, I heard that this functionality was coming and I am somewhat pleased. It is nice to have this functionality. It took me a while to find it, but then I noticed it embedded in the Object Explorer Details window.

One issue I had right out of the gate was that I typed a search and then started to click around in the Object Explorer window. Well that ended the search since the Object Explorer Details window refreshed based on what I was doing in the Object Explorer. So it would make sense that the search functionality be moved to its own window like most types of search functionality found in the Microsoft products. Just like using the find feature. Plus this means that you can only have one search displayed since there is only one Object Explorer Details window. What if I want to have multiple search results displayed at the same time?

Another issue was the filtering ability on the search. There really isn't any except if you select a database it will limit the search results to the database. You can't filter the search on just tables, views, stored procedures, indexes, etc.

Once you get the results returned then I would like a little more information returned. You do get the path which you can review to determine the database the item is associated with, but just having a database column would be helpful. Plus I would like to be able to do something with the results once I have them. Like being able to just right-click on them and depending on the object type open the table, modify the stored procedure, script the object, etc. The only thing the search is good for is to show me the object type and display a path as to where the object is located (not that I am complaining because this is very useful—and yes I guess I am complaining).

So here is my search laundry list (so far):

create a separate search window with the possibility of having more than one
include filtering capability (based on object type)
include more column metadata information (like database column – path is okay, but database would be more helpful)
include the object type options when you right-click on them (so you can script, modify, or open depending on the object type)
incorporate the search into the right-click context menu when you are in the Object Explorer and click on a folder or object (when it makes sense)

If you agree with these items in the list and would like to vote for these change please go to the Connect site here and vote.

https://connect.microsoft.com/SQLServer/feedback/ViewFeedback.aspx?FeedbackID=350636

SQL Server 2008 RC0 now publicly available

Tue, 10 Jun 2008 14:44:35 GMT

Just got a ping from my colleague and SQL Server Ace in Chicago, Aaron Lowe, telling me that RC0 is now available publicly on the MSDN downloads here. So after trying to get this through MSDN or TechNet Plus subscriptions it is available to everyone Weird...not sure why it just wasn't pushed out this way in the first place. Anyway, Teo Lachev posted a blog today in regards to the SQL Server 2008 Feature Pack for June 2008 here which you can download from here.

Download and enjoy the new release!

PerformancePoint Server - Monitoring & Analytics Tech Night Recording

Sun, 08 Jun 2008 22:09:29 GMT

A couple weeks back I did a Tech Night at the Magenic Minneapolis office. When I was using the MS BI VPC 6 it froze up on me quite a bit and I am thinking this was because I was using Live Meeting and sharing my desktop because I performed the presentation over the weekend and since then without any issues. I created a screencast of the entire presentation and uploaded it for everyone to check out to MSN videos (soapbox). I did the recording five times and picked the best one out of the five. I would do it a sixth time, but I don't think I will ever be completely satisfied with the recording, so I finally gave in and uploaded one.

I hope everyone finds it helpful. I go over an overview of the PPS 2007 product and a demonstration of using the Monitoring & Analytics portion which is based off the example by Kevin Goff, Microsoft MVP, taken from the Mar/Apr 2008 issue of Code magazine here.

Video: PerformancePoint Server - Monitoring & Analytics Tech Night

All of the files used for the demonstration can be found here. The files that are available include the presentation (PDF format), the Entire PSS Download sample files (including some readme instructions -- 2 parts to download), and the video if you want to download it (2 parts to download). I couldn't upload the video to YouTube because it was too long and apparently you need a director account to perform a large upload. The presentation was done prior to the release of PPS SP1, so the filter improvements will not be seen in this video. For information in regards to SP1 or to the download links check out the PerformancePoint Team Blog here.

SQL Server 2008 RC0 now available...with a TechNet Plus Subscription

Sat, 07 Jun 2008 01:39:31 GMT

I was doing a quick check of my blogs before I sign off for the night and I noticed that Andrew Fryer made a blog posting here stating that a new release is available. It is finally available and I can't even get it I don't have the required TechNet Plus subscription to download the newly released SQL Server 2008 RC0 from here.

There was another blog posting early in the week in regards to the release of the new SQL Server 2008 logo here that provided a little insight in regards to the meaning behind the new logos. Here is what the new colors represent:

IT Management - Microsoft blue
Security - Microsoft green
Application Infrastructure - Microsoft deep red (new color)
Business Productivity Infrastructure - Microsoft deep yellow

And here is the new logo for SQL Server 2008:

Pretty cool

Andrew Fryer did a posting a couple of weeks ago in regards to e-mail signatures here where he posted this clip which is pretty sweet too:

Well hopefully in a week or two the new RC0 will be made available to everyone to download. "BI to the masses!"

Did you know? SQL Server 2008 includes Backup Compression

Thu, 05 Jun 2008 23:30:36 GMT

SQL Server 2008 includes database Backup Compression:

Keeping disk-based backups online is expensive and time-consuming. With SQL Server 2008 backup compression, less storage is required to keep backups online, and backups run significantly faster since less disk I/O is required.

By default, backup compression significantly increases CPU usage, which can adversely impact concurrent operations. You can now create low-priority compressed backups in a session whose CPU usage is limited by Resource Governor.

SQL Server 2008 Developer and Enterprise Editions and later supports compressing backups, and every edition of SQL Server 2008 or later can restore a compressed backup.

· Check out a screencast about the new Backup Compression feature in SQL Server 2008 here.

· Read more about this in the SQL Server 2008 BOL ‘Backup Compression (SQL Server)’.

Did you know? SQL Server 2008 includes Backup Compression

Business Intelligence (BI) Webinar - Make Better Decisions with Your Data

Thu, 29 May 2008 09:34:49 GMT

DATE CHANGE - from June 3 to June 24

Tuesday, June 24 at 11:00 AM Pacific, 1:00 PM Central, 2:00 PM Eastern Aaron Lowe, one of Magenic's SQL Server Aces out of the Chicago office, and I will be presenting a webinar. This webinar is titled 'Make Better Decisions with Your Data' and is the first of two webinars we will be doing over the next couple of months. We are planning on another one towards the end of July that will be more technical in nature and focus on the new BI improvements in SQL Server 2008.

So what will you get by attending this webinar? Good question. You are going to walk away from this webinar with the following information:

The definition of BI
An understanding of the BI Maturity Model and where you are at
The difference between a spreadmart and a datamart
The definition of a BI Platform and an overview of Microsoft's BI offerings

UPDATED invite link (hyperlink below has been updated)

To find out more or to sign up for the webinar check out the following link here.

Did you know? SQL Server 2008 includes Auditing

Wed, 07 May 2008 13:31:01 GMT

SQL Server 2008 includes Auditing (server and database):

SQL Server 2008 now enables you to configure server and database level audit specifications. These specifications include server operations such as management changes and database actions such as data manipulation language (DML) and data definition language (DDL) operations. The output of the audits can be sent to a file, Windows Security event log, or the Windows Application event log.

· Check out a screencast about the new Audit feature in SQL Server 2008 here.

· Read more about this in the SQL Server 2008 BOL ‘Understanding SQL Server Audit’.

Video: Did you know? SQL Server 2008 includes Auditing

BIDS Helper on CodePlex.com

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 12:11:36 GMT

I blogged about the new release back in December here when version 1.2.0.1 came out which fixed a few issues with the SSAS buttons in the calculation tab and with the SSIS highlighter. In talking with colleagues and clients recently though it seems like quite a few people are surprised when I talk about BIDS Helper. I thought everyone already knew about it or was using it, but I guess not. I really feel that this is an excellent add-in for anyone doing SSAS or SSIS development that I had to post another blog posting. I know that my blog is starting to get more coverage thanks to the BI Blog aggregator http://biglogs.com and now that my blog is mirrored on the Magenic blog site at http://blog.magenic.com/blogs I wanted to post another entry promoting the BIDS Helper which is available here.

So what is so cool about BIDS Helper and why would you want to use it? Well the main features that I like are the options to deploy the MDX script in the calculations tab of the cube, aggregation manager, update estimated counts, column usage reports, expression and configuration highlighter, expression list, and smart diff (all of the features are cool and helpful, but these are some of the key ones I use). If you go to the site on CodePlex you can get detailed information about each feature with screenshots.

It appears that this add-in currently only works with the English version of BIDS and that it probably only works with 2005 and not 2008 versions of Visual Studio. I haven't actually tested it in VS 2008 yet, but according to some comments on the site there appears to be some issues.

Here is the complete list of features that are currently included with the BIDS Helper along with a picture from the site that highlights a few of the features:

Features

I did take a quick peek at the Source Code section for this Project and it appears that version 1.3.0.0 should be available anytime now. Some of the new features according to the comments are the ability to sort the SSIS packages by name (like you can do in SSAS), VS 2008 support, SQL Sever 2008 support, smart diff for SSAS objects, and more performance improvements . This is cool stuff and you got to thank Darren Gosbell, Greg Galloway, and John Welch (hopefully I got all of the names right) for making this available. Feel free to post an item on the discussion section for anything that you would like to see added because most of the new features being added are taken directly from this section here.

Microsoft Business Intelligence VPC Release 6

Sat, 26 Apr 2008 11:18:42 GMT

Yesterday I received an email from my colleague, Kory, asking me if I had heard of the new BI VPC version 6 (April 2008 release) that was available. I stated that the only one that I knew of was version 5.1 which I posted on my blog back in December here. I quickly queried the Microsoft Download Center here and I didn't see a new version available. I asked him where he saw this mentioned and he pointed me to a new BI blog that I had not seen yet by Peter Koller over in Norway here. Now I had to know where Peter discovered this so I left him a comment and he pointed me to the hidden gem buried on Microsoft's site here (look down in the lower right for the download links - 7 files).

So what is different. Version 6 includes new demos and presenter scripts for different verticals. When you extract the files it creates an additional demos folder which now contains all of the scripts so you don't need to try and pull them off the VPC at all. It still has all of the same programs installed and configured which is very nice . Here is everything it contains and I highlighted the new items (and this VPC will expire on 8/17/2009 - maybe just in time for PPS v2).

I didn't see a readme file associated with this, so if you are looking for the password it is the typical Microsoft demo one and the same one that was used on the last VPC, pass@word1. So let the downloads begin! Enjoy the VPC and I got to thank Kory and Peter for pointing this out and sharing this information with the community, thanks guys!

Did you know? SQL Server 2008 includes GROUPING SETS

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 22:12:09 GMT

SQL Server 2008 includes GROUPING SETS:

Grouping Sets is an extension to the GROUP BY clause that lets users define multiple groupings in the same query. Grouping Sets produces a single result set that is equivalent to a UNION ALL of differently grouped rows, making aggregation querying and reporting easier and faster.

Read more about this in the SQL Server 2008 BOL ‘GROUPING SETS’.

Check out a screencast about the new GROUPING SETS feature in SQL Server 2008 here.

Video: Did you know? SQL Server 2008 includes GROUPING SETS

Blog list: Blog List

Sat, 23 Feb 2008 19:39:05 GMT

Blog List

Channel 9: Screencasts
CodePlex
MSDN RSS Feed: Recent SQL Server Blog Posts
Jasper Smith - sqldbatips.com blog
Microsoft Download Center
Prologika Forums
Microsoft SQL Server Development Advisory Team
Paul S. Randal - In Recovery...
Kimberly L. Tripp
Carpe Datum
Conchango Blogs (including Jamie Thomson)
Andrew Fryer's Blog
Vidas Matelis BI Blog
The OLAP Report
The Microsoft PerformancePoint Team Blog
Stacia Misner's Blog
SQL BI
Sacha Tomey's blog
Russell Christopher's Semi-Useful BI Musings
Nick Barclay's BI Blog
Microsoft OLAP by Mosha Pasumansky
Microsoft Excel 2007
Mark Kromer - DBCF
Microsoft Business Intelligence Blog
Darren Gosbell (MVP)
Dan Meyers' BI Blog
Chris Webb's BI Blog
Adrian Downes Blogspot
BI Blogs
A BI Blog aggregating site that includes more than 60 BI related blogs -- and it will soon include mine!

Custom List: User Groups

Tue, 19 Feb 2008 11:07:15 GMT

User Groups

MN VSTS User Group
Minnesota Visual Studio Team System User Group
The Minnesota SharePoint User Group
The Minnesota SharePoint User Group meets the second Wednesday of every month at the Microsoft office in Bloomington, MN. The purpose of the user group is to bring the local SharePoint community together to share tips, tricks, and ideas on the uses of the
Twin Cities .NET User Group
The Twin Cities .NET User Group is organized and managed by ILM Professional Services - a Minnesota based consulting firm specializing in the .NET technology.
PASSMN Minnesota SQL Server User Group
As a part of the national PASS organization, the Minnesota SQL Server User Group (PASSMN) serves the Minnesota SQL Server community.
North Central District Business Intelligence SIG
NCBISIG.org a forum to exchange knowledge and ideas to better understand,develop, implement and support existing and future Microsoft BI technologies.