Professional SQL Server 2000 Programming

An Interview with Rob Vieira author of Professional SQL Server 2000

1. You recently spoke at the Amsterdam conference. Which is more fulfilling - writing books or speaking at conferences, and why?

Tough question. Speaking gives the more immediate gratification of seeing someone face to face, answering their questions, and knowing that you really helped someone - it's simply more "real". Book writing, however, has the sheer mass advantage. It's hard to beat the literally hundreds, if not thousands, of people who have contacted me to personally say thanks.

2. What would you say are the major developments in SQL 2000?

Ouch - another tough one. The difficulty is in defining "major". For me, the single biggest addition was definitely User Defined Functions. This is a feature that's going to impact about every project out there. After that, the XML integration and INSTEAD OF triggers are probably
the biggies.

3. What further improvements would you hope/expect to see in the new few months/next version?

I'm very much looking forward to the XML Updategrams release and also seeing XML support added to the OLAP functionality. For Yukon (the next release of SQL Server), I'm looking forward to the additional language support.

4.SQL Server's support for data warehousing and mining has been improved, can you outline some of the new features?

Probably the glitziest of all the new features is the new data mining functionality. Microsoft has added some features here that are normally only found is outrageously expensive (often 6 figures per seat) software. Data Mining allows you to see relationships that are not always intuitive (answer questions you didn't even know you should be asking) and can even do some predictive modeling.

On more general use, however, is the new parent-child hierarchy. One of the problems with the old OLAP Services (what Analysis Services was called under 7.0) was that it couldn't handle what is called a "ragged hierarchy" - that is, a hierarchy where the depth of the hierarchy was variable - often totally unpredictable. The new parent-child approach deals with this problem rather elegantly.

5. Do you see the PDA version of SQL spawning many apps?

That rides on the future of the CE and PocketPC platforms in general. The concept of code compatibility and replication between devices is something that is a major advantage versus the Palm world (where DB work is painful at best) - I'm hoping for good things, but only time will tell.

6. SQL Server 2000 features XML intergration - what do you see as the major benefits of this and what do you see as the future for this?

Today there are some serious security issues to be dealt with. You can beat them, but it removes much of the ease that one expects when they first look at the product. I'm expecting much of that to be taken care of with some of the web releases over the next year.

7. How can you see the .Net implementation fitting with SQL Server?

I don't think there's all that much that's .NET specific about this release of SQL Server. There will, however, likely be much simplified database access in the .NET environment. I'm also looking forward to having C# as a development language for SQL Server when we get to Yukon.

8. SQL Server 2000 reportedly marks the last release of SQL Server's previous management API (SQL-DMO) - WMI will take its place. Why is WMI the way forward?

WMI offers the advantage of requiring less "new" knowledge for the developer. WMI will be very similar to use for SQL Server, Exchange, and the other back office products. Perhaps the biggest advantage, however, is that you loose the dependency on the specific COM Interface id's from version to version. As long as the general syntax is still sound, things should still work fine with a new release. For those that have had to deal with DMO in the past this should be a major relief.

9. What does the year ahead hold for you?

A lot more time with my family. I'll be doing a few speaking events and probably contributing a few articles to SQL Server Magazine, but I'm taking time away from writing for the forseeable future.

10. If you could write/have written any non-computer book, which would it be and why?

A Science Fiction humor book. I started to write one about 15 years ago, but the manuscript was lost in a series of moves, and I've just never gotten back there. Perhaps someday that concept will live again - but not anytime soon.


Courtesy for Wrox Press