Home > DBA Stuff, SQL DB Engine > SQL DBA – Change RECOVERY mode & SHRINK all databases at once in SQL Server

SQL DBA – Change RECOVERY mode & SHRINK all databases at once in SQL Server


 
There are times when you are left with no or very less space in you SQL Server VM disks, and the main cause of this is not only the lot amount of data coming in but the heavy processing your database Server is doing, and thus filling up the entire log space.

 
SQL Server provides you some effective commands to shrink the database files which got inflated due to heavy processing and to make room for new data.

ALTER DATABASE <db_name> SET RECOVERY SIMPLE;

DBCC SHRINKFILE (N'<log_file_name>' , 100);

But this works with one database at a time, so what if you have lots of databases? It will be tiring and time consuming to visit each DB, get the database file names and apply the shrink command. Its even slow to do the same via SSMS GUI.
 

Note: Do not change the recovery mode in a PROD environment unless it is really required.

 
With the below T-SQL statements you can generate scripts for all the databases and can run to change all database settings at once:

-- Generate SQL Script to change Recovery mode to 'SIMPLE' for all DBs:
SELECT 
	'ALTER DATABASE [' + name + '] 
	 SET RECOVERY SIMPLE;' as SimpleRecovery4AllDBs
FROM sys.databases  
WHERE recovery_model_desc <> 'SIMPLE'

-- Generate SQL Script to Shrink log files of all DBs:
SELECT 
	'USE ' + DB_Name(database_id) + '; 
	 DBCC SHRINKFILE (N''' + name + ''' , 100);' as ShrinkAllDBs
FROM sys.master_files 
WHERE database_id > 4 and [type] = 1

 

Please let me know if you have any other way to do the same (and in more effective way) !!!
 


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  1. July 18, 2020 at 7:28 am

    I’m curious to know – suppose the recovery model of the databases are intentionally configured Full or Bulk Logged and if we change it with Simple, can we still achieve Point In Time recovery?

    Is it mandatory to change the Recovery Model to Simple before running Shrink command?

  2. July 18, 2020 at 1:27 pm

    Yes, you are correct, with simple recovery mode you cannot do Point in restore, always on, etc. Simple mode should be only used with DEV or Test databases (not PROD). I’ll add it as note in the post above. Thanks 🙂

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