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SQL Server 2025 Private Preview – Built-in AI, Fabric connectivity, Native JSON, and many more…

November 22, 2024 Leave a comment

 
On 19th November 2024 Microsoft announced the Private Preview of SQL Server upcoming version i.e. SQL Server 2025 !!!

This v-Next version emphasizes modern AI and Generative AI (GenAI) capabilities powered by Microsoft Copilot and contemporary Large Language Models (LLMs). These capabilities align with the latest advancements in GenAI, such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Meta’s Llama, etc. It also integrates Semantic Kernel, LangChain, and Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) functionalities, positioning it as an enterprise-ready AI database !!!

 
>> Built-in AI:

– SQL Server 2025 will be having Vector Database capabilities
    — New native Vector datatype
    — Vector search capabilities by using new vector functions VECTOR_DISTANCE() for calculating euclidean, cosine, and negative dot distance between two vectors.
    — Vector index powered by DiskANN (Disk based Approximate Nearest Neighbor)
    — I will be posting more about this topic in my upcoming blogs…

– Can call REST APIs with sp_invoke_external_rest_endpoint system Stored Procedure for calling LLMs

– Semanic Kernel integration, for semantic search capabilities for more intuitive data retrieval and analysis

– LangChain integration, by enabling seamless interaction between natural language queries and structured database operations

 
>> Fabric Mirroring:
– Mirroring replicates databases to Fabric with zero ETL
– Data is replicated into One Lake and kept up-to-date in near real-time
– Mirroring protects operational databases from analytical queries
– Compute replication is included with your Fabric capacity for no cost.
– Free Mirroring Storage for Replicas tiered to Fabric Capacity.

 
>> Other Database engine new features:
– Native JSON datatype, index, and functions
– Regular Expression (Regex) support, with new functions used at CHECK constraint, WHERE clause, SELECT list
– Copilot/GenAI in SSMS (Ver 21) for SQL query/code completions and recommendations
– Enhancements in Performance and Scalability
– Optimized locking for reducing memory lock consumption and minimizing concurrent transactions blocking through Transaction ID (TID) Locking and Lock After Qualification (LAQ)
– Real time event streaming to Azure Event Hubs and Kafka, by capturing and publishing incremental changes to data and schema

 
>> SQL Server setup – Feature selection:

SQLServer2025features

 
Signup for the SQL Server 2025 Private Preview program here: https://aka.ms/sqleapsignup
 

>> References:

– https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/sql-server/blog/2024/11/19/announcing-microsoft-sql-server-2025-apply-for-the-preview-for-the-enterprise-ai-ready-database/
– https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/announcing-sql-server-2025-bob-ward-6s0hc/
– https://ignite.microsoft.com/en-US/sessions/BRK195

 

Categories: SQL Server 2025 Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Azure SQL Database in Fabric Public Preview

November 20, 2024 Leave a comment

 

The SQL Server and Azure SQL team is revolutionizing AI app development with the Public Preview of SQL Database in Fabric which was announced at the Microsoft Ignite conference. Try it for free today!

 

With SQL Database in Fabric, you can:

  • Accelerate AI app development with speed, simplicity, and enhanced security.
  • Unify operational and analytics workloads on a single, seamless platform.
  • Leverage an autonomous, optimized, and secure design tailored for the AI era.
  • SQL database in Fabric lands all your data in OneLake in near-real time for analytics and AI
  • Get started for free – no charges until January 1, 2025!
 

Key Highlights:

  • Simple: Deploy databases in seconds, integrate seamlessly with OneLake, and leverage AI-assisted tools like Copilot.
  • Autonomous: Automatic scaling, optimization, and high availability.
  • Optimized for AI: Native vector and RAG support, API-driven model calls, and integration with Azure AI services and Azure AI Foundry.
  • Compatibility with popular frameworks such as LangChain and Semantic Kernel.
 

Learning:

We have multiple resources to help you, and your teams swiftly ramp up on Fabric Databases:

 

We would like to extend a  HUGE THANK YOU to to all the customers who participated in the SQL Database in Fabric Private Preview and shared their valuable feedback with us!

Categories: SQL Azure Tags: , ,

SQL Server 2022 preview announced, some awesome new features !!!

November 8, 2021 Leave a comment

 

SQL Server 2022 is coming !!!

 
On 2nd November 2021 in MS Ignite 2021 event Microsoft announced the preview of new version of SQL Server i.e. SQL Server 2022.

 
SQLServer2022

 
SQL Server 2022 will be more focused on Azure-enabled cloud and big data space, here are some excerpts from the announcements:

 
1. Azure Synapse link integration with SQL for ETL free and real time reporting & analytics: Here you can setup a Synapse Link relationship between SQL Pool in Azure Synapse and SQL Server as a data source and link required tables in Synapse Workspace. You can create PowerBI reports on top of these tables available in Synapse Workspace with real time data, without requiring you to write/setup an ETL from SQL Server to Synapse SQL Pool. This will also let you combine/JOIN datasets from different sources, data lake, files, etc. Similarly Data Scientists can create ML Models by using Synapse Spark Pools with PySpark language.

 
2. Azure Purview integration: with also work with SQL Server, for data discovery and data governance. Here you can use Purview to scan and capture SQL Server metadata for data catalog, classify the data (PII, non-PII, etc), and even control access rights on SQL Server.

 
3. Bi-directional HA/DR between SQL Server and Azure SQL MI: Now you can use Azure SQL Managed Instance as a Disaster Recovery site for your SQL Server workloads. You can setup Disaster Recovery as a Managed Service with Azure SQL Managed Instance (SQL MI). A Distributed Availability Group is created automatically with a new Azure SQL MI as READ_ONLY replica. This way you you can do failover from SQL Server to Azure SQL MI, and also back from Azure SQL MI to SQL Server.

 
4. QueryStore and IQP enhancements: Parameter Sensitive Plan optimization for handling Parameter Sniffing issues. Now the SQL optimizer will cache multiple plans for a Stored Procedure which uses different parameter values having big gap in cardinality providing consistent query performance. Enhancements on Cardinality-Estimation & Max-DOP feedback, and support for read replicas from Availability Groups.

 
5. SQL Server Ledger: Built on Blockchain technology, this feature will allow you to create and setup smart contracts on SQL Server itself. With ledger based immutable record of data you can make sure the data modified over time is not tampered with, and will be helpful in Banking, Retail, e-commerce, Supply Chain and many more industries.

 
6. Scalable SQL Engine and new features coming:
– Buffer Pool parallel scan
– Improvements on tempDB latch contention (System page GAM/SGAM concurrency)
– In-Memory (Hekaton) OLTP enhancements
– Multi-write replication with last writer wins
– Redesigned and improved SPANSHOT backups
– Polybase (REST API) for connecting to various files formats (parquet, JSON, csv) in Data lake, Delta tables, ADLS, S3, etc.
– Backup/Restore to S3 storage
– JSON enhancements and new functions
– New Time series T-SQL functions

 
For more details on SQL Server 2022 please check here” Microsoft official SQL Server Blog.

 

Categories: Microsoft, SQL Server, SQL Server 2022 Tags: , , , , ,

Database backup to Azure blob storage with SQL Server 2016+

February 9, 2021 Leave a comment

 
Backup to Azure was made available with SQL Server 2012 SP1 CU2. It provided significant cost savings versus on-premises costs of onsite/offsite storage, and device maintenance and better scalability than logical drives connected to Azure machines.

But backup to Azure was comparatively slow, and the maximum backup size was 1 TB, till SQL Server 2014.

 
Now with SQL Server 2016+ backup to block blobs offers more cost-effective storage, performance increases with backup striping and a faster restore process, support for larger backups, up to 12 TB, as well as granular access and a unified credential story.

Backup to block blobs also supports all of the existing backup and restore features, with the exception that appends are not supported.
 


 

For detailed information please check the Quickstart guide to SQL backup and restore to Azure Blob storage service

Categories: DBA Stuff, SQL Server 2016 Tags: ,

SQL Server 2019 released, awesome new features – download now !!!

November 4, 2019 Leave a comment

 
Today on 4th November 2019 Microsoft in MSIgnite2019 event announced the release of new version of SQL Server i.e. SQL Server 2019.
 

New stuff in SQL Server 2019 is all about Big Data Clusters for SQL Server, which will allow you to:
– Deploy scalable clusters of SQL Server, Spark, HDFS on Kubernetes
– Read, write, and process big data from Transact-SQL or Spark
– With Polybase query data from external SQL Server, Oracle, Teradata, MongoDB, and ODBC data sources with external tables
– and many more, we will check below…

 
–> Download SQL Server (evaluation version):

To download SQL Server 2019 you can Register and Download the Full or Evaluation version (180 days) here.

Or you can directly download the installer SQL2019-SSEI-Eval.exe
 

–> Free Developer Version:

Back in March 2016 Microsoft announced that going forward the Developer version of SQL Server any release will be free for Developers and Learning purpose. Register and Download the Developer version.

This Developer version is meant for development and testing only, and not for production environments or for use with production data. For more info please check my previous blog post.
 

–> Download SSMS (separate install):

Microsoft starting with SQL Server 2016 decoupled SSMS from SQL Server setup and is available as a separate installer. This is basically to support the move to make a universal version of SSMS for both SQL Server on-Prem & Azure SQL Database, that will ship every month or so. The SSMS setup is available separately as free download.
 

–> Download SSRS (Reporting Services):

Just like SSMS, now SSRS is also separately available for install from Microsoft Download Center, link.
 

–> Check new features in SQL Server 2019:

1. Big data clusters with scalable compute and storage composed of SQL Server, Spark, and HDFS. It provides key elements of a data lake – Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS), Spark, and analytics tools deeply integrated with SQL Server. [more info]

2. A complete Data Science & AI platform to train and operationalize models in SQL Server ML Services or Spark ML using Azure Data Studio notebooks.

3. Data virtualization allows queries across relational and non-relational data without movement or replication. PolyBase enabled you to run a T-SQL query inside SQL Server to pull data from Hadoop and return it in a structured format—all without moving or copying the data.

4. Intelligent Query Processing improves scaling of queries and Automatic Plan Correction resolves performance problems. [more info]
  – Table variable deferred compilation
  – Batch mode on row store
  – T-SQL Scalar UDF inlining
  – Approximate QP (Approximate COUNT DISTINCT)
  – Memory grant feedback, row mode

5. In-memory improvements for analytics on operational data using HTAP. Higher concurrency and scale through persistent memory (PMEM). [more info]
– Hybrid buffer pool
– Memory-optimized TempDB
– In-Memory OLTP support for Database Snapshots

6. Greater uptime with more online indexing operations. [more info]

7. Data Discovery & Classification labeling for GDPR and Vulnerability Assessment tool to track compliance.

8. Support for your choice of Windows, Linux, and containers. SQL Server on Linux for Docker Engine [link].

9. High Availability with, five synchronous replica pairs, Secondary to primary replica connection redirection, Run Always On availability groups on containers using Kubernetes. [more info]

10. Accelerated Database Recovery [more info]

11. SQL Graph enhancements, support of MATCH predicates in a MERGE statement, SHORTEST_PATH inside MATCH, and support for derived tables or view aliases in graph match query.
 

Check all the above and many more new features of SQL Server 2019 in MSDN Blogs.

Categories: Microsoft, SQL Server, SQL Server 2019 Tags: , ,