Customer Reviews

Microsoft® SQL Server(TM) 2008 New Features

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Folks, this book is *NOT* an introduction to Sql Server 2008 ... it is meant for people who already know SS 2005 and want to know about 2008's "NEW FEATURES" ... hence the title! Please don't leave scathing reviews because you didn't pay attention to the size of the book and it's related TOC.

I am an MCITP 2005 DBA and wanted to take the 70-453 exam to convert to a 2008 DBA. There are no Microsoft books on this, and slogging through the 2008 Self Study Guides wasn't going to help. All Microsoft has is a handful of White Papers which serve only to confuse you (and make you hate Microsoft). I found this title by mistake (on Amazon) and received it the day before my exam. I managed the first 3 chapters (Administration) before going to bed. I passed the exam 100% because Otey neatly outlined the new technologies, with a brief description on what it does, when to use it, and how to implement it.

If you are a developer, chapters 4 to 7 highlight what's been added and how to begin playing with it. If you need a Step-By-Step guide, at least Otey's book gives you the buzzwords you need to search Amazon for. And when you get that Step-By-Step guide you'll find that you already know the material and are just looking at the screen shots.

Really folks, this book is tight with information, and even goes into Office Integration methods, which was suprising to find in such a small book.

Appendix 'A' walks you through upgrading your previous Sql Server version.

If you're an admin who might need to upgrade your systems, buy the book and you'll know exactly how to plan it. Easy to read cover-to-cover in 2 days.

I don't know what all the fuss is about. I've been doing SQL Server since "2000", so all I needed was a quick summary of just the new features in 2008. I wasn't expecting anything in-depth, but something I could read in a few days and have a global picture of the changes/enhancements. This book did that quite well.

I will complain about the proofreading, though. For example, on page 128, "dilatation" (what your eyes do in the dark) appears instead of "declaration" - obviously a spell-checking artifact. This happens too much, but none of it is the author's fault: the art of proofreading (by humans) is probaby lost forever.

Based on the thickness of this book, one would expect more detail. I was not impressed; save your money and read Internet articles. Sorry, but I have say this is not a great book.

This book gives a very good overview of the new SQL Server 2008 features. The author divides the book into 3 major sections - administration, development, and business intelligence. Each section describes those features designed specifically for a particular developer role. As a software engineer, I found the section on development features useful because it covers the new functionalities for ADO.Net Entity Framework, LINQ, and T-SQL. I also found the appendixes section at the end of the book, which contains installation notes and quick facts on hardware needs and system limitations, quite informative.

The author packs a lot of information into this 200+ page book. However, please keep in mind that this book is not intended to be in-depth discussions of the SQL 2008 features. (It will take a lot more than 200 pages if the author decided to go that route.) It is intended to highlight those features that the author believes to be most useful to the readers. This is good for those who want to have a good fundamental understanding of SQL Server 2008.

-Review by Stanley Chen, OC.NET User Group Member

As an experienced Sql Server person, I was looking for a book that just describes new features in 2008. This book does that, but I would have preferred more details. The editorial review on Amazon describes it as "a concise yet in-depth look." Maybe I should have paid more attention to the word "concise."

Excluding appendices, it is 186 pages. Those 186 pages get eaten up quickly by filler such as 6 pages listing the different Sql Server editions that are available, 2 pages showing rudimentary sql use of the new operators; and many pages with 1/2 the page filled by a screen shot. Does such a concise book really need to dedicate a full page to showing what a standard "file download" and "save as" dialog box look like?

But having said that, it does itemize the most important of the new features.