Visual Studio 2013 RTM and SQL Server 2014 CTP available

Visual Studio 2013 RTM was released for MSDN Subscribers today. If you would like to download any of the versions, you can go here. Here is 20 of the new features.

1. TFS Support for Epics
2. A new team explorer
3. Cloud Load Testing
4. Git integration: Can use Git as your source repository
5. Copy the output of a build to a server – Already in the Team Foundation Service, now in Team Foundation Server
6. Improved Diagnostics for build
7. Default build process template
8. Post and Pre-Built Scripts (love this one personally)
9. Simplified Build process template
10. Pending Changes window is back
11. Coding indicators to show method dependencies
12. Coding indicators to show whether code changes break your tests
13. Some pieces of InRelease (recently purchased by Microsoft) integrated into TFS – more workflow (gates)
14. Team Room: Project chatter in one place
15. Roaming settings – allows you to have your settings go to any computer you use (excellent feature, much like settings in Windows 8 or 8.1)
16. Peek definition – no need to open a file to see its definition
17. Code Lens – see references when hovering over a method
18. Browser Link  – Can refresh a browser inside Visual Studio when running/debugging an application
19. Blue Theme – Ho Hum
20. Feedback tools

As of two days ago (10/15/2013), you could also download SQL Server 2014 CTP 2. The link to download is here. My favorite new feature since CTP1 is the enhanced In-Memory OLTP, but it is still not as awesome as I would like for range operations, which, to me, is the feature that may make SQL Server 2014 a must have upgrade.

Peace and Grace,
Greg

Twitter: @gbworld
YouTube: GABWORLD

Video: Deploying SSDT DACPACs in Visual Studio 2010

NOTE: This is a transcript, of sorts, from a Video I have posted at http://youtu.be/gXZFCZh6Hbg. You can watch the video here, as well. My video channel is http://www.youtube.com/gabworld. The playlist for data (.NET & SQL Server videos) is http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLW9_oAiMp1h87qisEOi4PEfZpdiu_HXya.

Deploying a DACPAC, video version of this blog entry

I am going to show three ways of deploying a database via SSDT created .dacpac files.

1. Deploying with Visual Studio
2. Deploying with SQL Server Management Studio
3. Deploying with SQLPackage.exe

The Solution and SSDT project

First, let’s look at the solution in Visual Studio 2010. This is a solution called Demo1 which comes from a course I am writing for Pluralsight on Behavior Driven Development, or BDD. The SSDT project is called emo1.HelloWorld.SSDT. In the SSDT project, you will see there are three tables.

If I look over at the /bin/Debug folder, you will see there is nothing here, as the project has not yet been built.

So I am going to right click on the project and choose Build.

Now you can see there are three files built, a DLL, a dacpac and a pdb. The imporatant one here is the dacpac, as it is what we need to deploy.

Deploying from SSDT in Visual Studio 2010

To do this, right click the Project Folder and choose publish

This brings up a dialog box. In this case I have not set the deployment server, so I will have to set that first.

I will click the Edit button and then choose my local server and change the database name to HelloWorld. I could also deploy to a database that already exists, if that is my choice.

I then click the OK button and then the Publish button.

After clicking Publish, I see the results in Visual Studio:

And I can go to SQL Management studio and right click the databases folder and choose Refresh.

We now see the database HelloWorld deployed.

Success on this one

Deploy with SQL Server Management Studio

You may wonder why you might want to deploy using SQL Server Management Studio. The simple answer is you can do this without having Visual Studio installed. A DBA can also use this tool for a database a developer is not allowed to install to.

To deploy it, I am going to right click the databases folder and choose Deploy Data Tier Application.

This opens up a wizard. We can ignore page 1 and click the Next button.

Now I will click the Browse button and find the DACPAC file.

I can then click the Open button on the Folder Dialog Box and the Next button on the Wizard. I then name the file and click the next button.

The next wizard screen gives a summary of the work, so I click the Next button and deploy the DAC.

Here are some screens of the DAC deploying. This should take about 30 seconds with this DAC.

If I right click the database folder and choose refresh.

We now see the database HelloWorld deployed.

Success on this one too

Deploy with SQLPackage.exe

You can also use the SQLPackage executable to install a dacpac. I have create a batch file that runs the following command:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\110\DAC\bin\sqlpackage.exe" /Action:Publish /SourceFile:"E:\projects\Pluralsight\BDD\Module1\Demo1\Data\Demo1.HelloWorld.SSDT

\bin\Debug\Demo1.HelloWorld.SSDT.dacpac" /TargetServerName:(local) /TargetDatabaseName:HelloWorld

Here is the solution running.

If I go to SQL Server Management Studio and right click the database folder and choose refresh.

We now see the database HelloWorld deployed.

Success on this one too

Summary

I have summarized three ways to deploy the output of a SSDT project (.dacpac file).

1. Deploying with Visual Studio
2. Deploying with SQL Server Management Studio
3. Deploying with SQLPackage.exe

Peace and Grace,
Greg

Twitter: @gbworld
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/gabworld