“I sense you skipped SQL Server 2005 in you... Skipping SQL Server 2005 leads to a bigger learning curve... A bigger learning curve leads to not knowing the product as well...Not knowing the product as well leads to suffering..Running in compatibility mode 8.0 is the path to the darkside.. SQL Server 2008 (mode 10.0) is the force...May the force be with you" --
So you decided to skip SQL Server 2005 and go straight to SQL Server 2008. You have some learning to do, let’s put this into perspective. SQL Server 2005 was so massive compared to SQL Server 2000 that it is almost like climbing Mount Everest. Going from SQL Server 2000 to SQL Server 2008 is like climbing Mount Everest but you start at the bottom of the Mariana Trench.
2000 -> 2005 = Climb Mount Everest (8,848m/29,028ft).
2000 -> 2008 = Climb Mount Everest from the bottom of the Mariana Trench (19,748 metres, 64,788 ft) .
Not only do you have to deal with a complete rewrite of DTS and SSAS but SQL Server 2008 compared to SQL Server 2000 has so many enhancements to T-SQL that it is not funny. You will also have to deal with deprecated and dropped features for example *= and =* joins.
But it is not all bad; here are a couple of good things to consider (IMO).
If your developers know C# better than VB then they might pickup SSIS easier since in SQL Server 2008 SSIS supports C#.
If you work with spatial data then you have waited for a good reason.
Several new datatypes in 2008 which could make you app perform better (date instead of datetime, saves 5 bytes per row), Compression etc etc
There is a lot more of course, the merge statement is back, it was available in beta 2 of SQL Server 2005 but then got yanked.
I am just wondering how many of you are going straight from SQL Server 2000 to SQL Server 2008 without having any exposure to SQL Server 2005 at all? For some boxes I am going from SQL Server 2000 to SQL Server 2008 but we already also have SQL Server 2005 boxes running. The most challenging part for me was going from DTS to SSIS.
Now let's come back to that silly "I sense...." part at the beginning. A couple of year ago this was my sig
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“I sense many useless updates in you... Useless updates lead to fragmentation... Fragmentation leads to downtime...Downtime leads to suffering..Fragmentation is the path to the darkside.. DBCC INDEXDEFRAG and DBCC DBREINDEX are the force...May the force be with you" --
I changed the sig because of this guy's answer here: http://p2p.wrox.com/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=39079
" I sense lack of friends in you" if you think that was a funny statement think again. Not all programmers created the mess they are in. In most cases it's a matter of cleaning up the mess of others before them. If you don't have anything positive to add then keep your comments to yourself. If you would have read my post thoroughly you would have seen that your recommendation was pretty much useless.
"May you drop of the earth"—
What can you say to that? BTW this is not the only time; another person asked me how I knew his tables were fragmented.
Anyway enjoy the upgrade to SQL Server 2008, you won't be bored. :-)