But this eye candy is worth waiting for.  What I am talking about?

I have spend that last weeks nose down in the Spatial bits for SQL Server 2008. I really believe this is the darkhorse super feature of the product. But a big problem with it has been visualizing the results. Unless you good at mentally visualing spatial relationships, it can be pretty hard to make sense of some the spatial based queries you are likely to want to use. Since CTP5, I have been using Morten Nielsen's SQL Server 2008 Spatial Tools quite happily.

In Eye Candy of the Highest Order, IsaacK introduces the Spatial Results pannel for SSMS. In short, you no longer have to suffer with this:

Because you render the data like this:

Yum! The downside is that this won't be in RC0 but, per Isaac, should be in RTM.

Issac has also started talking about some new features that will make constructing geo* instances easier with the new Builder APIs. Check out Our Upcoming Builder API for the details.