SQL Server 2008

ms_sql_srv_cvr

I get a lot of questions around SQL Server 2008, it seems like a lot of people have started to look at this product to see what it can do and how to skill up on all new features. The SQL Server TechCenter is a good place to start, here you can find product documentation on how to get started and white papers on everything from Data Warehousing to encryption and how to improve performance. There is also a free E-Book available now from MS Press, download it here

You can of course learn a lot by reading documentation to get facts, but for myself I want to try things out. You can of course install the product in a virtual machine and play around but I would also recommend you to try our Virtual Labs on SQL Server 2008. This gives you a manual that you can download and then do the lab online without installing anything. There is more than 20 available labs around SQL Server 2008. See the full list here: SQL Server 2008 Virtual Labs. If you want to run it yourself you can download a trial here. If you want to watch videos instead there is a lot of SQL Server 2008 videos on TechNet EDGE

I also want to recommend the SQL Server 2008 Compare site where you can look at comparisons between SQL Server 2008 and Oracle, DB2 or MySQL. You find both White Papers and Case Studies around this for all these products. We also have a tool called SQL Server Migration Assistant (SSMA) to help you migrating from Access, Oracle or Sybase. Read more about that and get access to the tool here

All this information and links should keep you busy for a while :-) Good luck!

Published 03-16-2009 2:40 PM by maria

Comments

# re: SQL Server 2008

Thanks a lot Ma'm...but the link is not working for me and as I told about this problem to others, they also had the same problem. I am not able to download this book. Could you please find out what's really goin wrong??

But anyways, thanks for your post.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009 9:07 AM by Kushal Gautam

# re: SQL Server 2008

Hi!

When I click on the link and sign in with my LiveID it works so it's very hard to understand what is not working for you. Is the problem when you log in with LiveID?

Tuesday, April 21, 2009 9:28 AM by maria

# re: SQL Server 2008

Hi Ma'm:

Now the link seems to be destined. Actually, I had problems while downloading this e-book, but not while accessing the link given above or signing in with my LIVE ID.

After signing in and completing all the procedures, there comes a page, where a 'Download' link button is shown and after clicking there, nothing happened. But I guess, there was problem with my browser...with IE I wasn't able to download but with some other browser, now I am able to do so.

And could you please brief about what actually the extension '.pl' is??currently, I've been downloading a file called pdf_loader.pl.

That would be helpful.

Thanks a lot for your response.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009 12:22 PM by Kushal Gautam

# re: SQL Server 2008

I'm using IE8 but haven't tried other browsers. The extension .pl is a pdf loader that display the document in your brower when opening.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009 12:37 PM by maria