March update of SQL Server Data Tools to support SQL Server 2014

On the heels of the new release date for SQL Server 2014 RTM, SQL Server Data Tools' (SSDT) availability was announced two days ago. It is fully compatible with SQL Server 2014.

Apart from bug fixes in the previous version, the following are the enhancements:

• Static code analysis extensibility
• Filter capabilities in the editable data grid
• Saving data compare settings to file (.dcmp)
• Additional TSQL Editor connection actions

With this all database tools are fully integrated with,

• Microsoft Visual Studio 2013 Express for web
• Microsoft Visual Studio 2013 for Windows Desktop
• Professional
• Premium
• Ultimate

These will be pushed via VS Updates. You could also bring it in using Tools | Extensions and Updates menu.

Visual Studio 2013 with SQL Server tools can be downloaded from here:
http://www.visualstudio.com/downloads/download-visual-studio-vs

Note that both SSDT VS 2010 and SSDT VS 2012 are available stand alone.
Review what's new in this update here:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ssdt/archive/2014/03/25/sql-server-data-tools-for-sql-server-2014-is-available.aspx

Review the posts for earlier version:
http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2012/12/sql-server-data-tools-gets-updated.html

http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2013/02/about-ssdt-and-vs-2012.html

Follow link for more:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/data/hh297027

Deploying DAC to SQL Server 2014

The acronym DAC in SQL Server has many different meanings as in the following bullet list:

• DAC - Data-tier Application
• DAC - Dedicated Administrator Connection
• DAC - Data Access Components
• DAC - Data Application Component

This post describes deploying a Data-tier Application extracted from SQL Server 2012 Express database to SQL Server 2014 CTP1 (should work with CTP2 as well). The two servers are on two partitions on a x64 bit Windows laptop, with SQL Server 2012 on Windows 7 Partition and CTP1 on Windows 8 Preview partition.

There are no issues for this deployment and the next few images shows the stages of deployment wizard while deploying to SQL Server 2014 CTP1. We start with a .dac file created on Windows 7 partition and copied over to the desktop on Windows 8 partition.

 

The steps are very clear and you may also review the following for more detailed discussion of DAC with earlier versions on older OS.


https://www.packtpub.com/article/working-with-data-application-components-sql-server-2008-r2
http://hodentekmsss.blogspot.com/2010/07/sql-server-2008-r2-and-data-tier.html