Creating a Map Report in SSRS - SQL Server 2008 R2

SQL Server 2008 R2 brought several new features into the SSRS (SQL Server Reporting Services) arena. In the data visualization category, we now have three additional ways to display and visualize/analyze data in the reports:

• Sparkline and data bars – Sparkline and data bars are normally used inside tables and matrices to analyze the trend and series and compare them with each other.
• Indicators – If you are aware of KPIs, the concept of indicators is not new to you. As the name implies, indicators have icons to represent trends (up, down or flat), progress state, conditions.
• Maps – It allows you to create maps or maps layers to let you visualize data against a geographic background.

In this article, I am going to demonstrate how you can create map reports to analyze your data against a geographical background and then in the next article I will be talking about creating a map report with drill down functionality, click here for more information.

SSAS - Best Practices and Performance Optimization - Part 3 of 4

In this tip series we have been discussing various techniques that can be used to optimize your SQL Server Analysis Services (SSAS) environment. In this segment we look at best practices for performance optimization for your cube design and development, for more click here.

SQL Server Analysis Services Best Practices for Performance Optimization - Part 2 of 4

In the first part of this series we looked at processing performance, query performance and hardware resources for your SSAS environment. In this tip, I am going to share best practices and performance optimization techniques for source system design and network settings for your Analysis Services environment, for more click here.

SQL Server Analysis Services - SSAS - Best Practices and Performance Optimization - Part 1 of 4

There are several aspects that can take a toll on performance for your Analysis Services cubes. Some problems could be related to the source systems, some could be because of poor design of your cube and MDX queries and some could be related to network issues. In this tip series, I am going to talk about some of the best practices which you should consider during the design and development of your Analysis Services cube and some tips which you can follow to tune your existing environment if it is suffering from performance issues, for more information click here.

Managing and Connecting to AlwaysOn Availability Groups

There are several ways to effectively manage and monitor availability groups, replicas and databases in SQL Server 2012 but the most efficient is the inbuilt dashboard which displays information in very a intuitive way for high-level monitoring and management. In addition, you can also use the newly introduced catalog views and dynamic management views, extended events as well as system performance counters, for more information click here.

Configuring and Creating An AlwaysOn Availability Group in SQL Server 2012

In the previous article on AlwaysOn Availability Groups in SQL Server 2012, we looked at The Environmental Setup for An AlwaysOn Availability Group. In this article we turn our attention to the creation and configuration of the Availability Group. For more information, click here.

SQL Server 2012 AlwaysOn Availability Group Environmental Setup

Continuing from AlwaysOn Part 1 the series continues with a step-by-step guide to setting up the environment for an AlwaysOn availability group. In this article we will break down AlwaysOn environment preparation into three steps :
1. Installation of SQL Server 2012 on each node/replica/server.

2. Installation of the failover clustering feature on each node/replica/server.

3. Creation of a failover cluster and joining all nodes/replicas/servers to the cluster.
For more information click here.