Blog Archives
Moving SSRS Reports
Yesterday I was tasked with migrating our Citrix EdgeSight database off of a 2005 SQL Server and migrating it to a new 2008R2 Server. No problem, I have done that a million times before. But wait a minute, that database has SSRS reports installed on that server and not our main reporting server. If you follow my blog, you will probably see that I have not had much experience with SSRS, my reporting experience has been with Crystal and other minor packages.
I started researching how to migrate these reports and was not pleased to see Citrix’s response. They recommended migrating the ReportServer and ReportServerTempDB databases to the new server and then reinstalling SSRS on the original server. So what happens then if you have other jobs on the new and old servers? This is not a good recommendation. After an exhaustive search the only option I saw within the tool was to download reports one at a time and upload them into the new server. This was also not an option with a fair amount of reports to migrate.
Enter Reporting Services Scripter from SQLdbatips.com. Run the program on the original server and select your Report folder and scripts are generated and placed into a folder of your choosing. These scripts can then be copied over to the new server and executed by command shell. In this particular instance we had to reopen the data source and enter new credentials. Problem solved, reports migrated successfully.
Enjoy!
Saving Time with SQL Server Migration Assistant for Oracle
After using the SQL Server Migration Assistant for Oracle on a current project to migrate an Oracle database to SQL Server, I have learned a couple of little tricks that I would like to pass on to you. These are mainly time savers so hopefully they will make you more productive in your project.
The first problem I noticed is that there was no easy way to copy projects nor was there a way to save a project file as another name, which would have allowed me to copy the project. Why would I want to copy a project? There are many settings such as column type mappings that will stay the same for my project and are very time-consuming to enter, if you are modifying the defaults. In my migration, I want to do many iterations in my development and acceptance environments with different SQL Server database names such as Round1, Round2, or Round3 and then use Red Gate Compare and Data Compare to verify that all of the schema and data from the migration are consistent in my migration. This gives me a warm and fuzzy feeling before I turn over the data to the testers.
However with each iteration, I must create a new project manually. Why? Because SSMA does not refresh to recognize new databases in the existing projects. That is very annoying. It only shows what is there at the time the project is created. Even if you reconnect to the SQL Server, it does not refresh.
If you know ahead of time that you will do many iterations, you could however create several databases before starting with the SSMA and then copy the project folder from the first project that you create manually. You must then rename the folder to the new project name and the corresponding project file (with an o2ssproj file extension) contained within the project folder. This would allow you to simply switch to the new database. You must also keep in mind that you need to double-click on the Oracle schema and make sure the target schema is selected as your new database. This will not happen automagically as you choose a new database name in the SQL Server metadata explorer.
Another option is to create new projects as you create the databases and then copy in the object-container.mappings and/or project-container.mappings files from the first project folder into the new project folder. This will allow you copy those settings into the new project and save you some time. I hope you find this useful. Enjoy.
Oracle Conversion Update
The Oracle Conversion, day 14, continues and it is not as exciting as I envisioned. Oh, don’t get me wrong, the end result, Global Domination for SQL Server, will be the ends that justify the means. But until then, migrate data, check data, clean data, remigrate date, check data, clean data, time migration, repair migration process, check data, clean data, remigrate, ad nauseam. Rinse, lather, repeat.
Oh, this is not my first rodeo, I’ve converted many projects before but never have I converted Oracle before. Granted, the SQL Server Migration Assistant for Oracle has made life much easier but at the same time it has made life much more difficult.
It is a quirky tool that is very temperamental. We had to restart it before we did a successive migration or it would fail we are guessing because it possibly caches information from the previous migration process and the MSDN blog wasn’t much help. We also had to hit apply on every setting change or it would revert some of them back to the original value.
In addition, we would have to convert schema sometimes four or five times before it would synchronize them properly to SQL Server, saying that the SQL execution failed. That answer gives me a huge amount of troubleshooting possibilities. When it works, it was a great time saver but had we known the quirkiness we probably could have scripted it all out and saved a lot of headaches.
Doesn’t sound like a big deal?
Well when you have some big tables and it takes eight hours to convert the schema and you try synchronizing and it fails and you have to convert the schema again, you watch the progress bar for many hours. Oh yeah, I left out the fact that the vendor is responsible for the migration contractually, so I guess ultimately they should have scripted it out. Enjoy!
SQL Server 2012, Here We Come!
After meeting with Microsoft today to discuss our existing licenses and software assurance level, my organization gave SQL Server 2012 the green light! With our existing software assurance agreement, we will be grandfathered in to the new structure. Thus, when we renew our agreement in 2014, we will convert our existing processor based enterprise licenses to their equivalent core based licenses without additional penalty. That conversion had management worried and there was even discussion of staying on 2008 R2 for as long as feasibly possible, which no DBA wants to hear.
With the grandfathering process, there will be a concerted push to build some new clusters so that they may be grandfathered in as well, especially since we found out that our new acceptance cluster did not count against our licenses if we had the appropriate MSDN licenses for our three SQL DBAs. Personally, I was worried that the new licensing structure may derail some of management’s plans to reduce our Oracle footprint onto SQL Server. If that had been derailed, my plans for global domination would have once again been thwarted by those darn meddling kids. Or was that just old man Smithers channeling through me again?
Enjoy!
Migrating SQL Server Database Logins with sp_help_revlogin
You’ve migrated your database to a new box, with no problems. You created the login that goes with this database, and all is right in the world. However, when your user goes to connect to it they get the dreaded error 18456, login failed. But wait, I created the login, right?
Not so fast there, accidental DBA. You are going to need the help of a nifty stored procedure called sp_help_revlogin. This stored procedure, provided by Microsoft in the link below, will generate a T-SQL script that will copy the logins, their passwords and their corresponding SIDs (or security identification number, which is usually the culprit here). This is also a great utility when the database has numerous users with various security levels and passwords. Really now, who wants to write all of that down and recreate it? Even with screenshots, it can turn into a large, fat-fingering and time consuming event. Mind-numbing, I would say. Why do something manually when you can do it automagically? Just think of all those happy logins that will not be orphaned by the dark side?
Here is also a code snippet to check for orphaned logins, for your enjoyment. Enjoy!
USE <database_name>; GO; sp_change_users_login @Action='Report'; GO;
