Over the past year, I've been discussing some of the various technologies found inside SQL Server 2005. Three of these technologies are CLR integration, HTTP endpoints, and Service Broker. (Articles on these topics were published, respectively, in the November 2005, March 2006, and November 2006 editions of the DNDJ.) Each of these is a powerful tool in its own right, and can be used to great effect in almost any SQL installation. When used together, however, they become much more powerful.

In today's complex and demanding environments, it is quite common for users to be able to submit requests faster than those requests can be processed. In some situations, this is because the system has an enormous number of users. In other situations, it is because the requests take a long time to process. In both cases, the system needs to be designed so that it can accept the requests immediately, and process those requests later on. Such a system is said to be asynchronous.

A number of years ago, I worked for a company that was developing internal applications with SQL Server 2000. We didn't have any real database administrators. I was given that responsibility, but I was really a developer, one of many in fact. The problem with this arrangement was that all the developers had high-level rights to SQL Server. Each one could make whatever changes seemed appropriate to him at the time, and they could do this without consulting me. This often resulted in data incompatibilities that caused a bit of downtime, but lots of irritation. One day, however, my frustration reached a peak when some developer accidentally deleted a table that was used by a large number of applications.

SQL Server 2005 has many new and improved features. So many, in fact, that it would be very difficult to cover them all thoroughly. Therefore, I've been concentrating on those features that I feel will have the most impact on developers. Because of this, I want to present two more new T-SQL features. They were left out of my first T-SQL article because of space limitations. However, I believe that interest in these capabilities has grown, and that they deserve some coverage here.

These days, applications built around a service-oriented architecture (SOA) are all the rage. Complex systems can be written as a collection of services that communicate with each other through standard protocols. When implemented properly, these systems can become immensely flexible, scalable, and easy to maintain. The most common SOA designs utilize Web services as the communications medium, because they can be created and consumed by disparate systems and platforms. This highly useful capability has made Web services a very important part of today's information systems.

Sequential numbers. Sooner or later, you'll find a process that requires you to generate a series of sequential numbers. As a matter of fact, most database engines provide at least one method of producing such numbers. Microsoft Access, for example, has AutoNumber columns, while SQL Server has IDENTITY columns. However, these are features of tables. There are times when you need some sequential numbers, but creating a table is inconvenient or inefficient. So how does one proceed? How does one obtain a list of sequential numbers without creating tables?

Do you love XML? Have you been using XML with SQL Server? Many people have, starting way back when with SQL Server 7.0. Back then, there was no support for XML in the database, so we had to write external programs to convert the relational data into an XML format. This was time-consuming and often inefficient. When SQL Server 2000 came out, with its integrated support for XML, there were a lot of high expectations. Unfortunately, XML still couldn't be easily stored in the database, although it could be created and consumed.

Have you ever heard the expression 'I want it so bad that I can taste it?' Well, that's the way I feel about SQL Server 2005. I've been looking forward to the official release for quite some time. When people ask me why, I usually say 'SELECT TOP X.' In addition to generating some funny looks, this response gets my point across rather nicely. The next version of SQL Server supports many enhancements to the T-SQL language, and the ability to pass a variable to the TOP clause is just one of them. While changes such as this may seem small and insignificant, they can have a large impact on SQL developers.

For most of this year, I've been giving presentations and teaching classes on various aspects of Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005. In my consulting role, I've been constantly presented with problems that, while definitely solvable with current tools, simply screamed for the new products. Alas, like most of you, I haven't been in a position to use these tools in a production environment. Now the wait is over. By the time you read this, production versions of both products should be available to the general public. Now we all need is to help each other learn how to make the best use of the new and improved features that these products provide. That's where .NET Developer's Journal comes in.

A new version of SQL Server 2005, codenamed Yukon, is to be launched at a gala event at the Moscone Center in San Francisco today. SQL Server 2005 features significant enhancements in Enterprise Data management, Developer Productivity and Business Intelligence. First benchmarks for SQL Server 2005, says Microsoft, have established it as the price and performance leader among enterprise database management platforms.

Unless you have been living under a rock, then you know that November 7 is the biggest day in 2005 so far as Microsoft developers are concerned. Tomorrow, October 7, exactly one month in advance of that day, Jerry Dixon of .NET Developer's Journal is featuring SQL Server 2005 in a SYS-CON Webinar which you can register for now and freely participate in tomorrow at noon EST.

.NET Developer's Journal Editorial Board member Tim Huckaby writes: 'Microsoft's Paul Flessner gave his keynote entitled 'Getting Ready for Connected Systems' at Tech·Ed 2005 here in Orlando, Florida this morning. The huge announcement of the day was that SQL Server 2005, Visual Studio 2005, and BizTalk Server 2006 will launch the week of November 7. Now the world can stop speculating that these products will slip into 2006 - Microsoft has officially committed to dates.'