SQL 2012 Upgrade Part 5: Query Playback Testing

Trace replay was a very important part of our testing plan. Our desire was to complete the SQL Server 2012 upgrade without the end-users noticing any change.There is no practical way to completely ensure that we could accomplish this but being able to successfully execute a batch of queries that emulates the live production environment would go a long way towards getting the "warm and fuzzy" feeling.

Trace Replay via SQL Server Profiler Fills C: Drive

You might notice that SQL Server Profiler fills up your C: drive with temporary files while you're doing a replay. I found this out quickly since my C: drive was rather small and only had about seven gigabytes of free space.When you're running a trace replay from Profiler there is actually a trace running that monitors the activity of the replay. This is how you can see what the results of the replay are. The problem with this is that, by default, the results of the trace are being stored in temporary files on the C: drive.

SQL 2012 Upgrade Part 4: SSIS Testing

Read on to see how we planned to test our SSIS packages and components and what really happened.

SQL 2012 Upgrade Gotcha: SQL 2000 Not Supported in Native Client

We're only a few days from our SQL Server 2012 upgrade and a new issue pops up. Apparently, the SQL Server Native Client 11.0 (the one that ships with SQL Server 2012) does not support SQL Server 2000. I found this out when I ran a script to test the processing of all our Analysis Services databases.

SQL 2012 Upgrade Part 3: Test Prep

Playback trace capture is a simple process but it is imperative that we capture enough data to get an accurate test. This requires something I haven’t mentioned much yet but really should have: communication. If you don’t want to freak out your developers, especially ones that still have scars from their upgrade bites, you want to get them on board early. Not only will the developers like you better, they will be more apt to help you out. You’re probably going to need their help to communicate to your/their customers and to help you get the right test data together.

SQL 2012 Upgrade Part 2: Test Plan

While I probably should have worked out the test details earlier in the SQL Server 2012 upgrade planning, some of the details didn’t come out until later in the planning process (after the schedule was pretty much set). Luckily, we didn’t wait too long and it didn’t impact our upgrade schedule.

SQL 2012 Upgrade Part 1: The Test Environment

This post begins a series I will be doing on how we upgraded all the servers used by our BI Team to SQL Server 2012.

The biggest part of our SQL Server 2012 Upgrade Plan is testing. Although Microsoft hasn’t really changed a whole lot in what we do, there is still the off-chance that some minor change will blow up one of our solutions. I am pretty explosion-averse and was about to start pounding my head against a wall trying to come up with a way to test without impacting developers or users. Then I got lucky; one day I was chatting with a co-workers and he had a really great idea for how to create a test environment that would fit our needs.