Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2

Nowadays, there is a growing need in all organizations to make decisions based on business information. Thus, it is also necessary to increase the productivity and flexibility of the technical teams in order to ensure a quick response to the needs of the organizations.

Microsoft SQL Server's new version has been designed to help organizations address this challenge. Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 is built upon all the strong aspects of SQL Server 2008 and it adds new powerful features for Business Intelligence analysis, such as:

• PowerPivot for Excel: PowerPivot for Excel is an add-in for Excel 2010 which enables the user to work with large quantities of information in an Excel worksheet without losing performance;
• PowerPivot for SharePoint: this module enables SharePoint 2010 and Excel Services to process published PowerPivot documents in Excel format (.xslx). PowerPivot supports document with over a million rows, without losing performance.
• StreamInsight: A development platform for Complex Event Processing Applications, where it is necessary to process a very high number of events happening in quick succession. Using this technology, it is possible to extract, analyze and correlate events, enabling real time monitoring, manipulation, and artifacts handling.
• Master Data Services: a useful tool for Master Data Management which enables the management of non-transactional information such as customer and product data. This tool aims at solving a common problem: the dispersion of non-transactional information across different systems, making it easier to manage and maintain the information in a consistent way.
• SQL Server Reporting Services: Improvements in SharePoint integration;

Tools included in the Platform

SQL Server 2008 R2 has a set of tools to which new functionalities have been added, such as:

• Relational Database Engine: The database engine is safe, reliable and scalable providing high availability and performance. It offers support for structured and non-structured data (XML). Additionally, the CLR included in SQL Server's relational engine allows the application development in common programming languages like C# and VB.NET.
• Integration Services: Extraction, Transformation and ETL for data warehouses.
• Analysis Services: Provide analytic information processing capabilities (OLAP), so that it enables a quick and sophisticated analysis of large volumes of information stored in multi-dimensional models. This sub-system is the basis for very powerful Business Intelligence solutions.
• Reporting Services: Easy-to-use solution for the creation and management of traditional (paper-oriented) and interactive (web/office-based) reports in various formats, built with information from several sources.
• Service Broker: Enables the development of distributed applications with an intense activity at the database level. The Service Broker implements a set of patterns that add asynchronous messaging functionalities to SQL applications.
• Replication Services: Data replication for applications that use distributed or mobile data processing. These services support high availability systems, scalable concurrency with secondary data storage for corporate reporting solutions, and integration with other systems including Oracle databases.

For more information on Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2:
- Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 official site