Shared Properties

No matter what task you use in your package, there is a standard set of properties for each task in the SSIS environment that you will have available to you. Many of the same properties have been carried over from SQL Server 2000 DTS, but most are new and complete the vision of an enterprise-ready ETL tool. Here is a list of the properties that you will use:

• Disable: If set to true, then the task is disabled and will not execute.

• DelayValidation: If set to true, SSIS will not validate any of the properties set in the task until runtime. This is useful if you are operating in a disconnected mode and you want to enter a value for production that cannot be validated until the package is deployed. The default value for this property is false.

• Description: The description of what the instance of the task does. The default name for this is <task name>, or if you have multiple tasks of the same type, it would read <task name 1> (where the number 1 increments). This property does not have to be unique and should accurately describe what the task does for people who may be monitoring the package in your operations group.

• ExecValueVariable: Contains the name of the custom variable that will store the output of the task's execution. The default value of this property is <none>, which means that the execution output is not stored.

• FailPackageonFailure: If set to true, the entire package will fail if the individual task fails. By default, this property is set to false.

• FailParentonFailure: If set to true, the task's parent will fail if the individual task reports an error. The task's parent can be a package or container. You'll read more about containers later.

• ID: Automatically generated unique ID that is associated to an instance of a task. The ID is in GUID format and looks like this: {BK4FH3I-RDN3-I8RF-KU3F-JF83AFJRLS}

• IsolationLevel: Specifies the isolation level of the transaction, if transactions are enabled in the TransactionMode property. The values are Chaos, ReadCommitted, ReadUncommitted, RepeatableRead, Serializable, Unspecified, and Snapshot. The default value of this property is Serializable. These options correspond with standard SQL Server transactions.

• LoggingMode: Specifies the type of logging that will be performed for this task. The values are UseParentSetting, Enabled, and Disabled. The default value of this property is UseParentSetting, which tells the task to use the logging mechanism for the package or container.

• Name: The name associated with the task. The default name for this is <task name>, or if you have multiple tasks of the same type, it would read <task name 1> (where the number 1 increments). As a SSIS designer, you should probably change this name to make it more readable to an operator at runtime, but it must be unique inside your package.

• TransactionOption: Specifies the transaction attribute for the task. The values are NotSupported, Supported, and Required. The default value of this property is Supported, which enables the option for you to use transactions in your task.

Each task also has an Expression page in its editor that helps make the task dynamic. You'll look at this after you look at each of the tasks.