Chapter 14 -- Optimizing Query Performance

Chapter 14

If you want to end up with a poorly performing application or a complete project failure, you should wait until the end of the project to deal with performance concerns. If, however, you want your application to be the best it can be, you must consider performance throughout the development cycle. In fact, you must consider performance before you even write your first line of code.

Every chapter of this book has included some information on performance. If you've turned directly to this chapter in hopes of finding the secret to improving your lackluster application, you'll be disappointed. We can offer only guidelines for you to keep in mind, along with some pointers that refer back to earlier information or to other helpful materials.

Microsoft SQL Server systems can be brilliantly fast with well-designed, well-implemented applications. It can support workloads of the type and size that no one dreamed possible back in 1988 when SQL Server first became available. But with a poorly planned or poorly implemented system, SQL Server can perform horribly. Statements like "SQL Server is slow" are not uncommon. (Nor are such statements about other database products.) Anytime you hear this from someone who has deployed a production application, your first thought should be that the person has dropped the ball somewhere along the lineor that SQL Server is unsuitable for the task at hand. (SQL Server can handle most systems, but some are still beyond its reach.)

If this is the first chapter you've turned to, please stop and go back at least to Chapter 3. All of the chapters from Chapter 3 to this one are relevant to performance issues. You might also revisit Chapter 11, which is about cursors, and Chapter 13, on locking. A thorough understanding of cursors and locking is a prerequisite for understanding the material in this chapter.



Inside Microsoft SQL Server 7.0
Inside Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 (Mps)
ISBN: 0735605173
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 1999
Pages: 144

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