A quick heads up to let you know that VS 2008 Service Pack 1 is now available (links below). It typically takes a couple of months from this point before we'll see a final release.
This Service Pack includes new cool feature:
One interesting point is that MS is going to simultaneously ship SQL Server 2008 which actually has a hard dependency on SP1.
I thought I’d take a moment to highlight some new features that Dev’s would care about in SQL Server 2008.
- Change Data Capture: Async “triggers” capture the before/after snapshot of row level changes and writes them to Change Tables that you can query in your app. They aren’t real triggers as this asynchronously reads the transaction log.
- Granular control of encryption, right through to the database level without any application changes required.
- Resource Governor – very helpful when you allow users to write adhoc queries / reports against your OLTP database. Allows a DBA to assert resource limits & priorities.
- Plan Freezing – allows you to lock down query plans to promote stable query plans across disparate hardware, server upgrades, etc.
- New Date, and Time data types, no longer just DateTime types that you have to manually parse out the time or date to just get the real data you want.
- DataTimeOffset – is a time zone aware datetime.
- Table Value Parameters to procs – ever want to pass a result set as an arg to a proc?
- Hierarchy ID is a new system type for storing nodes in a hierarchy….implemented as a CLR User Defined Type.
- FileStream Data type allows blobish data to be surfaced in the database, but physically stored on the NTFS file system. ….but with complete transactional consistency with the relational data and backup integration.
- New Geographic data support, store spatial data such as polygons, points and lines, and long/lat data types.
- Merge SQL statement allows you to insert, or update if a row already exists.
- New reporting services features such as access to reports from within Word & Excel, better SharePoint integration
Personally, haven't spent any time with SQL Server 2008 but that's a great set of new features that I can hardly wait to start using in real-world applications.
Downloads
· VS 2008 SP1 : http://download.microsoft.com/download/7/3/8/7382EA08-4DD6-4134-9B92-8585A5B07973/VS90sp1-KB945140-ENU.exe
· .NET 3.5 SP1 : http://download.microsoft.com/download/8/f/c/8fc1fe13-55de-4bf5-b43e-375daf01452e/dotNetFx35setup.exe
· Express 2008 with SP1:
o http://download.microsoft.com/download/F/E/7/FE754BA4-140B-413C-933F-8D35FB150F12/vbsetup.exe
o http://download.microsoft.com/download/F/E/7/FE754BA4-140B-413C-933F-8D35FB150F12/vcsetup.exe
o http://download.microsoft.com/download/F/E/7/FE754BA4-140B-413C-933F-8D35FB150F12/vcssetup.exe
o http://download.microsoft.com/download/F/E/7/FE754BA4-140B-413C-933F-8D35FB150F12/vnssetup.exe
· TFS 2008 SP1: http://download.microsoft.com/download/a/e/2/ae2eb0ff-e687-4221-9c3e-9165a942bc1c/TFS90sp1-KB949786.exe
Feedback Forum: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=119125