Why Does the Wizard Fail When Transferring Data for Several Thousands of

Tables?

Current wizard architecture creates a DTS package data flow to transfer data. There are
scalability limits for several thousands of tables. We feel this is reasonable since package
designers are not likely to use several thousands of sources and destinations in one data
flow. There may be some changes to this in Beta 3.

Why Can I Not Copy Objects in the Import / Export Wizard?

The Import / Export wizard is designed to enable the user to easily move data to and from
SQL Server. Copying database objects between servers is really a management operation
rather than a data movement operation, even though data is, in fact, moved.

The Copy Database Wizard in the SQL Server Management workbench enables users to
copy database objects, and is specialized for doing this.

The DTS Import / Export wizard, on the other hand, simplifies typical DTS operations–
loading data from diverse sources including flat files, spreadsheets and OLEDB data
sources.

Why Can I Not Design Packages in the SQL Server Management Studio?

The SQL Server Management Studio is an environment for managing the storage and
execution of deployed packages. It has special features for doing this, including
integration with the DTS Service, and the ability to enumerate packages on remote
servers. But it is not a design environment.

The Business Intelligence Design Studio is an environment for designing packages,

organizing them in Solutions and Projects, debugging them and managing source and
version control for multi-user projects.

So in SQL Server 2005, users design packages in a specialist environment and manage
them in a separate specialist environment.

More information on designing and managing packages, and on deploying packages

between environments, can be found in Books Online.

What Are Data Sources and Data Source Views? How Do They Relate to
Connections in My Package?

Data Sources and Data Source Views are not objects within your DTS package, instead
they are separate objects saved in a Data Transformation Project in the Business
Intelligence Development Studio. As they are in the project and not in a DTS Package,
they can be shared between DTS Packages allowing a Data Source View to be defined
for a star schema and used consistently by every package which loads that star schema.
Data Sources define how to connect to an OLEDB or ADO.NET database. They hold the
connection string, and some other properties including a friendly name for the connection
and a description field.

Data Source Views are subsets of a relational schema that is pointed to by a Data
Source. These views can be elaborated with named queries, calculated columns, virtual
relationships and friendly names. For example, when working with a large schema you
may only want to use a small set of tables from the source; using a Data Source View
enables you to define this subset.

Data Sources and Data Source Views are design-time objects which can only be used
within BI Development Studio projects. At design-time, a Data Source can be used by
one or more DTS Packages in a project, but as at runtime a deployed DTS Package will
not have access to these design-time objects. DTS Packages contain Connections, which
enable the package designer to manage connectivity to databases, files, and so on. At
design-time a Connection can reference a Data Source or a Data Source View, but at
runtime the DTS Connection has all the necessary metadata to be used stand-alone. This
way the user can design different packages which share Data Source references and
Data Source Views, and then run them independently of each other and deploy them
separately.

If a DTS Connection references a Data Source, then an object using the DTS
Connection can use any Data Source View which also uses the Data Source. In this
way, a DTS Package can easily refer to only a small subset of a large schema.

Finally, DTS Connections are more generic than Data Sources–they can connect to text
files, HTTP connections, FTP connections and many other scenarios where a connection
string is needed–not just to OLEDB and ADO.NET managed providers.

More information on Connections, Data Sources and Data Source Views is available in
Books Online.

Why Is There No Microsoft Excel or Microsoft Access Data Source?

Excel and Access data files can be imported using a properly configured OLEDB
Connection Manager. You can also easily use the DTS Import / Export Wizard which
will build the Connection Manager for you.

For more information search Books Online for "Creating a Package Using the DTS
Import/Export Wizard."

Why Is the Fast Parse Option Not Used by Default in the Data Flow?

The Fast Parse option is opportunistic. It doesn't support locale-specific parsing or date
formats other than year-month-date. It is only useful for limited data formats, for which
faster parsing is possible compared to the default standard parse. Therefore, users have to
explicitly choose the option based on their data format.

For more information search Books Online for "Fast Parse."

Why Do We Have Separate WMI Data Tasks and Event Tasks?

System management data can be useful for influencing a DTS control flow. For example,
before running an ETL flow, you can check whether SQL Server is running, whether
there is a C: drive on the machine or if there is enough disk space available. WMI data
task is used to retrieve such system data.

System management events can be useful for taking real-time actions within a DTS
control flow. For example, only run the ETL flow when memory usage drops below 50%
or only start a data flow after a new source file is available on the file system. The WMI
event task allows definition and handling of such system events.

These two tasks are also fundamentally different in the functionality they provide. In this
release we have been more aggressive about separating tasks based on the features they
provide to support granular building of packages. Another example of this separation is
the File System Task and the FTP Task. The features they provided were combined into
one task in DTS 2000, but in this release have been separated to make the packages easier
to build, understand and support.

Why Is the Expression Language Not SQL or Visual Basic?

Neither SQL nor Visual Basic meets the requirements of the DTS data flow. For
example, we wanted to support a range of operators such as bitwise operators
manipulating bitmasks that are used in many scenarios as flags. Also, in order to make
best use of memory (and thus get the best performance) the DTS data flow is strict about
data types–this is also reflected in the expression syntax.

The DTS expression syntax enables you to design high-performance data flows with
complex handling of strings and data types. If there are functions you need which are not
supported by the expression language, or if you would prefer to use Visual Basic syntax,
you can use the Script Component which enables you to work with Visual Basic .NET in
the data flow.

Why Are There Functions Missing from the Expression Language?

Resources didn't permit implementation of every function now found in SQL Server
TSQL. We surveyed customers and developers to assemble our initial set, and will attend
carefully to beta feedback as we prepare for future betas and eventual release.
Why Do I Have to Configure Sort Order at the Source Adapter, Rather than at the
Consuming Component, for Example Merge?

The order of rows is set at the source adapter and cannot be changed by most downstream
transforms (Sort would be one exception). Source adapters that are cognizant of the order
of sourced data can set this information without user assistance, but in most cases
insufficient metadata is provided to a source component to allow it to set output column
sort information; as such, the user becomes responsible for this effort.

Why Do I Have to Deal with Having to Lock Variables in My Package?

The DTS runtime uses multiple threads for execution when appropriate to improve
concurrency and by doing so improve performance and scalability. In order to avoid
having more than one thread attempt to access the same variable at the same time, all
access to variables must be made "safe" by locking them for your operation; not doing
this could result in packages with a range of responses, from ones that "sometimes don't
work" to ones that return completely incorrect results. This can be an issue even if the
package is completely linear: for example, if the user were to change the concurrency
setting in a loop.

Why Is There No Notification to the Component When an Output Path Is

Detached?

DTS Designer users should be able to delete a path, then reattach it, without breaking
their package or changing its behavior. By providing an OnOutputPathDetached
method, we would allow ill-behaved components to break this understanding. To satisfy
component authors who wish to provide a variable number of outputs, the DTS object
model provides a property on the output called DeleteOutputOnPathDetached that will
auto-delete the output when the path is detached if the property is set to true.

Why Is There a Windows Service for DTS?

The new Windows service for DTS will allow an operator to see and stop DTS packages
running on a particular server. The service is exposed inside the SQL Management
Studio. Note: The DTS service needs to be started first as it is off by default.

See the FAQ topic "Why am I not able to see running packages under my DTS server in
Mgt Studio?"

For more information search Books Online for "DTS Service" and "Managing DTS
Service."
Why Am I Not Able to See Running Packages Under My DTS Server in Mgt
Studio?

The DTS service is disabled by default. This behavior is by design so that the service is
not running unless the system administrator wants it running. To start the DTS Service
right-click on My computer and choose Manage (from either the Start button or
Desktop), then inside the Computer Management window click Service and
Applications and then Services to see all the Windows Services listed on the right side.
Find DTS Server in the list and right-click to choose Start. (You can also double-click to
open its properties and change the Startup Type to Automatic if you would like the
service to automatically start each time the machine starts.)

For more information search Books Online for "DTS Service" and "Managing DTS
Service."

Why Is Package Logging No Longer in the Systsem Database MSDB by Default?

SQL 2005 DTS adds many new options for logging information about your database.
This allows you to define one or more log providers per package that can be of different
types. Log Provider Types include Text Files, SQL Server, Windows Event Log, and so
on. Within your package you can add the log providers by going to the DTS menu and
choosing Logging.

For more information search Books Online for "DTS Log Providers" and "Setting
Logging Options in Packages."

Why Aren't Changes in the Schema of an XML Document Seen in the Source
Adapter?

Changes in the schema of an XML file significantly affect the metadata of the data flow.
This requires the user to explicitly change the schema and take account of the metadata
changes.

Why Am I Having Problems Migrating Packages That Reference

DTSGlobalVariables Parent?

The scope of changes incorporated in DTS 2005 required a complete object model
rewrite. As a consequence after migration to SQL Server 2005 DTS, ActiveX script
references to SQL Server 2000 DTS objects accessed via the DTSGlobalVariables
Parent property will no longer be valid.

Why Am I Having Problems Migrating Data Pump Tasks?

The DTS 2005 Data Flow Task replaces the DTS 2000 Data Transformation Tasks,
offering greatly enhanced functionality. As a result though, there is no unambiguous
mapping between the 2000 and 2005 offerings. To ensure continued correct operation of
legacy Data Transformation Tasks, they are not completely migrated to SQL Server
2005. The migration wizard currently wraps such a task in a dedicated SQL Server 2000
package, and invokes it from an Execute SQL Server 2000 DTS Package Task.

Why Can I Not Migrate a Dynamic Properties Task?

As this task is directly dependent on the no-longer-present DTS 2000 object model, the
migration wizard currently offers only limited support for this task. Instances of this task
are replaced with script tasks containing comments describing the properties once set by
this task. Manual modification is required to restore prior functionality.

Why Aren't Global Variables Available in the ActiveX Script Task?

Access to global variables is not supported in Beta 2.

Why Don't We Include the Data Transformation Task and the Data Driven Query
Task with DTS?

SQL Server 2005 includes the Data Flow task in place of these two SQL 2000 tasks. The
Data Flow task places no limits on the number of sources, destinations and transforms,
unlike in SQL 2000 where the user was limited to a singe source, destination, and
transform per task. The new object model required to support this expanded functionality
could not accommodate these two less robust tasks.

Why Is DTS No Longer Client-Side Redistributable?

DTS has been rewritten from a useful utility in SQL Server 2000 to a feature rich
application and platform in SQL Server 2005. This change comes with a responsibility of
providing service and support to DTS users best handled by managing and licensing the
DTS engine functionality similar to other SQL server applications. Therefore, while users
can easily deploy packages with the new Deployment wizard, they will be required to run
the SQL Server 2005 setup and install DTS on each machine where they want to run the
packages. This will not only help ensure the user/machine is using a correct version of the
DTS executables but will also assist in updating the software in the future.

Why Does DTS Not Support an MSI-Based Deployment?

MSI-based deployment has the advantage of a complete stand-alone install, but it would
require the re-distribution of DTS binaries. If an important security patch is required, it
would be impossible to get the fix out to every deployment target in a managed fashion.
The current deployment utility requires target servers to have an existing installation of
DTS as this is a much more serviceable model for administrators.

For more information search Books Online for "Deployment Utility."