I have a huge schema containing billions of records, I want to purge data older than 13 months from it and maintain it as a backup in such a way that it can be recovered again whenever required.
Which is the best way to do it in SQL - can we create a separate copy of this schema and add a delete trigger on all tables so that when trigger fires, purged data gets inserted to this new schema?
Will there be only one record per delete statement if we use triggers? Or all records will be inserted?
Can we somehow use bulk copy?
I would suggest this is a perfect use case for the Stretch Database feature in SQL Server 2016.
More info: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/library/dn935011.aspx
The cold data can be moved to the cloud with your given date criteria without any applications or users being aware of it when querying the database. No backups required and very easy to setup.
There is no need for triggers, you can use job running every day, that will put outdated data into archive tables.
The best way I guess is to create a copy of current schema. In main part - delete all that is older then 13 months, in archive part - delete all for last 13 month.
Than create SP (or any SPs) that will collect data - put it into archive and delete it from main table. Put this is into daily running job.
The cleanest and fastest way to do this (with billions of rows) is to create a partitioned table probably based on a date column by month. Moving data in a given partition is a meta operation and is extremely fast (if the partition setup and its function is set up properly.) I have managed 300GB tables using partitioning and it has been very effective. Be careful with the partition function so dates at each edge are handled correctly.
Some of the other proposed solutions involve deleting millions of rows which could take a long, long time to execute. Model the different solutions using profiler and/or extended events to see which is the most efficient.
I agree with the above to not create a trigger. Triggers fire with every insert/update/delete making them very slow.
You may be best served with a data archive stored procedure.
Consider using multiple databases. The current database that has your current data. Then an archive or multiple archive databases where you move your records out from your current database to with some sort of say nightly or monthly stored procedure process that moves the data over.
You can use the exact same schema as your production system.
If the data is already in the database no need for a Bulk Copy. From there you can backup your archive database so it is off the sql server. Restore the database if needed to make the data available again. This is much faster and more manageable than bulk copy.
According to Microsoft's documentation on Stretch DB (found here - https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/sql-server-stretch-database/), you can't update or delete rows that have been migrated to cold storage or rows that are eligible for migration.
So while Stretch DB does look like a capable technology for archive, the implementation in SQL 2016 does not appear to support archive and purge.
Related
I have 2 tables. The source table being from a linked server and destination table being from the other server.
I want my data load to happen in the following manner:
Everyday at night I have scheduled a job to do a full dump i.e. truncate the table and load all the data from the source to the destination.
Every 15 minutes to do incremental load as data gets ingested into the source on second basis. I need to replicate the same on the destination too.
For incremental load as of now I have created scripts which are stored in a stored procedure but for future purposes we would like to implement SSIS for this case.
The scripts run in the below manner:
I have an Inserted_Date column, on the basis of this column I take the max of that column and delete all the rows that are greater than or equal to the Max(Inserted_Date) and insert all the similar values from the source to the destination. This job runs evert 15 minutes.
How to implement similar scenario in SSIS?
I have worked on SSIS using the lookup and conditional split using ID columns, but these tables I am working with have a lot of rows so lookup takes up a lot of the time and this is not the right solution to be implemented for my scenario.
Is there any way I can get Max(Inserted_Date) logic into SSIS solution too. My end goal is to remove the approach using scripts and replicate the same approach using SSIS.
Here is the general Control Flow:
There's plenty to go on here, but you may need to learn how to set variables from an Execute SQL and so on.
Requirement :
Transfer millions of records from source (SQL Server) to destination (SQL Server).
Structure of source tables is different from destination tables.
Refresh data once per week in destination server.
Minimum amount of time for the processing.
I am looking for optimized approach using SSIS.
Was thinking these options :
Create Sql dump from source server and import that dump in destination server.
Directly copy the tables from source server to destination server.
Lots of issues to consider here. Such as are the servers in the same domain, on same network, etc.
Most of the time you will not want to move the data as a single large chunk of millions of records but in smaller amounts. An SSIS package handles that logic for you, but you can always recreate it as well but iterating the changes easier. Sometimes this is a reason to push changes more often rather than wait an entire week as smaller syncs are easier to manage with less downtime.
Another consideration is to be sure you understand your delta's and to ensure that you have ALL of the changes. For this reason I would generally suggest using a staging table at the destination server. By moving changes to staging and then loading to the final table you can more easily ensure that changes are applied correctly. Think of the scenario of a an increment being out of order (identity insert), datetime ordered incorrectly or 1 chunk failing. When using a staging table you don't have to rely solely on the id/date and can actually do joins on primary keys to look for changes.
Linked Servers proposed by Alex K. can be a great fit, but you will need to pay close attention to a couple of things. Always do it from Destination server so that it is a PULL not a push. Linked servers are fast at querying the data but horrible at updating/inserting in bulk. 1 XML column cannot be in the table at all. You may need to set some specific properties for distributed transactions.
I have done this task both ways and I would say that SSIS does give a bit of advantage over Linked Server just because of its robust error handling, threading logic, and ability to use different adapters (OLEDB, ODBC, etc. they have different performance do a search and you will find some results). But the key to your #4 is to do it in smaller chunks and from a staging table and if you can do it more often it is less likely to have an impact. E.g. daily means it would already be ~1/7th of the size as weekly assuming even daily distribution of changes.
Take 10,000,000 records changed a week.
Once weekly = 10mill
once daily = 1.4 mill
Once hourly = 59K records
Once Every 5 minutes = less than 5K records
And if it has to be once a week. just think about still doing it in small chunks so that each insert will have more minimal affect on your transaction logs, actual lock time on production table etc. Be sure that you never allow loading of a partially staged/transferred data otherwise identifying delta's could get messed up and you could end up missing changes/etc.
One other thought if this is a scenario like a reporting instance and you have enough server resources. You could bring over your entire table from production into a staging or update a copy of the table at destination and then simply do a drop of current table and rename the staging table. This is an extreme scenario and not one I generally like but it is possible and actual impact to the user would be very nominal.
I think SSIS is good at transfer data, my approach here:
1. Create a package with one Data Flow Task to transfer data. If the structure of two tables is different then it's okay, just map them.
2. Create a SQL Server Agent job to run your package every weekend
Also, feature Track Data Changes (SQL Server) is also good to take a look. You can config when you want to sync data and it's good at performance too
With SQL Server versions >2005, it has been my experience that a dump to a file with an export is equal to or slower than transferring data directly from table to table with SSIS.
That said, and in addition to the excellent points #Matt makes, this the usual pattern I follow for this sort of transfer.
Create a set of tables in your destination database that have the same table schemas as the tables in your source system.
I typically put these into their own database schema so their purpose is clear.
I also typically use the SSIS OLE DB Destination package's "New" button to create the tables.
Mind the square brackets on [Schema].[TableName] when editing the CREATE TABLE statement it provides.
Use SSIS Data Flow tasks to pull the data from the source to the replica tables in the destination.
This can be one package or many, depending on how many tables you're pulling over.
Create stored procedures in your destination database to transform the data into the shape it needs to be in the final tables.
Using SSIS data transformations is, almost without exception, less efficient than using server side SQL processing.
Use SSIS Execute SQL tasks to call the stored procedures.
Use parallel processing via Sequence Containers where possible to save time.
This can be one package or many, depending on how many tables you're transforming.
(Optional) If the transformations are complex, requiring intermediate data sets, you may want to create a separate Staging database schema for this step.
You will have to decide whether you want to use the stored procedures to land the data in your ultimate destination tables, or if you want to have the procedures write to intermediate tables, and then move the transformed data directly into the final tables. Using intermediate tables minimizes down time on the final tables, but if your transformations are simple or very fast, this may not be an issue for you.
If you use intermediate tables, you will need a package or packages to manage the final data load into the destination tables.
Depending on the number of packages all of this takes, you may want to create a Master SSIS package that will call the extraction package(s), then the transformation package(s), and then, if you use intermediate processing tables, the final load package(s).
Problem:
I need to get data sets from CSV files into SQL Server Express (SSMS v17.6) as efficiently as possible. The data sets update daily into the same CSV files on my local hard drive. Currently using MS Access 2010 (v14.0) as a middleman to aggregate the CSV files into linked tables.
Using the solutions below, the data transfers perfectly into SQL Server and does exactly what I want. But I cannot figure out how to refresh/update/sync the data at the end of each day with the newly added CSV data without having to re-import the entire data set each time.
Solutions:
Upsizing Wizard in MS Access - This works best in transferring all the tables perfectly to SQL Server databases. I cannot figure out how to update the tables though without deleting and repeating the same steps each day. None of the solutions or links that I have tried have panned out.
SQL Server Import/Export Wizard - This works fine also in getting the data over to SSMS one time. But I also cannot figure out how to update/sync this data with the new tables. Another issue is that choosing Microsoft Access as the data source through this method requires a .mdb file. The latest MS Access file formats are .accdb files so I have to save the database in an older .mdb version in order to export it to SQL Server.
Constraints:
I have no loyalty towards MS Access. I really am just looking for the most efficient way to get these CSV files consistently into a format where I can perform SQL queries on them. From all I have read, MS Access seems like the best way to do that.
I also have limited coding knowledge so more advanced VBA/C++ solutions will probably go over my head.
TLDR:
Trying to get several different daily updating local CSV files into a program where I can run SQL queries on them without having to do a full delete and re-import each day. Currently using MS Access 2010 to SQL Server Express (SSMS v17.6) which fulfills my needs, but does not update daily with the new data without re-importing everything.
Thank you!
You can use a staging table strategy to solve this problem.
When it's time to perform the daily update, import all of the data into one or more staging tables. Execute SQL statement to insert rows that exist in the imported data but not in the base data into the base data; similarly, delete rows from the base data that don't exist in the imported data; similarly, update base data rows that have changed values in the imported data.
Use your data dependencies to determine in which order tables should be modified.
I would run all deletes first, then inserts, and finally all updates.
This should be a fun challenge!
EDIT
You said:
I need to get data sets from CSV files into SQL Server Express (SSMS
v17.6) as efficiently as possible.
The most efficient way to put data into SQL Server tables is using SQL Bulk Copy. This can be implemented from the command line, an SSIS job, or through ADO.Net via any .Net language.
You state:
But I cannot figure out how to refresh/update/sync the data at the end
of each day with the newly added CSV data without having to re-import
the entire data set each time.
It seems you have two choices:
Toss the old data and replace it with the new data
Modify the old data so that it comes into alignment with the new data
In order to do number 1 above, you'd simply replace all the existing data with the new data, which you've already said you don't want to do, or at least you don't think you can do this efficiently. In order to do number 2 above, you have to compare the old data with the new data. In order to compare two sets of data, both sets of data have to be accessible wherever the comparison is to take place. So, you could perform the comparison in SQL Server, but the new data will need to be loaded into the database for comparison purposes. You can then purge the staging table after the process completes.
In thinking further about your issue, it seems the underlying issue is:
I really am just looking for the most efficient way to get these CSV
files consistently into a format where I can perform SQL queries on
them.
There exist applications built specifically to allow you to query this type of data.
You may want to have a look at Log Parser Lizard or Splunk. These are great tools for querying and digging into data hidden inside flat data files.
An Append Query is able to incrementally add additional new records to an existing table. However the question is whether your starting point data set (CSV) is just new records or whether that data set includes records already in the table.
This is a classic dilemma that needs to be managed in the Append Query set up.
If the CSV includes prior records - then you have to establish the 'new records' data sub set inside the CSV and append just those. For instance if you have a sequencing field then you can use a > logic from the existing table max. If that is not there then one would need to do a NOT compare of the table data with the csv data to identify which csv records are not already in the table.
You state you seek something 'more efficient' - but in truth there is nothing more efficient than a wholesale delete of all records and write of all records. Most of the time one can't do that - but if you can I would just stick with it.
We have an Oracle Database which has about 500 000 records and we have an etl job which runs every day and it will delete all the records from Oracle and reinsert the data (because some of the data is updated on every day) and in this process the lastupdatedTime for all the records is current day. This whole process is maintained by some other team.
And We have an application which is related to search, for this we are using Solr for the better performance. To use Solr, we are reading all the data from Oracle DB and storing into SolrCollection and this is a separate Job.
My questions, is there any better way to get only the modified records from Oracle and update only those into my Solr Collection. If we go with lastUpdatedTime in Oracle Db it wont help in my scenario.
I have an application that produce approximately 15000 rows int a table named ExampleLog for each Task. The task has a taskID, that is saved in a table named TaskTable, thus it's possible to retrieve data from the ExampleLog table to run some queries.
The problem is that the ExampleLog table is getting very big, since I run everyday at least 1 task. At the time being my ExampleLog table is over 60 GB.
I would like to compress the 15000 rows which belong to a TaskID, and compress them or just Zip them and then save the compressed data somewhere inside the database as Blob or as Filestream. But it is important for me to be able to query easily the compressed or zipped file and proccess some query in a efficient manner inside the compressed or zipped data. (I don't know, if it's possible or I may lost in term of performance)
PS: The compressed data should not be considered as backup data.
Did someone can recommend an good approach or technique to resolve this problem. My focus is on the speed and of the query running on the ExampleLog and the place taken on the disk.
I'm using SQL Server 2008 on Windows 7
Consider Read-Only Filegroups and Compression.
Using NTFS Compression with Read-Only User-defined Filegroups and Read-Only Databases
SQL Server supports NTFS compression of read-only
user-defined filegroups and read-only databases. You should consider
compressing read-only data in the following situations: You have a
large volume of static or historical data that must be available for
limited read-only access. You have limited disk space.
Also, you can try and estimate the gains from page compression applied to the log table using Data Compression Wizard.
The answer of Denis could not solve my Problem completely, however I will use it for some optimization inside the DB.
Regarding the problem of storing data in package/group, there are 2 solutions of my problem:
The first solution is the use of the Partitioned Table and Index Concepts.
For example, if a current month of data is primarily used for INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, and MERGE operations while previous months are used primarily for SELECT queries, managing this table may be easier if it is partitioned by month. This benefit can be especially true if regular maintenance operations on the table only have to target a subset of the data. If the table is not partitioned, these operations can consume lots of resources on an entire data set. With partitioning, maintenance operations, such as index rebuilds and defragmentations, can be performed on a single month of write-only data, for example, while the read-only data is still available for online access.
The second solution it to insert from the code (C# in my case) a List or Dictionary of row from a Task, then save them inside a FILESTREAM (SQL Server) on the DB server. Data will later by retrived by Id; the zip will be decompressed and data will be ready to use.
We have decided to use the second solution.