Environment: SQL Server 2008 SP3 - using SSMS2008 (local or remote) and SSMS2012 (remote)
Something happened with our SQL Server instance recently. Nobody is able to create a new database through an SSMS (SQL Server Management Studio) interface. Neither SSMS for 2008, or SSMS for 2012.
What happens is they hang (or appear to hang). Sit and spin forever, and then the performance of the SQL instance really starts to tank while it is chewing away. CPU usage skyrockets.
Things I've noticed:
Telling it to create the MDF/LDFs on a local drive or network drive makes no difference.
We've tried disabling the anti-virus tools on both the SSMS machine and SQL instance server, with no change.
We've tried using the SSMS on the SQL instance server itself, and it also just spins. Any SSMS (we've tried three different machines) does the same thing.
If I open Windows Explorer and look at the locations I've told it to put the MDF/LDFs, they are created. I see the MDF and LDF show up.
As soon as I kill the SSMS process (because it feels like it's hanging), it does some cleanup work and the MDF/LDFs go away.
I can successfully use the CREATE DATABASE t-sql script in a query window, and it creates the databases fine, fast as can be, like one would expect.
FILESTREAM is not enabled for the server instance at all. No database uses it in the instance.
This only started happening recently - and the only thing I found with GoogleFu was a hotfix by Microsoft for SQL2008-SP2, that had to deal with microfilters and antivirii. This is SP3, so that fix is rolled into it (as well as we disabled AV on the SQL server and our local machines - to be sure).
Any suggestions or ideas? Is there some trace profile I can start up that would show me what is going on, step by step, to see where the SQL instance seems to be spinning its wheels when I try creating a database through the SSMS interface?
Related
I have created a database in SQL Server 2012 with mdf and ldf pointing to a external hard drive attached to my machine. I created tables, stored procedures, populated tables, etc. etc.
I removed the hard drive at the end of the day.
Today, when I attached the hard drive and tried to access the DB in Management Studio, I see the name of the database with (Recovery Pending).
What does this mean? I see the mdf and ldf files in the D drive.
What worked for me was to take the database offline*, then back online - no RESTORE DATABASE was necessary in this case, so far as I can tell.
In SQL Server Management Studio:
right-click on the database
select Tasks / Take Offline ... breathe deeply, cross fingers...
right-click on the database again
select Tasks / Take Online
When you removed the drive, you forcefully disconnected the database from the SQL Server service. SQL Server does not like that.
SQL Server is designed by default so that any database created is automatically kept open until either the computer shuts down, or the SQL Server service is stopped. Prior to removing the drive, you should have "Detached" the database, or stopped the SQL Server service.
You "may" be able to get the database running by executing the following command in a query window: RESTORE DATABASE [xxx] WITH RECOVERY;
You could, although I would not normally recommend this, alter the database to automatically close after there are no active connections.
To accomplish this, you would execute the following query:
ALTER DATABASE [xxx] SET AUTO_CLOSE ON WITH NO_WAIT;
Another way that works is to "Restart" the Database Engine. If feasible and/or practical for this server, it may be faster whenever you have several DB in the external drive.
In SQL Server Management Studio:
Attach the external drive
right-click on the database engine : Server Name(SQL Server
12.0.2000 ... etc)
Select "Restart"
Answer Yes when asked if you want to proceed
Below worked for me:
Run SQL Management Studio as Administrator (right click on SQL
Management Studio icon and select 'Run As')
Take database offline
Detach the database using DROP option
Attach the database
If you were using this database with a Web App running on IIS then you may need to restart the IIS Server
Hope this helps someone
If the SQL Server knows that database recovery needs to be run but something is preventing it from starting, the Server marks the db in ‘Recovery Pending’ state. This is different from the SUSPECT state because it cannot be said that recovery is going to fail – it just hasn’t started yet.
Check this thread: How to fix Recovery Pending State in SQL Server Database?
On my development box, I always run the latest version of SQL Server. I often deploy databases from my dev box to a live/staging area for review or testing. I've done this many times and it has always been a painful process, but I am realizing that I need to find an easier, more reliable and consistent way of performing this basic operation.
I normally use WebMatrix purely for deployment and it's worked fine, but I've been having problems getting it to work on my server for some reason. Consequently, I am seeking an alternative solution.
Creating a SQL dump file would probably work, but it's not an acceptable solution a database contains images and easily exceeds 2 gigs of data which would take forever.
The Import/Export utility fails due to issues with incomplete schema copies, identity inserts and checks. The solutions offered for these issues has failed to work in my particular case.
The Backup and Restore method also fails due to some strange incompatibilities between SQL Server 2008 and 2012. SQL Server 2008 Management Studio throws exceptions during the restore process of a 2012 database. It's odd that this happens, even though I set the compatibility of the database to version 2008.
I haven't tried the Detaching, copying and reattaching files method, but I haven't bothered trying since it would probably fail for the same reasons the backup and restore method did.
Are there other alternatives out there? Also, why is this so unbelievable hard for a task that is so common and important, especially in this day in age of 2013? Get real Microsoft!
We changed our method of deploying and moving databases between servers, instances and versions by adopting the tools from RedGate. They are expensive, but worth it IMHO.
My team creates scripts for ~everything.
Database Creation, Alter, Inserts, etc, etc.
And we write all scripts that check for the existence of things before trying to create them.
Aka, we can run the scripts over and over and get the same results.
And we deploy to different environments by using SqlCmd.exe.
EDIT
See:
http://odetocode.com/blogs/scott/archive/2008/02/02/versioning-databases-views-stored-procedures-and-the-like.aspx
and
http://odetocode.com/blogs/scott/archive/2008/01/30/three-rules-for-database-work.aspx
=============
If that is "too much" then I agree with the other poster, RedGate is your friend.
Points below aside, have you considered the Database Projects within VS2012? they allow you to script off the tables, sp's, triggers, users etc you want, generate sql cmd scripts, make changes and schema compare and version control your database code, I'd certainly recommend it
"Creating a SQL dump file would probably work, but it's not an
acceptable solution a database contains images and easily exceeds 2
gigs of data which would take forever."
Why is this a problem? where are you transferring the file from and to and over what connection?
"The Backup and Restore method also fails due to some strange
incompatibilities between SQL 2008 and 2012. SQL 2008 Management
Studio throws exceptions during the restore process of a 2012
database. It's odd that this happens, even though I set the
compatibility of the database to version 2008"
This shouldn't be an issue if file is created in 2008 prior to restoring. If you create a new DB in your 2008 instance, then take a backup from that and restore it to a 2012 instance with 2008 compatiblity, then you should be able to use it there, back it up from the 2012 instance and restore to 2008 again afterwards.
I am running an instance of SQL Server Express on an old underpowered tablet PC used for a special purpose application. Periodically the SQL Server process kicks in and hammers the CPU at 100% bringing the application to a halt. (Technically, it doesn't halt, it just slows it down to the point where key processes time-out.) It will be another two or three years before the hardware is replaced so that's not an option. Is there a way to throttle SQL Server Express?
There are a few techniques to identify CPU-hogging activity on MSSQL, but since your box is completely unresponsive at the time, you have few options. Using SQL Profiler to run a background trace logging to a table or file might be your best bet.
Until very recently, you needed a paid version of MSSQL to use Profiler, however MS now includes Profiler with MSSQL Express 2012 SP1. Here's a direct download link:
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=35579
(Note, you can probably install Profiler without upgrading your MSSQL server instance, if you don't want to).
If you've never used Profiler to diagnose CPU-hogging queries before, here's how I would suggest going about it:
new trace > connect to your MSSQL instace
make sure the "CPU" column is selected
make sure both the "started" and "completed" events for all the queries (Statement/Query/Batch/Procedure/etc) are checked.
Use a "column filter" to only show events where there is a value in the "CPU" column
Select a name for the trace, and a destination (table or .TRN file)
Start the trace and leave it running
After experiencing the CPU issue, once your box recovers: open the trace results, paying particular attention to the CPU column, and the date/time the 100% utilization started. Here's a link with more about using Profiler to analyze traces:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms175848.aspx
The background to my problem is based on distributed computing. I want to have a database with some numbers in them and then a number of computers go through each row calculating another number (a little bit of an over simplification).
The problems I'm having are routed in my poor understanding of SQL servers (I think). I've got Microsoft SQL server 2012 (and 2008) installed on this machine and I've somehow managed to make a server for this task but then the problems arise.
I can't add a table to the server (I'm trying to do this in VS2010). When I expand the server and right click on tables and select add new table i get the following error:
"The server version is not supported. Only servers up to Microsoft SQL Server 2008 are supported."
That stops me making a table and from there I can't move on. I've downloaded and installed the VS2010 SP1 (and re-installed it again when it didn't fix the problem) as I found this suggested for similar issues.
Any help on this would be greatly appreciated. I've read around but nothing seems to work, people suggest using "SQL Management Studio" but I don't seem to have this installed!
Also, I haven't gotten to this step yet, but if this gets fixed any advice/links on how to access the database from a different machine (over the same local network) would be greatly appreciated!
Many thanks,
Fraser
R Harvey gave you the pointer to SSMS - that's the ideal tool to use.
As for other computers accessing your local database - the name of your computer (where MSSQL is installed) is the name of the server in your connection string.
When I click on the "Databases" node in "Object Explorer" it just keeps on "Loading items" until at some point it just hangs.
This happens only when connecting to a remote server, not when accessing a database on my PC.
It also doesn't happen with any other node.
The guys at the web-hosting company didn't have any trouble with it. (But they're running 2008, and so is the SQL server there)
I reinstalled the whole SQL server etc. but to no avail.
What might be the problem?
I experienced this same problem: when accessing a remote server with the Object Explorer, SSMS would hang indefinitely. The Windows System Event Log would show DCOM error 10009 ("DCOM was unable to communicate with the computer MACHINE_NAME using any of the configured protocols.").
The solution was to clear the MRU history and other settings from my profile. To do that:
Close any open instances of SSMS 2012
In Explorer, open "%AppData%\Microsoft\SQL Server Management Studio"
Rename the "11.0" folder to something else, like "11.0.old"
Open SSMS 2012
You'll see that your MRU list has been cleared. You should then be able to re-enter your credentials and use SSMS as normal.
If everything works, you can delete the renamed folder. Otherwise, delete the new "11.0" folder that was created and rename the original one back to "11.0".
I have no idea whether it's actually the MRU list that's causing this problem or if it's some other profile data.
We were able to discover that SSMS is trying to make a DCOM connection over port 135 to the SQL Server (perhaps for SSIS, T-SQL Debugging, or something else). Our firewall was configured to block port 135. By opening the port in the firewall we were able to use SSMS (hence the reason it worked against local databases but not remote ones). Unfortunately, an open port 135 is an invitation for a lot of attacks, so that wasn't a practical solution for us.
Turn Auto-Close off on all the databases. Worked like a charm to me!
Every time you expand or refresh the database list, server has to awake the databases causing the hang.
Just run this to find all the databases that have auto-close on
SELECT name, is_auto_close_on
FROM master.sys.databases AS dtb
WHERE is_auto_close_on = 1
ORDER BY name
Credits to http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/sqlserver/en-US/99bbcb47-d4b5-4ec0-9e91-b1a23a655844/ssms-2012-extremely-slow-expanding-databases?forum=sqltools
To turn-off this setting for a database - Right click on database instance in object explorer -> Click properties -> Click "Options" in left navigation pane in database properties window -> Change the value of Auto Close property to "False" in right pane as shown in the snapshot below:
Assuming you have access to only one database at the hosting company (which is almost always the case, at least with a certain username/password), you can avoid the need to use the dropdown at all by setting your registered server to default to the database you're supposed to access:
(It may take longer here, too, but this will be one-time. You can also type it instead of waiting for the list to populate.)
This way, even if the login the host created for you routes you to tempdb or something by default, Management Studio will still put you in the context of your database.
I see now that you are talking about the Object Explorer node, not the "Use database" dropdown that I somehow interpreted incorrectly. An exercise to try might be to highlight the databases node (don't expand it) and click on F7 (Object Explorer Details). If this loads for you then it can be an alternative to navigate through the hierarchy and, as a bonus, you can show lots of entity attributes here and also multi-select, two things you have no control over in Object Explorer.
If that doesn't help, then your host should be helping you better than they appear to be. If SSMS 2012 is supported then they should be able to test this in SSMS 2012 and confirm or deny that they can reproduce it. If it is not supported then I think your recourse is to install SSMS 2008 as well (they can co-exist) and use it for managing this specific server.
Of course, just about anything that you can do in Object Explorer (and plenty of things you can't), you can do by using the catalog views and/or DMVs. So before you determine what to do, you may want to review (or share with us) exactly what you are using Object Explorer for - if there is a way to do it without Object Explorer, you might like the workaround better than having two versions of the tool (since the improvements in 2012 SSMS have absolutely nothing to do with Object Explorer).
In my case deleting the profile folder worked exactly once. The next time I opened SSMS 2012 it would freeze again when connecting to a server. SP1 didn't fix this either.
That was until I found the following simple workaround described on a ticket by Ben Amada over at connect.microsoft.com: Always close the Object Explorer Details before closing SSMS 2012.
So the complete workaround for me is this:
Follow Jaecen's answer, but close SSMS 2012 again after it created a clean profile folder
Apply Hoodlum's recommendation and copy SqlStudio.bin from the old profile folder to the new one (the old profile folder can be deleted afterwards)
Everytime before closing SSMS 2012 make sure the Object Explorer Details window is closed
The first two steps are required only once, or if the Object Explorer Details window was left open accidentally.
Edit
I just noticed that closing the Object Explorer Details window is also required when (re-)connecting to an SQL server in the same SSMS session. So basically whenever connecting to a server the Object Explorer Details windows has to be closed.
I spent over a month with Microsoft SQL Support troubleshooting this. It has been submitted as a bug.
I have both SQL 2012 SSMS and VS 2012 installed on Win 7 (64).
Deleting the profile folder never worked for any reasonable length of time.
The workaround we found was to ensure that my SSMS profile defaulted to the Master database when connecting. It appeared to have something to do with the fact that I'm connecting with Windows Authentication and I belong to more than one AD group that have SQL permissions assigned AND I don't have SQL specific permissions set up on my AD account.
I am connecting to several remote servers rangig from 2000 to 2012.
SMSS on local PC is SQL Server 2012,SMSS is 11.0.2100.60
SSMS freezes several times a day.When this occurs, I go via RDP to the
local server / SMSS / Activity Monitor and kill the processes from my PC with Database Name = master, one at a time, until SMSS on my PC unfreezes.
This always works, however, a cure for the disease raher than the symptoms would be highly welcome.
Have some SQL Servers from 2000 to 2012,
access then through SMSS from my desktop.
Problem occurs with varying frequency, looks like this: when I collapse a server in object explorer, SMSS freezes.
looking in activity monitor on the server in question, i find a process in master db with host = my desktop executing the following query
SELECT dtb.name AS [Name] FROM master.dbo.sysdatabases AS dtb ORDER BY [Name] ASC SMSS
killing the process frees SMSS.
Here is what worked for me
Open SSMS
click on connect to object explorer button
in the connect to server dialog box expand options >>
click reset all
Done!
I've test approximately all above answers but my SSMS got stuck in expanding the database list. I found the problem finally. The problem was because of a database that I restored it but It did restore correctly at the end. Then When I expanded the database list it was sticking.
I run a the query
SELECT
dtb.name AS [Name]
,dtb.database_id AS [ID]
,CAST(has_dbaccess(dtb.name) AS bit) AS [IsAccessible] FROM master.sys.databases AS dtb
Then the result took too long and at the end timed out but When I filter the stuck database I got result.
SELECT
dtb.name AS [Name]
,dtb.database_id AS [ID]
,CAST(has_dbaccess(dtb.name) AS bit) AS [IsAccessible] FROM
master.sys.databases AS dtb
Where name <> 'StuckDB' ORDER BY [Name] ASC
At the end I decided to detach StuckDB to solve my problem.
I have now applied SQL 2012 Service Pack 1 (through Windows Update) and it seems to work fine now, though it does take a very long time to load.
"Open SSMS click on connect to object explorer button in the connect to server dialog box expand options >> click reset all" - it works
I solved this problem by changing my default database back to master.
Go to database properties at SSMS and change compatibility to 2012. Then check.