What's the best way to know which stored procedure are currently running in a database.
I have a stored procedure which basically calls other 3 and passes them some parameters and these 3 stored procedures take a long time to complete... I would like to know which one is running...
Thanks
I think you can also use SQL profiler to get information in more detail.
Use Activity Monitor to detect what is currently running on your database.
The Command column might indicate which stored procedure is currently running.
To help you monitor whats stored procedure is running I would suggest creating a SQL Job to run those 3 stored procedures seperately as steps. That way you can place an email alert step in between them so that you know when each one has completed.
This shouldn't be too difficult to setup in SQL Server Agent.
EDIT: SQL Profiler is an option, but this will have an impact on performance as you will be monitoring the live database, plus you indicated that the stored procedures take a while to run so you would want those times to increase. IMO I think a simple email alert, or some other form of notification which could be built at the end of each stored procedure would be you best option.
e.g. An simple insert to a log file with a timestamp indication when each stored procedure has finished.
Related
I need to collect data from a SQL Server table, format it, and then put it into a different table.
I have access to SQL Server but cannot setup triggers or scheduled jobs.
I can create tables, stored procedures, views and functions.
What can I setup that will automatically collect the data and insert it into a SQL Server table for me?
I would probably create a stored procedure to do this task.
In the stored procedure you can create a CTE or use temp tables (depending on the task) and do all the data manipulation you require and once done, you can use the SELECT INTO statement to move all the data from the temp table into the SQL Server table you need.
https://www.w3schools.com/sql/sql_select_into.asp
You can then schedule this stored procedure to run at a time desired by you
A database is just a storage container. It doesn't "do" things automatically all by itself. Even if you did have the access to create triggers, something would have to happen to the table to cause the trigger to fire, typically a CRUD operation on the parent table. And something external needs to happen to initiate that CRUD operation.
When you start talking about automating a process, you're talking about the function of a scheduler program. SQL Server has one built in, the SQL Agent, and depending on your needs you may find that it's appropriate to enlist help from whoever in your organization does have access to it. I've worked in a couple of organizations, though, that only used the SQL Agent to schedule maintenance jobs, while data manipulation jobs were scheduled through an outside resource. The most common one I've run across is Control-M, but there are other players in that market. I even ran across one homemade scheduler protocol that was just built in C#.NET that worked great.
Based on the limitations you lay out in your question, and the comments you've made in response to others, it sounds to me like you need to do socialize your challenge within your organization to find out what their routine mechanism is for setting up data transfers. It's unlikely that this is the first time it's come up, unless the company was founded in the last week or two. It will probably require that you set up your code, probably a stored procedure or maybe an SSIS package, and then work with someone else, perhaps a DBA or a Site Operations team or some such, to get that process automated to fire when you need it to, whether through an Agent job or maybe a file listener.
Well you have two major options, SP and SSIS.
Both of them can be scheduled to run at a given time with a simple Job from the SQL Server Agent. Keep in mind that if you are doing this on a separate server you might need to add the source server as a Linked Server so you can access it from the script.
I've done this approach in the past and it has worked great. Note, for security reasons, I am not able to access the remote server's task scheduler, so I go through the SQL Server Agent:
Run a SQL Server Agent on a schedule of your choice
Use the SQL Server Agent to call an SSIS Package
The SSIS Package then calls an executable which can pull the data you want from your original table, evaluate it, and then insert a formatted version of it, one record at a time. Alternatively, you can simply create a C# script within the SSIS package via a Script Task.
I hope this helps. Please let me know if you need more details.
I have a stored procedure in SQL Server 2008 R2. It was working correctly, but it stopped working (I did not change the code).
It is something difficult to explain, specially because I can not share the stored procedure's code (company's rules). I will try to explain it as much as possible.
This stored procedure is executed by a software, this software calls two stored procedures. One of the stored procedures works correctly and the another one "fails" (it doesn't do anything and not return any error). Both stored procedures do similar things such as update and insert information, from parameters, in some tables. If I check the software's logs I can see that this software is calling both stored procedures correctly. In fact, the stored procedure does not return any error, it just does not do anything.
When I run this stored procedure manually, I use the same parameters that the software should pass and it works correctly.
I simulated a real case and the software called both stored procedures, one works and the another one did not do anything. Then, I executed the second stored procedure manually with the same parameters and it worked correctly.
In addition, the database's user has enough permission (I guess it, because it was working correctly).
Another important thing is that I have two environments with the same databases. The software calls both stored procedures in both environments. In one of the environments it works correctly and the another environment the software calls both stored procedures, but one of them does not do anything as I have explained here.
Regards and thanks!
First, try to run the stored proc using Profiler to get exactly what is being sent, it may not be sending what you think it should.
Next check the structure of the two databases for the tables/views referenced, any functions in the procs. Make sure to also check permissions. Script the stored procs in both databases and compare. When database on two servers have an issue like this it is often that the servers are not in sync with the exact code they should have.
Also the data may be different resulting in no data that needs to be acted on by the stored proc in one server.
One reason this can happen is the use of temp tables; if they are not available, it may fail, and the scope works differently in a stored procedure than in an interactive session.
My boss and I have been trying to see what sort of auditing plan we could try for our stored procedures. Currently there're two external applications taking information from our database through stored procedures and we're interested in auditing when they're being executed, and what values are passed as parameters. So far what I've done is simply create a table for the stored procedures one of the apps is using, and as they use the same input parameters, have one column per parameter. Obviously this isn't the best choice, but we wanted to get quick info to see if they were running batch processes and when they were running them. I've tried SQL Server Audit, but it doesn't catch the parameters unless you're executing a SP in a query.
SQL Server Profiler will do this for you; its included for free. Setup a trace and let it run.
You can also apply quite a bit of filtering to the trace, so you don't need to track everything; you can also direct the output to a file, or sql table for later analysis. This is probably your best bet for a time limited audit.
I think I've used the SQL Server Profiler (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms181091.aspx) in the past to audit SQL execution. It's not something you would run all the time, but you can get a snapshot of what's running and how it's being executed.
I haven't tried using them, but you might look at event notifications and see if they will work for you.
From BOL
Event notifications can be used to do the following:
Log and review changes or activity occurring on the database.
I've written a stored procedure that takes 15 min when executed from Management Studio. When it's activated from Service Broker, however, after 4 hours it hasn't done even half of its work.
Are there known performance issues when running SPs from Service Broker? (Perhaps Service Broker runs the SP inside a transaction and Management Studio doesn't?)
I'm using SQL Server 2005.
Update:
It appears the problem was executing a stored procedure from another stored procedure. More specifically, I have a stored procedure which receives an operation (export or delete). This SP then calls the respective SP based on the operation (one has an ETL process, the other deletes data). Forcing recompile on these SPs seems to have fixed the problem. I wonder if SQL Server should make an action plan for each sub-SP though, independent of the SP that's calling them. In that case, no recompile would be needed.
I don't know about Service Broker, but for general stored procedure troubleshooting check out the suggestions given at this question. They helped me a lot to figure out some problems with my stored procedures.
You can take a look at what the stored procedure is doing with the WhoIsActive routine, you can acquire the query plan and study if there is any difference with the query plan when executed in Management Studio, you can experiment with the OPTIMIZE FOR hint to eradicate parameter sniffing...
(Parameter sniffing is that the query plan is generated differently when other parameters are supplied. Is Service Broker passing the same parameters to your SP as the ones you pass in Management Studio?)
Good luck and please post your findings here if you are unsuccessful.
I am thinking about creating stored procedures on the fly.
ie running CREATE PROCEDURE... when the (web) application is running.
What are the risks or problems that it can cause?
I know that the database account needs to have the extra privileges.
It does NOT happen everyday. Only from time to time.
I am using sql server and interested in mysql and postgres as well.
Update1:
Thanks to comments, I am considering creating a new version of stored procedure and switching over instead of ALTERing the sp. example: sp1 -> sp2 -> sp3
Update2:
The reason:
My schema changes because of custom fields (unknown number and type of columns)
I tried dynamic sql and sp_executesql first. Of course it works. Dynamic sql works greate for 1,2,3 simple update,inserts.
But it got too ugly and a lot of work and it does not mix well with stored procedure, problems with sql parameterization because it is used inside a stored procedure and the number and type of params is not known at compile time (long story).
At least the basic scenario for this solution is not that complicated.
The logic of the sp does NOT change. For each custom field I have to add a new parameter to sp and add a column to update, insert, etc.
I also considered making stored procedure parameters dynamic like sp_executesql that accepts any number and type of params but could not find a way.
For a transactional system it's probably quite expensive. If you have a large batch job and want to use a code generator for some reason (quite a common architecture in ETL tools, notably Oracle Warehouse Builder and Wherescape Red), it's not unreasonable to do this.
You mentioned that you would be adding and/or changing the calling profile of the stored procedure when you do this alteration. How are you lock-stepping the new calling profile with the application that makes the call to this? What's your roll-back plan if you ever have to revert a change that was made?
In the past what I've done is just append an incrementing numeric suffix to the stored procedure name with the new calling profile -- then you can modify the old version of the SP to call the new one with a default value for the parameter, and then you can release your software calling the new version.
If something breaks in your new version and you have to rollback, calls to the old stored proc will still work without error, and just populate the custom fields with your default values.
Firstly, the answer to this question really depends on what exactly this stored procedure is intended to do. If it's just reading data or creating a result set for reporting and you don't mind if it's a little inconsistent, then you're probably fine. If it's doing anything remotely interesting with your data then it's a very risky thing to be doing. You should think about whether it's possible (and what would happen) for two users users (or the same user twice) to run multiple versions of the the same stored procedure at the same time. Smells like a train wreck to me. One option is to only allow this procedure alteration to take place when no other users are logged into the system, or forcibly boot them off the database if they are. Another option is to create your new stored procedure with a slightly different name and swap them over when you deem it safe to do so.
Another issue is that one of the major benefits of stored procedures is that the execution plan is cached, meaning it will execute faster. If you are creating them on the fly you lose that advantage.
If you really need to do this then you should randomise the name of the procedure to avoid clashing with other users. Remember always that other users may be doing their own thing at the same time - most database systems won't give transactional isolation for stored procedures (Postgres is the only one I know of that does).
It would be extremely rare that this would be a desirable thing to do - could you elaborate at all on what made you choose this approach?
I would not do that personally.
As you mentioned you will need extra privileges to grant access to create/alter database objects. That can create a serious security risk as nothing would stop your application from creating a malicious stored procedure if someone discovered a security hole in it.
If your schema changes, change the stored procedures with the schema.
You will not be able to alter the procedure if one or more users are running the procedure, or another procedure that references your procedure. You will block until all the dependent procedures and the procedure you want to compile (and I think the procedure s you invoke from your procedure, but I am not certain) are not in use. This may be a long time on a busy production system, and if you are unlucky, you may timeout waiting for all the dependencies to not be in use (5 minutes on Oracle).
You can also get into very ugly situations (I have). Take for example stored procedures B and C, both of which call A, the procedure that you are trying to compile. When no one is running B, the system locks B. Now any user trying to run B will stall. The system then tries to lock C, but C is generating a very lengthy report that will not be done for another 10 minutes. You will timeout waiting for the lock, and some of your users will have an unresponsive system for 5 minutes. My experience is with Oracle, I would make sure your target DBMS does not behave in the same fashion, or has quicker failures or a better lock acquisition strategy.
I guess I am cautioning that what looks like may work on a development server may fail dramatically on a busy production system.
I'm not sure that the locking discussed by Tony BanBrahim is true in SQL Server 2005.
I have some long-running SPs (a 3 hours batch process of about 30 sub-processes), and I have been able to alter the SP while it is still running. (I don't believe the changes take effect until the next run, but it doesn't cause any blocking or any error). Now the outer long-running SP does both call SPs dynamically with EXEC and statically, but I've change both the root and nested SPs while they are running without error messages or blocks.
WRT your original question, I would think that your tactic is fine if used in a controlled way.
I don't know for sure, but it sounds like one or both:
an architectural problem
is existing code locking the schema tables from the application?
I'd take a look to see what code is locking the schema tables and rewrite that code. Do you have a 3rd party something or other that is locking those tables?