Large DB replication/copy to dedicated report server

sql server replication : Large DB replication/copy to dedicated report server - help

Paul Ibison
9/21/2006 12:00:00 AM

It largely depends on the volume of changes, and their nature, what you want
to do on the standby server (eg do you want access to it as a reporting
server).

For SQL Server 2000, if the volume of changes is not too large, I'd set up
transactional replication. Once the snapshot agent has run, I'd zip up the
snapshot folder and ftp it to the secondary server then unzip and then
initialize, setting the alternative snapshot destination so as to pick up
the unzipped files. The out of the box compression will handle upto 2GB cab
files, so it has to be a custom solution like the one outlined above
(incidentally, for SQL Server 2005, I'd use "initialize with backup" which
is simpler, but I'd still zip up the backup file before FTPing it).

After that, the distribution agent will just transfer the changes made to
the replicated tables, which is typically much smaller volume of traffic
than the whole database.

Although a little dated now, this article should help shed some light on the
choices available : http://www.replicationanswers.com/Standby.asp

Cheers,
Paul Ibison SQL Server MVP, www.replicationanswers.com .

BH337
9/21/2006 6:30:03 AM

We currently have a production installation of SQL Server 2000 Enterprise
Edition that has a 40 gig database that is hit heavily. I am setting up
another installation of SQL 2000 to host a read only copy of the production
database to strictly run reports. The data will need to be updated once a
day at night.

I am looking at the following options.

-Snapshot Replication. This will be done overnight, but I am concerned with
how a snapshot will handle a 40 gig DB and the time it will take.

-Transaction Replication. Will need to do the initial snapshot, but then
only update changes via the TLogs at night? Not sure if you can schedule how
often the Tlogs are referenced to change the read only db.

-DTS Pakcage. Schedule a DTS package to copy the production DB to the
Report Server every night. Again, with 40 gig DB, this is going to take
awhile.

-Backup/Restore. Backup DB, copy to report server, restore to report
server.

Does anyone have any thoughts on what method would be better? Or any
suggestions on a better method? Thanks.

Hilary Cotter
9/21/2006 10:06:27 AM

I would use transactional replication, putting large tables into their own
publications. Make sure if you do split up your tables into different
publications that you group them by DRI.

--
Hilary Cotter
Director of Text Mining and Database Strategy
RelevantNOISE.Com - Dedicated to mining blogs for business intelligence.

This posting is my own and doesn't necessarily represent RelevantNoise's
positions, strategies or opinions.

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