SQL Server 2008 Resource Kit

I was at an evening  event to kick of specialist Finance based chapter of PASS (Professional Association for SQL Server) at the NYSE offices in London and I was asked about the resource kits Microsoft used to put out with SQL Server up until 2000.  The DBA asking the question was annoyed that they had gone and wanted Microsoft to reinstate them for SQL Server 2008.

In my opinion a lot of the sort of stuff that used to be in resource kits for whatever platform is now appearing on Codeplex i.e. useful stuff written by Microsoft Consultants or MVP's that is free to use but comes with no support or warranty.  The other way tools become available is from third party partners such as  Quest, Red Gate, Idera to name a few.  Many of these have free evaluation periods or free cut down versions to get you to buy-in to them.

This will continue with  the release of SQL Server 2008 and I can see user friendly add-ins for policy management, the performance data warehouse and so on.

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