Migration: Welly Lee details SQL Server Migration Assistant 5.0 at TechEd

Welly Lee sent me a link to his talk "Automating Database Migration to Microsoft SQL Server". He gave this talk on SQL Server Migration Assistant 5.0 (SSMA) at Tech Ed North America in Atlanta on May 16th, 2011.

Welly shared some customer experiences:

  • AIM Healthcare: "We moved nine-terabyte system migrated from Oracle using SSMA.  It resulted in significant TCO savings."
  • E. & J. Gallo Winery: "We were going for Better - Faster - Cheaper. And we attained all three!"
  • Justin Brands: "We not only reduce $63,000 in annual licensing cost but we also improved uptime."
  • Motorola: "We improved development productivity and lowered cost after migrating our mission-critical system from Oracle."

One of the adjunct toolkits for migration that he mentioned was the Microsoft Assessment and Planning (MAP) Toolkit. This tool gives a nice overview of your environment and it may even be helpful at home if you have a high-tech family like me.

I have not had time to play with SSMA with each of the databases that it supports: MySQL, Oracle,  Sybase, and Microsoft Access. A few factoids that I gathered:

  • For each non-Microsoft database, there are at least 55 configuration options available.
  • Data is mapped to the closest data type with user customization.
  • SSMA supports these destination databases:
    • SQL Server 2005 (all versions)
    • SQL Server 2008 (all versions including SQL Server 2008 R2)
    • SQL Server 'Denali' - next generation
    • SQL Azure

You may download his slides here, or view his session here.