SQL Server

Microsoft SQL Server is the relational database management system that Light Speed IT Solutions uses with the applications it develops.

As well as providing features for creating and using relational databases, SQL Server also provides analysis tools for OLAP analysis, generating and distributing reports, sending notifications in response to database changes, and integrating/transferring data with other databases and data sources.

SQL Server and the .NET Framework

SQL Server works particularly well with .NET applications, making it an ideal choice for Light Speed IT Solutions applications. One of the reasons for this is that the data types used in SQL Server match quite closely the primitive data types used by the .NET framework. Also, any .NET framework technologies released by Microsoft that are relevant to databases will always support SQL Server first before they support any other type of database. A good example of this is Linq to SQL.

The main data access technology, ADO.NET, used by applications to communicate with SQL Server is also written for the .NET Framework. In the latest version of SQL Server, several new features exist for hierarchical, instead of relational data. These features work well with the ADO.NET Entity Framework, helping to support an object oriented model derived from a SQL Server database schema.

Code Generation with SQL Server

Code generation is an important part of developing any Light Speed IT Solutions database driven applications. The design of the SQL Server relational databases we create is used as a model from which source code is generated for the project. This model is further refined by using the ORM/code generator LLBLGen Pro. With LLBLGen Pro an entity model can be created which is derived from the the database schema.

SQL Server Reporting Services

Light Speed IT Solutions also has much experience in using the reporting features of SQL Server. This part of SQL Server is known as SQL Server Reporting Services. SQL Server Reporting Services includes a report generation engine, a subscriptions feature allowing scheduled report generation and different methods of distributing reports, and a reporting website that can be used across a company intranet.

Reporting Services can also be used within existing ASP.NET and .NET Windows Forms applications. For both there is a report viewer control that can be used to embed Reporting Services reports within these applications.