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RapidSQL 5.2 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 If you right click on the Explorer, you will see the figure below. Take a couple of moments to look at this and you'll see some incredible options here. Getting a blank window to create a new object is peanuts compared to the rest of the items. You can extract a script for the object into a window for editing. Not only does this bring back a script for the object, but it also includes any permissions and indexes as well. Selecting report will generate an HTML report for the object. Notice the help item. Does this fire up RapidSQL's help? Nope. It issues an sp_help on that object name. Dependencies shows you all of the object dependencies. Schema will display a window with the table schema in a grid format similar to what you see in Enterprise Manager or DBArtisan when you create a table. Copy name will copy the name of the selected object to the clipboard so that you no longer have to remember how to type that 65 character descriptive name one of your DBAs decided to put on a neat new object. Need to get a quick look at some data in the table? You could go up to the toolbar, click new, type in select * from <table>, and click the green arrow to execute. If that sounds like a lot of work, why not do it the easy way since you are probably in the Explorer anyway. Right click a table and select the "select * from" item. Accomplishes the same thing, but you didn't have to type anything. Take another item off my wish list of features along with the other dozen or so that made it into this version.
DBMSes and the stuff we are doing with them are getting more and more complicated. Used to be that when you clicked the new button, you would get a blank screen to start typing your TSQL in. You can now do a lot more inside of RapidSQL. The new button has a drop down arrow next to it. From here you can create a new version control project, SQL script, open a DDL editor for any object type supported by your DBMS, create a text file, HTML document, Java applet, or Active Script. For those that write their ASP in a text editor, you might want to seriously consider pitching Notepad and moving to RapidSQL. You can now create all of your ASP pages and have database productivity tools right in the same interface.
I'm going to highlight some of the features of the version control integration, but save a lot of the detail for a future article due to the vast array of features that are available within RapidSQL that tie into the version control system and extend it. The other reason is that I have had a lot of difficulty in getting the features to work. When I create a new project, I can check out files at will. But if I open a project that I had previously created, every single item in the version control system is disabled and I can't check out files or work with them. I think some of this is due to bugs that need to be worked out and others to me not knowing how to use the functionality. I would say to be extremely cautious when using the version control interface and make sure all work is saved before accessing it. I had two instances when RapidSQL terminated without even an error message when accessing version control. The first time was when creating a new project with isql windows open and the other time was when I tried to open a project that had been saved. The version control system that I am using is Visual Source Safe. RapidSQL can also work with PVCS or MKS Source Integrity. After you have set up the version control integration from the options screen, the first step in using it is to create a new project. In this example I am going to create one directly from a database, but as you can see from the bottom of the figure below, this is not the only way you can start out.
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All content on this site, except where noted, represents an original work of Michael R. Hotek and is protected by applicable copyright laws. The SQL Server FAQ is the sole work of Neil Pike. No page, portion of a page, or download may be used for commercial purposes in whole or in part without the express, written permission of the applicable author.
