SQL Server Azure walk-through and basics

Cloud migrations can be tough. The last thing you want to do is overspend and negatively impact your users. First, If you would like some help or to talk with us to bounce some ideas we would love to chat with you. Below are several resources our clients find useful when building their road maps.

Videos

Migrating Databases to Azure was recorded at Austin SQL Saturday, 2018.

• This is the go-to reference material for identifying which core features are supported by Azure SQL Databases and/or Managed Instances.
• Are you migrating a single database or multiple databases? Here’s a presentation on successfully migrating existing databases to Azure SQL Database.
• Elastic Pool allows you to pay for a bucket of resources that can be applied to multiple databases.
• Understand the basics of vCore pricing model (easier to understand) vs DTU pricing model. Need super charged Azure SQL Database? Need 100TB Azure SQL Database? Take a look at Hyperscale which his in public preview as of 3/20/2019.
• Is the new kid on the block “Azure SQL Managed Instances” a better solution for you? Managed Instances are expense compared to Elastic pools but it includes High Availability and more features supported by on premise version of SQL Server to support “Lift and Shift” migrations so you don’t have to change legacy code.

Executing your Migration to Azure

Congrats, you’re ready to start migrating! There are a number of different ways you can move data from your on-premises application to Azure. Picking the right strategy and project plan will secure your data and reduce (or completely eliminate) downtime.

Here are a few articles we love to share to get you familiar with the paths we find most successful.

• Your Azure SQL Database Service Level Agreement might not be exactly what you assume it is. Read the SLA and make sure you plan to meet your business SLA. As of 3/20/2019 the SLA hasn’t changed since May 2016. I actually wished Cosmos DB SLA was used for Azure SQL DB.
• Here is how you can perform an Azure SQL Database Live Migration with no downtime for Azure SQL Database. Want Microsoft to move your data for you? You can use DMS (Data Migration Service) but notice Microsoft doesn’t do everything for you.
• You can also use DMS to Azure Managed Instances.
• Here is my recommended way of pushing backpac’s around. Learn more about Using SQLPackage to Import or Export backpacs
• The following are some more great tips to help your Initial Sync using Transactional Replication to Azure SQL Databases.
• When using the DTU pricing model instead of vCore pricing model leverage the Azure SQL DTU Calculator to help you find a good starting tier for your database or elastic pool. I still encourage you’re to validate acceptable performance for your workload before going live.
• To help you get an expectation for your expenses understand the service tiers with Azure SQL Databases and utilize the Azure Price Calculator to estimate your expense.

Tuning for Performance and Availability

More modern versions of SQL Server makes automating and tuning easier and more intuitive, but you’ll still need to review your TSQL for many things. Below we give you tips and tricks for tuning in Azure.

• Want to know how to monitor and tune performance? Query Performance Insight which sits on top of Query Store is your best monitoring tool and its free. That’s right, you really don’t need vendor tools.
• You can check out the Cadillac of Azure SQL Database and Managed Instance performance monitoring. It’s also known as Azure Analytics and is in preview as of 3/20/2019.
• Are you curious to see how Query Store works in Azure SQL database? Here is a great breakdown of limits and also how to make Query Store and DMV’s work for you!
• How does Microsoft’s define DTU.
• The following is a great review of saving money with performance tuning in Azure SQL Database on Simple Talk.
• Monitoring the wait statistics in your Azure SQL Database.  In case you, want a great process for the box product it’s a little different and you can get that here.

After Your Migration

With a migration project complete, you can focus on monitoring and maintenance. This of course depends on how much work you did before moving your data. Below are resources our clients found incredibly helpful with building their maintenance timeline plans.

• Let Azure SQL Database Automate tuning for you. Notice that create and drop indexes are not supported for Managed Instances and only Azure SQL Database or Elastic Pools.
• Once you migrate your databases all data management tasks are not done. While Microsoft manages a lot of basic trivial DBA tasks for you there are still a lot of areas where you must manage tasks. You will quickly see managed service isn’t really 100% managed as business continuity and business needs will drive how you enable and monitor several services.
• Finally, if you made it this far and you want some more guidance we would love to help.  Contact us and we will set up a free thirty-minute consultation to help make sure you are on the right track to make your migration to Azure SQL databases a success.

Additional Resources

Learn from Microsoft’s Data CAT

Tools and Services

Data Migration Assistance is used to test and help migrate your databases.

Azure DTU Calculator is a helpful starting tool for finding the sweet spot for finding your initial performance tier.

Load test your applications with Visual Studio. This allows you to stress performance tiers with your own code.  You can also use this interesting tool to Test a production workload against Azure SQL Database.

Database
Migration Service will allow Microsoft to help you move your data.

Talk with ProcureSQL!