Well, SQL Management Studio is definitely faster (and a blessing as such) in a couple of key areas when dealing with remote databases:
1. opening the connection and listing all databases - MUCH faster than EM, which would let you make a cup of tea while listing databases on a server.
2. Table-editing operations, saving table structure, etc. Again MUCH faster than EM and a blessing. I use it mainly for this.
The negative site is largely to do with the two things: 1) user interface, 2) running queries. I agree with
this post that it seems kinda "dumbed down" at the front end.
Major negatives in my view:
i) Rather inflexible way of getting around windows and managing connection to databases.
ii) Impossible to open more than one instance of a table! In EM, you could say "Open-Query" on any table any number of times to run queries quickly and easily. Major disadvantage here.
iii) Running even a simple query becomes a journey of a thousand clicks.
iv) Complicated-looking UI which is actually less flexible than EM+QA
v) Table designer grid control is quirky. Single click to edit field name, TWO-clicks (or click+F2) to edit field type. Sometimes you forget and type over stuff, or click and use arrow keys to edit field type text, and end up arrowing to another cell. EM was easier to use because it kept it simple!
vi) Table designer shows field properties as a treeview of properties and
sub-properties!! I mean yes, let's make that little property window even
harder to navigate. I was hoping to have the option of displaying field properties as extra columns in that HUGE unused space on the right of the fields that isn't used for anything at all. When editing properties over multiple fields, it's fiddly and takes much longer than in EM.
vii) Indexes/Relationships dialog in the table designer - yuck! Again, what's with the
collapsed treeview of properties?! As with most things in SQLMS vs EM, not less but more clicks are involved in changing values, and assigning field names to indexes and r/ships. In EM it was clear as day where your most-used values are - the name of the index/relationship and the lists of fields. The field lists weren't
hidden behind another friggin click and dialog like in SQLMS.
viii) Field selection in dialogs is painful. While fields in the table designer are displayed in the order you have ordered them, field
selection in dialogs, like when creating indexes, is in
alphabetical order - that is, in a
different order to how you're used to looking at them! This is
basic UI design being thrown out the window.
gripe gripe..
The only thing I
do appreciate about SQLMS is that it's faster to edit table structures, save changes etc, over a remote connection. For my local dbs I still use EM and won't be upgrading to SQL 2005 while it prevents me from using EM if I want to.
Is that enough?
