user134363
user134363

Reputation:

What tools do I need to create an SSIS package in SQL Server 2008 Express?

On my development machine I have Visual Studio 2010 and SQL Server 2008 Express. On our production server we have SQL Server 2008 Standard. I am going to create a WCF service that will reside on the production SQL server that will fire my SSIS package when called.

Because I have SQL Express on my development machine, I do not have access to create SSIS packages from this machine at all. This is needed so I can write the WCF service in the first place.

So, I could simply download SQL Server 2008 Standard from our msdn subscription to my development machine, but for reasons I cannot get into, this is not immediately possible. It will be in the near future but not soon enough.

How can I get this done? Are there tools to download? Where? I have researched this at length but there appears to be 5 different ways that lead to no where.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 6454

Answers (3)

Diego
Diego

Reputation: 36126

So you want to create a package without BIDS?

Feel free to create one using plain text, there you go :)

<DTS:Executable xmlns:DTS="www.microsoft.com/SqlServer/Dts" DTS:ExecutableType="MSDTS.Package.1">
    <DTS:Property DTS:Name="PackageFormatVersion">2</DTS:Property> 
    <DTS:Property DTS:Name="CreationDate" DTS:DataType="7">5/18/2012 1:21:47 PM</DTS:Property> 
    <DTS:Property DTS:Name="ProtectionLevel">1</DTS:Property> 
    <DTS:Property DTS:Name="DisableEventHandlers">0</DTS:Property> 
    .....a lot more properties.....
</DTS:Executable>

I'm joking, of course. My points are:

  • dtsx packages are merely XML files created by BIDS
  • you can create your package anywere, if you cant use your local box, use what you have, even if that means to use your server (if that's your only option, do it)
  • you dont need BIDS or even the SSIS service to run pacakges. DTEXEC, DTEXECUI and SQl Server Agent are capable of running packages by themselves (unless the packages are deployed to the package store)
  • I am not aware of any tool that builds packages other than BIDS. It wouldn't make much sense, is like asking if there is a tool where you can build C# application other than visual studio

Upvotes: 1

user847990
user847990

Reputation:

Since you have a licensed Edition of SQL Server on your network you can install the full suite of tools on your development server or your own desktop if you wish. This will give you access to BIDS software that SliverNinja mentioned.

I would say since you are limited to what can be done you only option would be to deploy a simple/basic package to your production server. If your development server can communicate with that server, I would say create your WCF service on the development box and have it simply call the package on your production server. The package does not have to do anything fancy to simply verify that you can call it correctly. Just have the package import a simple file and output it to a different file; or just export some catalog data from a database.

I do not see, since you are limited by not being able to duplicate your production environment on your dev server, that this would be unreasonable to do in this situation. If it has to get done, it has to get done.

Upvotes: 2

SliverNinja - MSFT
SliverNinja - MSFT

Reputation: 31641

You need BIDS (Business Intelligence Development Studio) to create the DTSX packages and SSIS which isn't available with SQL Express.

You also need Visual Studio to create WCF services, which it sounds like you already have.

Upvotes: 0

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