Wednesday, September 6, 2017

Dynamic Threshold for Statistic Update - SQL Server 2016

By default, on a SQL Server Database, statistics are updated automatically when one hits a threshold of changes. If the Auto Update Statistics setting is turned on by default, the threshold for number of changes to trigger auto statistic update before SQL Server 2016 was

For tables with more than 500 rows - 20% of tables row count + 500 changes
For tables with less than 500 rows - 500 changes

However, in modern day times, the above formula may not be effective. 10 million row tables is pretty much a norm and not typically considered huge. The threshold of changes for 10 million row table would be 2,000,500 changes, which is a huge number of changes required to trigger auto stat update. This effectively implies, on larger tables one would be running without updated statistics almost all the time as the threshold is too high as the tables get bigger. To address this problem, SQL Server 2016 has a behavior called dynamic statistic threshold,  which is enabled by default.


As the table gets bigger, the threshold for statistic update reduces. For tables greater than 25,000 rows dynamic statistics is applicable. For example consider the following table with 1 million rows

Let’s update statistic before starting the task



Make note the updated stat time (12:12 AM)

Now let’s run the following script to make 100,000 changes (10%)

SET ROWCOUNT 100000
GO
/* SET Rowcount so that we can update just 100K rows */

Update Production.product_1M
SET StandardCost = StandardCost + 5
WHERE  Productid % 5 = 0
GO

Please note on older versions of SQL Server, by default, 10% changes wouldn't suffice to trigger auto stat update.


Now let’s check if statistics are updated. A select is query has to be fired on the table to trigger auto statistic update.


Surprisingly they are updated as the statistic updated time has changed to 12:15 AM.

Though there is no official exact formula how statistic update has been triggered, following pic shows how the threshold percentage reduces with row count of the table.


Picture referred from the following blog: https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/saponsqlserver/2011/09/07/changes-to-automatic-update-statistics-in-sql-server-traceflag-2371/

Dynamic Statistic update threshold is not a new feature and has been available since SQL Server 2008 via the trace flag 2371. Meaning, one can enable "Dynamic Statistic update threshold" on SQL Server 2008 and after by turning the trace flag 2371 on. On SQL Server 2016 and after, "Dynamic Statistic update threshold" has been made a default behavior.

Sunday, September 3, 2017

DBCC CloneDatabase for SQL Server 2012

Dear All,

In case you are wondering, title of the post is not a typo :) DBCC CloneDatabase is going to be available for SQL Server 2012 :)

For folks who don't know, DBCC CloneDatabase is a feature introduced in SQL Server 2014 SP2 for creating a skeleton copy of the database. When I mean skeleton copy, I mean without the data but the exact schema, table structure, index, constraints, file and file groups and the best of all - table and index statistics. Using DBCC CloneDatabase, one can actually get a exact copy of the database ( including actual statistics ) but without the data. This is extremely useful in performance troubleshooting as one can clone a production database using DBCC CloneDatabase and backup the cloned database and restore to DEV / UAT to get estimated plans. SQL Server 2016 onwards Querystore's data and reports are also included to the cloned database. One can read more about DBCC CloneDatabase over here

Coming back to the title of the post, Microsoft product team will be extending DBCC CloneDatabase to SQL Server 2012 as a part of SQL Server 2012 Service Pack 4. SQL Server 2012 Service Pack 4 ( SP4 ) is due to be released in September 2017. A excellent move by product team to extend cloned database SQL Server 2012. Check out the official announcement of SP4 over here. More importantly, observe the comments section :)