Microsoft SQL Server

Microsoft SQL Server

Microsoft SQL Server is a relational database management system (RDBMS) that supports a wide variety of transaction processing, business intelligence and analytics applications in corporate IT environments. Microsoft SQL Server is one of the three market-leading database technologies, along with Oracle Database and IBM's DB2.

Like other RDBMS software, Microsoft SQL Server is built on top of SQL, a standardized programming language that database administrators (DBAs) and other IT professionals use to manage databases and query the data they contain. SQL Server is tied to Transact-SQL (T-SQL), an implementation of SQL from Microsoft that adds a set of proprietary programming extensions to the standard language.

The core component of Microsoft SQL Server is the SQL Server Database Engine, which controls data storage, processing and security. It includes a relational engine that processes commands and queries and a storage engine that manages database files, tables, pages, indexes, data buffers and transactions. Stored procedures, triggers, views and other database objects are also created and executed by the Database Engine.

SQL Server services, tools and editions

Microsoft also bundles a variety of data management, business intelligence (BI) and analytics tools with SQL Server. In addition to the R Services and now Machine Learning Services technology that first appeared in SQL Server 2016, the data analysis offerings include SQL Server Analysis Services, an analytical engine that processes data for use in BI and data visualization applications, and SQL Server Reporting Services, which supports the creation and delivery of BI reports.

On the data management side, Microsoft SQL Server includes SQL Server Integration Services, SQL Server Data Quality Services and SQL Server Master Data Services. Also bundled with the DBMS are two sets of tools for DBAs and developers: SQL Server Data Tools, for use in developing databases, and SQL Server Management Studio, for use in deploying, monitoring and managing databases.