SQL MSDTC

[JIMMIE WHITAKER]

I'm using msde. On the little icon in task tray, you have under current
service, a choice of mssqlserver, and another choice is msdtc. What is
msdtc? And what is sqlserver agent?

[Erland Sommarskog]

Re: SQL MSDTC

JIMMIE WHITAKER (kpsklab@worldn et.att.net) writes:[color=blue]
> I'm using msde. On the little icon in task tray, you have under current
> service, a choice of mssqlserver, and another choice is msdtc. What is
> msdtc?[/color]

DTC = Distributed Transaction Coordinator. You need DTC when you are
running distributed transactions. That is transactions that involve more
than one server (and the other server does not have to be an SQL Server;
it could be Oracle), and you need two-phase commit. That is, both
servers must commit or rollback the transaction.
[color=blue]
> And what is sqlserver agent?[/color]

SQL Server Agent is a tool that permits you run jobs. These jobs can
run on a regular schedule or they can be one-offs that are only run on
demand. Even for a one-off you can schedule a job to run later, for
instance in the wee hours of night.

Standard usage of Agent in about any production system is to schedule
backups. But you can also use Agent for other things that are to run
regularly. An Agent job consists of one or more steps, and a step can
be a batch of T-SQL statements, but can also be a set of Windows
command-line commands. I think you can run Active-X too.


--
Erland Sommarskog, SQL Server MVP, esquel@sommarsk og.se

Books Online for SQL Server SP3 at

http://www.microsoft.com/sql/techinfo/productdoc/2000/books.asp