Microsoft® SQL Server 2012 Unleashed

What’s New in Query Optimization

There aren’t really any significant enhancements in SQL Server 2012 related to query optimization. There is an enhancement to the FORCESEEK table hint that allows you to now optionally specify an index name along with an optional column name to control which index and column the query plan should perform an index seek against.

Additionally, a new FORCESCAN table hint has been added, which complements the FORCESEEK hint by allowing you to specify that the query optimizer use an index scan operation as the access path to the table or view referenced in the query.

SQL Server 2012 also introduces a new index structure, columnstore indexes, which can be used to significantly speed-up the processing time of common ...