Microsoft® SQL Server 2008 R2 Unleashed

The Query Editor

The Query Editor sits at the top of the list for development tools in SSMS. The Query Editor, as its name indicates, is the editing tool for writing queries in SSMS. It contains much of the functionality that was contained in SQL Server 2000’s Query Analyzer. The capability to write T-SQL queries, execute them, return results, generate execution plans, and use many of the other features you may be familiar with in Query Analyzer are also available with the Query Editor.

One main difference with the Query Editor is that is has been integrated into the SSMS environment. In SQL Server 2000, the Query Analyzer was a separate application with its own independent interface. In SQL Server 2008, SSMS houses the query-editing capabilities ...