Professional SQL Server 2012 Internals and Troubleshooting

Chapter 13

Diagnosing SQL Server 2012 Using Extended Events

WHAT’S IN THIS CHAPTER?

• Introduction to Extended Events
• Why you should start using Extended Events
• Creating Extended Events sessions in SQL Server 2012
• Viewing data captured by Extended Events

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INTRODUCTION TO EXTENDED EVENTS

If you’re familiar with recent versions of SQL Server, then it’s likely you’ll have heard of Extended Events, also known as XE or XEvents, and you know that it’s a diagnostics feature built into the database engine. For most people, however, their knowledge of it is not much more than that. The lack of a need to use it and a challenging command set in the first release in SQL Server 2008 meant that learning to use it was often a low priority on people’s “to do” list.

Fortunately, SQL Server 2012 should change that, as not only has the product’s documentation made it clear that Extended Events is set to become one of SQL Server’s primary diagnostic tools in future versions, but also, and perhaps more important, a graphical user interface for it is now part of SQL Server Management Studio. No longer does a complex set of T-SQL commands need to be understood before you can use the feature.

The objective of this chapter is to introduce you to the Extended Events feature in SQL Server 2012 using its new graphical user interface. After reviewing how Extended Events work and the terminology it uses, you’ll see how easy ...