Professional SQL Server™ 2005 Programming

20.4. Planning for Replication

Replication is one of those things where it can be easy to "just toss something together." It's also one of those things where it is easy to create a huge mess if you take such a cavalier approach. Keep in mind that SQL Server may automatically make some alterations to your schema to implement replication — do you really want SQL Server adding columns and objects to your database without fully thinking about that first? Of course not.

Any replication installation worth doing is worth taking the time to plan out. Some planning considerations include:

• What data is to be replicated

• Replication type

• Replication model

Along with these are other factors that will influence your decision, such as current network topologies, current server configurations, server growth potential, activity levels, and so forth. Each replication method has its advantages and disadvantages, and there is not a one-size-fits-all approach to replicating data. For instance, if you have a slow network or unreliable connection, then you may not want to implement transactional replication. Instead, you may opt to use merge replication that runs during a scheduled connection time. As has been pointed out repeatedly in this chapter, however, you need also need to balance that against consistency needs.

20.4.1. Data Concerns

First, you have to consider what you are going to publish and to whom. You need to identify your articles (tables and specific columns to be published) and how you ...