PASS Summit 2012 Recap & the Milestones of SQL Server 2012
Last week marked the completion of a great week at PASS Summit 2012, the world’s largest technical training conference for SQL Server professionals and BI experts alike. During this year’s 3-day conference, nearly 4,000 attendees heard firsthand about the great advances being made toward managing big data. Over the course of two keynote speeches by Microsoft Corporate Vice Presidents Ted Kummert (Data Platform Group) and Quentin Clark (SQL Program Management), Microsoft announced the following:
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- Project codename “Hekaton,” a new in-memory technology that will be built directly into the data platform, will ship in the next major version of SQL Server. Currently in private technology preview with a small set of customers, Hekaton completes the company’s portfolio of in-memory technologies across analytics, transactions, streaming and caching workloads, enabling business acceleration by shrinking the time from raw data to insights.
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- SQL Server 2012 Parallel Data Warehouse (PDW), the next version of Microsoft’s enterprise-class appliance, will be available during the first half of 2013. SQL Server 2012 PDW includes PolyBase, a fundamental breakthrough in data processing that will enable queries across relational data and non-relational Hadoop data.
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- SQL Server 2012 SP1, which supports Office 2013 by offering business users enhanced, new capabilities for self-service business intelligence using familiar tools such as Excel and Sharepoint, is now available for download.
What’s more, on the final day of PASS Summit 2012, attendees were treated to the presentation, “Big Data Meets SQL Server 2012” by Microsoft Technical Fellow David DeWitt.
All the while, conference participants attended a wide variety of technical sessions presented by industry experts in addition to a host of other programs. From on-site certification testing, to hands-on-labs, attendees were able to boost their technical skills using these resources, as well as work through technical issues with top Microsoft Customer Service and Support (CSS) engineers and get architectural guidance from the SQL Server, Business Intelligence and Azure Customer Advisory Teams (CAT). Of course, the learning didn’t stop there; attendees were invited to new, “I Made That!” Developer Chalk Talks, which featured 30 minute casual talks with the Microsoft developers who worked on specific features and functionalities of SQL Server 2012. The topics appealed to many, ranging from AlwaysOn to Hekaton. You can see more great photos from PASS Summit 2012 on the SQL Server Facebook page or access the video interviews with Dave Campbell, Quentin Clark, and David DeWitt available at the SQL Server virtual press room.
And so, as we close on another year of PASS Summit, it’s the perfect time to look back and see how far we’ve come since the launch of SQL Server 2012. Join us below, as we take a celebratory look at the milestones we’ve hit along the way, and let’s look together toward the bright future ahead!
