Microsoft has truly established SSIS as a major player in the extraction, transformation, and loading (ETL) market. Not only is the SSIS technology a complete code rewrite from SQL Server 2000 DTS, it now rivals other thirdparty ETL tools that can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars depending on how you scale the software — and it is included free with the purchase of SQL Server 2014. Free always sounds great, but most free products can take you only so far if the feature set is minimal or the toolset has usability, scalability, or enterprise performance limitations. SSIS, however, is the real deal, satisfying typical ETL requirements with an architecture that has evolved dramatically from earlier incarnations. At the time of this publication, SSIS held the world speed record of loading more than 2 terabytes in a single hour.
Packages
A core component of SSIS is the notion of a package. A package best parallels an executable program that you can write that contains workflow and business logic. Essentially, a package is a collection of tasks snapped together to execute in an orderly fashion. A package is also a unit of execution and development, much like a .NET developer creates programs or DLL files. Precedence constraints are used to connect the tasks together and manage the order in which they execute, based on what happens in each task or based on rules defined by the package developer. The package is brought together into a .DTSX file that is actually an XML-structured file with collections of properties. Just like other .NET projects, the file-based code is marked up using the development environment and can then be saved and deployed to a SQL Server.
Don’t worry; you won’t have to know how to write this type of XML to create a package. That’s what the designer is for. The point here is that the SSIS package is an XML-structured file, much like .RDL files are to Reporting Services. Of course, there is much more to packages than that, and you’ll explore the other elements of packages, such as event handlers, later in this post.
Control Flow
The brain of a package is its Control Flow, which orchestrates the order of execution for all its components. The components consist of tasks and containers and are controlled by precedence constraints, discussed later in this post. For example, below diagram shows three tasks that are tied together with two precedence constraints.
Tasks
A task can best be described as an individual unit of work. Tasks provide functionality to your package, in much the same way that a method does in a programming language. However, in SSIS, you aren’t coding the methods; rather, you are dragging and dropping them onto a design surface and configuring them. You can develop your own tasks, but here are the current ETL tasks available to you out of the box:
Also included are a whole set of DBA-oriented tasks that enable you to create packages that can be used to maintain your SQL Server environment. These tasks perform functions such as transferring your SQL Server databases, backing up your database, or shrinking the database. Each of the available tasks is described in Chapter 3 in much more detail, and you will see them in other examples throughout the tutorial.
Tasks are extensible, and you can create your own custom tasks in .NET if you need a workflow item that doesn’t exist or if you have a common scripting function that can benefit from reuse in your package development. To learn more about this topic, see Chapter 19.
NOTE There’s a thriving ecosystem of third-party components that are available for SSIS. If you are looking for a task or Data Flow component that doesn’t exist out of the box, be sure to the first search online before creating your own. Some examples of these components include support for SFTP, SalesForce.com communication, SharePoint integration, and compression of files to name just a few.
Precedence Constraints
Precedence constraints are package components that direct tasks to execute in a given order. In fact, precedence constraints are the connectors that not only link tasks together but also define the workflow of your SSIS package. A constraint controls the execution of the two linked tasks by executing the destination task based upon the final state of the prior task and business rules that are defined using special expressions. The expression language embedded in SSIS essentially replaces the need to control workflow using script-based methodologies that enable and disable tasks, as was used in the DTS legacy solution. With expressions, you can direct the workflow of your SSIS package based on all manner of given conditions. You’ll look at many examples of using these constraints throughout this tutorial.
To set up a precedence constraint between two tasks, you must set the constraint value; optionally, you can set an expression. The following sections provide a brief overview of the differences between the two.
Constraint values define how the package will react when the prior task of two linked tasks completes an execution. The options define whether the destination task of two linked tasks should execute based solely on how the prior task completes. Three constraint values are possible:
Success: A task that’s chained to another task with this constraint will execute only if the prior task completes successfully. These precedence constraints are coloured green.
Completion: A task that’s chained to another task with this constraint will execute if the prior task completes, whether or not the prior task succeeds or fails. These precedence constraints are coloured blue.
Failure: A task that’s chained to another task with this constraint will execute only if the prior task fails to complete. This type of constraint is usually used to notify an operator of a failed event. These precedence constraints are coloured red.
You can also conditionally tie tasks together by writing logic on a precedence constraint. This is done by placing an SSIS expression language (resembles C#) on the precedence constraint. For example, you might specify that a task should run only at the end of each month. To do this, you would add an expression that evaluated the runtime of the package to determine if the next step should be run. Much more about writing expressions can be found in Chapter 5.
Containers
Containers are core units in the SSIS architecture for grouping tasks together logically into units of work. Besides providing visual consistency, containers enable you to define variables and event handlers (these are discussed in a moment) within the scope of the container, instead of the package. There are four types of containers in SSIS:
Task Host Container: Not a visible element that you’ll find in the Toolbox, but rather an abstract concept like an interface.
Sequence Container: Allows you to group tasks into logical subject areas. Within the development environment, you can then collapse or expand this container for usability.
For Loop Container: Loops through a series of tasks until a condition is met.
For each Loop Container: Loops through a series of files or records in a data set, and then executes the tasks in the container for each record in the collection.
Because containers are so integral to SSIS development, Chapter 6 is devoted to them. As you read through the tutorial, you’ll see many real-world examples that demonstrate how to use each of these container types for typical ETL development tasks.
Data Flow
The core strength of SSIS is its capability to extract data into the server’s memory, transform it, and write it out to an alternative destination. If the Control Flow is the brains of SSIS, then the Data Flow would be its heart. The in-memory architecture is what helps SSIS scale and what makes SSIS run faster than staging data and running stored procedures. Data sources are the conduit for these data pipelines, and they are represented by connections that can be used by sources or destinations once they’ve been defined. A data source uses connections that are OLE DB–compliant and ADO.NET data sources such as SQL Server, Oracle, DB2, or even nontraditional data sources, such as Analysis Services and Outlook. The data sources can be in scope to a single SSIS package or shared across multiple packages in a project.
Frequently Asked SSIS Interview Questions & Answers
All the characteristics of the connection are defined in the Connection Manager. The Connection Manager dialog options vary according to the type of connection you’re trying to configure. Below Diagram shows you what a typical connection to SQL Server would look like.
Connection Managers are used to centralize connection strings to data sources and to abstract them from the SSIS packages themselves. They can be shared across multiple packages in a project or isolated to a single package. Connection Managers also allow you to externalize the configuration of them at runtime by your DBA with a configuration file or parameters (which we’ll describe in Chapter 22). SSIS will not use the connection until you begin to instantiate it in the package. This provides the ultimate in lightweight development portability for SSIS.
You learned earlier that the Data Flow Task is simply another executable task in the package. The Data Flow Task is the pipeline mechanism that moves data from source to destination. However, in the case of SSIS, you have much more control of what happens from start to finish. In fact, you have a set of out-of-the-box transformation components that you snap together to clean and manipulate the data while it is in the data pipeline.
One confusing thing for new SSIS developers is that once you drag and drop a Data Flow Task in the Control Flow, it spawns a new Data Flow design surface with its own new tab in the SSDT user interface. Each Data Flow Task has its own design surface that you can access by double-clicking the Data Flow Task or by clicking the Data Flow tab and selecting the name of the Data Flow Task from the drop-down list. Just as the Control Flow handles the main workflow of the package, the Data Flow handles the transformation of data in memory. Almost anything that manipulates data falls into the Data Flow category. As data moves through each step of the Data Flow, the data changes, based on what the transform does. For example, in below diagram, a new column is derived using the Derived Column Transformation, and that new column is then available to subsequent transformations or to the destination.
In this section, each of the sources, destinations, and transformations are covered from an overview perspective. These areas are covered in much more detail in later chapters.
Sources
A source is a component that you add to the Data Flow design surface to specify the location of the source data that will send data to components downstream. Sources are configured to use Connection Managers in order to enable the reuse of connections throughout your package. SSIS provides eight out-of-the-box sources:
OLE DB Source: Connects to nearly any OLE DB data source, such as SQL Server, Access, Oracle, or DB2, to name just a few.
Excel Source: Specializes in receiving data from Excel spreadsheets. This source also makes it easy to run SQL queries against your Excel spreadsheet to narrow the scope of the data that you wish to pass through the flow.
Flat File Source: Connects to a delimited or fixed-width file.
Raw File Source: Produces a specialized binary file format for data that is in transit; it is especially quick to read by SSIS. This component is one of the only components that does not use a Connection Manager.
Xml Source: Retrieves data from an XML document. This source does not use a Connection Manager to configure it.
ADO.NET Source: This source is just like the OLE DB Source but only for ADO.NET-based sources. The internal implementation uses an ADO.NET DataReader as the source. The ADO.NET connection is much like the one you see in the .NET Framework when hand-coding a connection and retrieval from a database.
CDC Source: Reads data out of a table that has change data capture (CDC) enabled. Used to retrieve only rows that have changed over a duration of time.
ODBC Source: Reads data out of table by using an ODBC provider instead of OLE DB. When you are given the choice between OLE DB and ODBC, it is still recommended in SSIS packages that you use OLE DB.
If the source components included in SSIS do not provide the functionality required for your solution, you can write code to connect to any data source that is accessible from a .NET application. One method is to use the Script Component to create a source stream using the existing .NET libraries. This method is more practical for single-use applications. If you need to reuse a custom source in multiple packages, you can develop one by using the SSIS .NET API and object model.
Transformations
Transformations are key components within the Data Flow that allow changes to the data within the data pipeline. You can use transformations to split, divert, and remerge data in the data pipeline. Data can also be validated, cleansed, and rejected using specific rules. For example, you may want your dimension data to be sorted and validated. This can be easily accomplished by dropping a Sort and a Lookup Transformation onto the Data Flow design surface and configuring them.
Transformation components in the SSIS Data Flow affect data in the data pipe in memory. Because this process is done in memory, it can be much faster than loading the data into a staging environment and updating the staging system with stored procedures. Here’s a complete list of transformations and their purposes:
Destinations
Inside the Data Flow, destinations consume the data after the data pipe leaves the last transformation components. The flexible architecture can send the data to nearly any OLE DB–compliant, flat file, or ADO.NET data source. Like sources, destinations are also managed through the Connection Manager. The following destinations are available to you in SSIS:
Variables
Variables are another vital component of the SSIS architecture. SSIS variables can be set to evaluate to an expression at runtime. You can also set variables to be set in the Control Flow with either a Script Task or an Expression Task. Variables in SSIS have become the method of exchange between many tasks and transformations, making the scoping of variables much more important. By default, SSIS variables exist within a package scope, but they can be scoped to different levels within a package as mentioned earlier in the “Containers” section.
Parameters
Parameters behave much like variables but with a few main exceptions. Parameters, like variables, can make a package dynamic. The largest difference between them is that parameters can be set outside the package easily and can be designated as values that must be passed in for the package to start, much like a stored procedure input parameter. Parameters replace the capabilities of Configurations in previous releases of SQL Server.
Error Handling and Logging
In SSIS, you can control error handling in several places, depending on whether you are handling a task or Data Flow errors. For task errors, package events are exposed in the user interface, and each event can have its own event-handler design surface. This design surface is yet another area where you can define workflow, in addition to the Control Flow and Data Flow surfaces you’ve already learned about. Using the event-handler design surface in SSIS, you can specify a series of tasks to be performed if a given event happens for a task in the task flow.
Some event handlers can help you develop packages that can self-fix problems. For example, the OnError error handler triggers an event whenever an error occurs anywhere in scope. The scope can be the entire package or an individual task or container. Event handlers are represented as a workflow, much like the Control Flow workflow in SSIS. Ideal use for an event handler would be to notify an operator if any component fails inside the package. (You will learn much more about event handlers in Chapter 18.) You can also use the precedence constraints directly on the task flow design surface to direct workflow when a task fails to complete or it evaluates to an expression that forces the workflow to change.
Logging has also been improved in SSIS in this latest release. Logging is now enabled by default, and packages are easier to troubleshoot. More than a dozen events can be simply selected within each task or package for logging. You can also choose to enable partial logging for one task and enable much more detailed logging for another task, such as billing. Some of the examples of events that can be monitored are OnError, OnPostValidate, OnProgress, and OnWarning, to name just a few. The logs can be written to nearly any connection: SQL Profiler, text files, SQL Server, the Windows Event Log, or an XML file. You’ll see some examples of this in Chapter 18.
SSRS | Power BI |
SSAS | SQL Server |
SCCM | SQL Server DBA |
SharePoint | BizTalk Server |
Team Foundation Server | BizTalk Server Administrator |
Our work-support plans provide precise options as per your project tasks. Whether you are a newbie or an experienced professional seeking assistance in completing project tasks, we are here with the following plans to meet your custom needs:
Name | Dates | |
---|---|---|
SSIS Training | Dec 07 to Dec 22 | View Details |
SSIS Training | Dec 10 to Dec 25 | View Details |
SSIS Training | Dec 14 to Dec 29 | View Details |
SSIS Training | Dec 17 to Jan 01 | View Details |
Yamuna Karumuri is a content writer at Mindmajix.com. Her passion lies in writing articles on IT platforms including Machine learning, PowerShell, DevOps, Data Science, Artificial Intelligence, Selenium, MSBI, and so on. You can connect with her via LinkedIn.