Chapter 50. Why automate tasks with SSIS?
SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) is a platform that offers many benefits when Windows Server and SQL Server are the primary technologies used. For cost reasons, SSIS is a good choice when SQL Server is already implemented. This is because a license is required only if SSIS is installed on a server other than one that has a fully licensed SQL Server Engine installed. SSIS integrates directly with SQL Server, and the integrated development environment (IDE) of Visual Studio .NET is used to develop SSIS packages. This can be valuable when Visual Studio .NET is already being used in house for other Microsoft-based development by limiting learning curves of the IDEs. By default, SQL Server installs a version of Visual Studio .NET called Business Intelligence Development Studio, or BIDS. This version has specific projects that are related to BI development. If a full version of Visual Studio .NET is already installed, it can be used as well. SSIS works with many other database server technologies, including Oracle and DB2. This makes SSIS a sound solution when the database server technologies used in-house are a mix of technologies.
