I'm currently looking for some ColdFusion hosting. I'm getting a bit sick of the limitations of MS Access databases (poor security, no sql stored procedures/triggers), and seeing as pretty much all CF hosts are running windows, it's either Access or MS SQL. Trouble is, I've never used MS SQL. What do I need on my machine to manipulate an MS SQL database? Do I simply define it as a dsn on my machine and use it that way? Do I need some sort of MS SQL client? What about keeping a copy of the database local for development without having a local copy of MS SQL running?

As you can see, I'm pretty lost. Can someone, anyone give me an idea how they develop with MS SQL? Thanks.

You will need MS-SQL Enterprise Manager to connect to the database remotely. You either need the SQL CD or I think you can download the trial version from Microsoft, when your installing just select the Client Tools option.

Thanks for your response.

Originally posted by HAGallery
You will need MS-SQL Enterprise Manager to connect to the database remotely. You either need the SQL CD or I think you can download the trial version from Microsoft, when your installing just select the Client Tools option.

That trial is still going to expire after 120 days, right? I guess that means I will need a copy of MS SQL... crap.

To the best of my knowledge, the trial never expires, you could also use DBArtisan, I have both and don't really care for one over the other.