We are getting requests for hosting SQL Server
databases. Until now, we have not been offering
shared SQL databases on our NT/2K servers.

Looking for advice on how to offer shared SQL. I see
other hosts doing it, but don't quite understand
how they get around the issues of not giving the
customer use of the SQL Admin and other system
utilities to manage their database.

I might be naive, but it looks like just pointing a
system DSN at a database would not be enough?

As sa (admin) user you create databases for each client. You then create a sql server logon user for each client and give them appropriate priviledges to their database. You then setup a DSN for them to use with their asp pages ( although the smart ones will use OLE connection strings instead ). You also do other stuff like fixing the size of the primary data files and transaction file. It's faily easy once you've done it once. The only bit which isn't easy is buying the SQL Server in the first place because it costs a lot.:D

Yes, SQL server is very expensive. We just launched Shared SQL 2000 server for our dedicated/colocation customers and the SQL license alone was over $15,000.00.

One recommendation is make sure you run SQL on a seperate server, it is a CPU/Memory hog.