Summary
With SQL Server 2014, it’s all about the AlwaysOn features. The update (adoption) of the AlwaysOn and availability group capabilities has already been nothing short of astonishing. Older, more complex HA solutions are being cast aside left and right in favor of this clean, highly scalable method to achieve five-nines and high performance. It is truly the next generation of HA and scale-out for existing and new database tiers of any kind. As mentioned earlier, some of the concepts and technical approaches in AlwaysOn and availability groups might seem a bit reminiscent of SQL clustering and database mirroring because they are. But both of these earlier features have paved the way for what we now know as AlwaysOn and availability groups. Microsoft publicly advises all of its customers that have implemented log shipping, database mirroring, and even SQL clustering to get to AlwaysOn and availability groups as soon as possible.
The next chapter describes SQL Server 2014 Analysis Services. This is a comprehensive coverage of SSAS and how to build up a star-schema based OLAP cube.