Overview
The Azure SQL migration extension for Azure Data Studio provides the ability to:
- Understand your migration readiness through a comprehensive SQL assessment.
- Get right-sized SKU recommendations for your Azure SQL targets.
- Migrate both on-premises and cloud-based SQL Server databases to Azure SQL Database, Azure SQL Managed Instance or SQL Server on Azure VMs.
In this blog post, I'll walk you through the new features we're introducing in the Azure SQL Migration extension's latest Azure Data Studio version that will help you save time and effort in the migration process.
What's new in v1.2.0
The latest version of the Azure SQL Migration extension includes multiple bug fixes and feature improvements to ensure a more seamless migration journey. Specifically, the v1.2.0 release includes support for the functionality called out in the following sections.
Pre-migration validation
Pre-migration validations are a new feature introduced in the 1.2.0 version of the Azure SQL Migration extension. This functionality allows customers to comprehensively validate the provided configuration using self-hosted integration runtime (SHIR) migration scenarios.
The validation mechanism checks SHIR connectivity to the source SQL Server and the Azure SQL target. It also validates the network file share and Azure Storage account configuration before starting the migration.
This updated user experience in the Azure SQL Migration wizard is designed to reduce the friction and number of attempts required to perform a migration while increasing the chances of completing a successful migration on the first attempt.
As shown in the following screenshot, the migration workflow now requires selecting Run validation to run a pre-migration validation before you can progress with the migration.
After selecting Run validation, a Running validation panel appears on the right side of Azure Data Studio:
The pre-migration validation runs automatically, verifying multiple settings in the migration configuration. On the Running validation panel, under the Validation steps, the process goes through checking Integration runtime connectivity, Source database connectivity, and Target database connectivity.
The pre-migration validation can also be initiated on demand by selecting Start validation button at the top of this side panel. Address any configuration problems identified in the validation step details before moving to the next step.
After all, steps are successfully validated, select Done, and then select Next.
Amazon RDS for SQL Server assessments
The Azure SQL Migration extension can now assess whether a source Amazon RDS instance includes any migration blockers or breaking changes for Azure SQL Managed Instance and Azure SQL Database targets.
Hyperscale support for Azure SQL Database assessments and right-sized recommendations
When generating assessments and right-sized recommendations for Azure SQL Database targets, the Hyperscale service tier is now supported. This new feature will enable you to identify what hardware configuration within the Hyperscale service tier best fits your highly scalable storage and compute performance database workload needs.
Support for sovereign regions
The Azure SQL Migration extension now supports customers in sovereign clouds, including Azure for US Government. This requires enabling support for such clouds in Azure Data Studio’s account configuration settings.
Conclusion
The latest features introduced in the Azure SQL migration extension for Azure Data Studio version 1.2.0 provides a more seamless migration journey, with pre-migration validation and support for Amazon RDS for SQL Server sources, right-sized recommendations using the Hyperscale service tier, and sovereign clouds.
We look forward to hearing about your experience using the Azure Database Migration extension for Azure Data Studio. Please don't hesitate to contact us with questions or suggestions at the Azure Community forum — Azure Database Migration Service forum.