We have cutomers interested in sending their Sql 2008 data to other customers with SQL 2000. Now obviously this does not currently work, so I’m attempting to create a “generic” backup process that allows us to backup and restore our data on Server 2000 and up (since SQL2000 is the least common denominator of all or customers). Right now we are generating our backups this way (C#):
Server server = new Server( GetServerConnection( serverName, userName, password ) );
Backup backup = new Backup();
backup.Action = BackupActionType.Database;
backup.Database = GetDatabasePrefix() + databaseName;
backup.Devices.AddDevice( fileName, DeviceType.File );
backup.Initialize = true;
backup.SqlBackup( server );
My first question is, is there any way to “force” the backup to be run as SQL 2000, even if the database is SQL 2005 or 2008?
Also, we were thinking of avoiding this by using the bcp procedure on the database to package up and unpackage the tables and zip them together. In the zip process I’d put a header flag in to declare it a “generic” backup. Does this seem reasonable, or is there a simpler way of doing this? Since the application is the same regardless of server, all of the columns and tables should be the same. Thanks for the help!
If you are porting data only, BCP or a custom SSIS package sounds like your most likely options that will be reusable. You may want to peek at the SSIS import/export wizard, it is pretty simple to use and may accomplish what you want.