SQL Server Archives - Dawid's Blog

Dealing with SQL Server Space - Part 1

Recently, I have been building a large database for the new House-Buddy project. The site uses a huge collection of data to identify the sweet-spots around a particular location. The site is hosted on a shared hosting which in theory had unlimited DB storage, but after they noticed the size of the database has grown

How to regain space after dropping columns in SQL Server

I hit an annoying issue today. I wanted to regain space after I dropped several columns in a table. When I run the famous query from StackOverflow:

SELECT 
    t.NAME AS TableName,
    s.Name AS SchemaName,
    p.rows AS RowCounts,
    SUM(a.total_pages) * 8 AS TotalSpaceKB, 
    CAST(ROUND(((SUM(a.total_pages) * 8) / 1024.00 / 1024.00), 2) AS NUMERIC(36, 2)) AS TotalSpaceMB,
    SUM(a.used_pages) * 8 AS UsedSpaceKB, 
    CAST(ROUND(((SUM(a.used_pages) * 8) / 1024.00/ 1024.00), 2) AS NUMERIC(36, 2)) AS UsedSpaceMB, 
    (SUM(a.total_pages) - SUM(a.used_pages)) * 8 AS UnusedSpaceKB,
    CAST(ROUND(((SUM(a.total_pages) - SUM(a.used_pages)) * 8) / 1024.00, 2) AS NUMERIC(36, 2)) AS UnusedSpaceMB
FROM 
    sys.tables t
INNER JOIN      
    sys.indexes i ON t.OBJECT_ID = i.object_id
INNER JOIN 
    sys.partitions p ON i.object_id = p.OBJECT_ID AND i.index_id = p.index_id
INNER JOIN 
    sys.allocation_units a ON p.partition_id = a.container_id
LEFT OUTER JOIN 
    sys.schemas s ON t.schema_id = s.schema_id
WHERE 
    t.NAME NOT LIKE 'dt%' 
    AND t.is_ms_shipped = 0
    AND i.OBJECT_ID > 255 
GROUP BY 
    t.Name, s.Name, p.Rows
ORDER BY 
    t.Name

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SELECT

t.NAME AS TableName,

s.Name AS SchemaName,

p.rows AS RowCounts,

SUM(a.total_pages) * 8 AS TotalSpaceKB,

CAST(ROUND(((SUM(a.total_pages) * 8) / 1024.00 / 1024.00), 2) AS NUMERIC(36, 2)) AS TotalSpaceMB,

SUM(a.used_pages) * 8 AS UsedSpaceKB,

CAST(ROUND(((SUM(a.used_pages) * 8) / 1024.00/ 1024.00), 2) AS NUMERIC(36, 2)) AS UsedSpaceMB,

(SUM(a.total_pages) - SUM(a.used_pages)) * 8 AS UnusedSpaceKB,

CAST(ROUND(((SUM(a.total_pages) - SUM(a.used_pages)) * 8) / 1024.00, 2) AS NUMERIC(36, 2)) AS UnusedSpaceMB

FROM

sys.tables t

INNER JOIN

sys.indexes i ON t.OBJECT_ID = i.object_id

INNER JOIN

sys.partitions p ON i.object_id = p.OBJECT_ID AND i.index_id = p.index_id

INNER JOIN

sys.allocation_units a ON p.partition_id = a.container_id

LEFT OUTER JOIN

sys.schemas s ON t.schema_id = s.schema_id

WHERE

t.NAME NOT LIKE 'dt%'

AND t.is_ms_shipped = 0

AND i.OBJECT_ID > 255

GROUP BY

t.Name, s.Name, p.Rows

ORDER BY

t.Name

I got a set of numbers which were the same before and after the removal has

DBCC CLEANTABLE('YOUR_DB', 'SCHEMA.TABLE');

1	DBCC CLEANTABLE('YOUR_DB', 'SCHEMA.TABLE');

There is, however, a potential issue with this approach if

Transaction log is full due to LOG_BACKUP

Yesterday, when I was building a large DB from scratch I got an error saying:

Transaction Log for 'Database' is full due to LOG_BACKUP

1	Transaction Log for 'Database' is full due to LOG_BACKUP

Running this simple query solved the issue:

ALTER DATABASE MyDB SET RECOVERY SIMPLE;

1	ALTER DATABASE MyDB SET RECOVERY SIMPLE;

Category: SQL Server

Dealing with SQL Server Space - Part 1

How to regain space after dropping columns in SQL Server

Transaction log is full due to LOG_BACKUP

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