I’m just watching the Golden Globe Awards ceremony and I can’t stop from thinking about the unbelievable impact information technology has on our lives. And it all happens so fast …

The love story I have with Information Technology officially started in 1988 when I managed to write a BASIC program that displayed the graph of the SIN function. I was 11 years old and I lived under the spell of Star Wars, the fantastic saga of George Lucas. I never would have dreamed that one day I’ll walk into a cinema, watch a movie, and then while leaving the screening room I’ll have the “this was mainly computer generated” revelation. In fact, as recently as 2-3 years ago I did not imagine this will happen in 2009. It seems that every now and then things happen that change dramatically our lives. James' Cameron’s Avatar is one such thing. I dare to say that after Avatar cinematography will never be the same again. The age of immersive, mind blowing, computer generated, three dimensional experiences has truly arrived. Much earlier that one would predict 10 or even 5 years ago. For a pure and natural geek like me this is kind of a dream coming true. I guess the next big bet is how soon will the human race actually reach a planet like Pandora.

To be completely honest, the story behind Avatar didn’t manage to overthrow completely my personal top 3 in science fiction stories. The first two places are still held by George Lucas’s Star Wars and Frank Herbert’s Dune. So, James Cameron’s Avatar has to settle for third place. What did actually leave me speechless is what Cameron did with it to while transforming the story into a movie. Via endless streams of trillions and trillions of calculations and probably petabytes of data, the fantastic world of Pandora moved from our imagination onto the 3D screens of our favorite cinema where we can see it, hear it, and almost touch it. The geek inside asks: how soon will we be able to also feel it? The only serious answer I can give to myself is: sooner than you imagine. Again, it’s not the story that makes me really tick, although it hides some interesting criticism to the American way of life and, to a larger extent, to the Homo Sapiens’s way of life. It’s really the technology behind the movie that lights my imagination. To much of my surprise, we did this in 50 years or so. Wow…

Looks like all my favorite movies from 2009 are on the winners list. Hangover just got the prize for best comedy. I was kind of not really convinced when some friends asked me to watch together with them this one. I laughed my heart out. It made me ask myself when was the last time I had such a good laugh.

Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds got a prize for Christopher Waltz as best supporting actor. Well, I guess Tarantino is in a league of his own (nota bene, I’m a huge fan of Tarantino; in fact, I have to admit he’s my favorite film director) and Inglorious Basterds is just a new gem following the footsteps of Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, and Kill Bill. To much of my surprise, Waltz’s performance in the role of SS colonel Hans Landa was a true masterpiece. Combine this with Tarantino’s unmatched talent to create slow-paced chess-mate situations and you get a true masterpiece.

Robert Downey Jr. got the prize for best leading actor in a comedy or musical for his performance in Guy Ritchie’s Sherlock Holmes. Before seeing Sherlock Holmes in Downey’s interpretation, I could bet almost anything on the fact that there’s nothing more you can do in yet another movie about the great detective. I was wrong. Plain and simple. And I like this Sherlock Holmes much more than the classic and stiff one.

As I’m wrapping up this post, Avatar is winning the Golden Globe Award. I’m a geek, not a film critic so I’m allowed to cheer, right? Cameron just said that being in the movie-making business is the best job in the world. My take is that the prize belongs equally to Cameron as it belongs to information technology. Which makes our job equally interesting, don’t you think?

I admit, this might not be the best name for this post, but as I'm writing it the Golden Globe Awards event is unfolding, so I hope my cinematography bias is excused. In case you're still wondering, this is about SQL Server 2008 R2. "Take Two" might not be the best choice simply because SQL Server 2008 R2 is not an attempt to fix issues with SQL Server 2008. As a matter of fact, I think SQL Server 2008 was a smashing hit. What do you do when you have such a winner at hand? It's simple: you build on it. And it sure looks like Microsoft is going to do this with R2.

But enough with the digression, let's get back to the core of the subject. Which are the major new things to expect from SQL Server 2008 R2?

Reporting Services is one area where we'll see significant improvements. To name just a few of them: new constructs in the expression language, new layout features, better data visualization, shared reporting components, and deeper SharePoint integration. There's also going to be a new Report Builder and a new rendering extension that enables us to consume reports as ATOM feeds (see my previous post about ATOM feeds).

Data modeling and analysis will benefit a lot from the new PowerPivot technology. Despite the fact that it’s available mainly as an Excel 2010 extension, PowerPivot is at its heart nothing more and nothing less than an in-memory multidimensional cube based on Analysis Services technology. And it has its own language (see my previous post). But the thing that will make PowerPivot a real winner is its availability in SharePoint 2010 via Excel Services, part of the SQL Server 2008 R2 SharePoint 2010 Insights.

Operations gets its fair share through the new functionalities related to Applications and Multi-Server Management. Concepts like data-tier applications, server groups, and control points are some of the most important things in this area.

Master Data Services enables you to implement master data management solutions (more about this in a future, dedicated post).

Finally, the StreamInsight technology firmly puts SQL Server on the map of Complex Event Processing platforms. The best definition for StreamInsight is one that I’ve recently heard saying that instead of throwing the query to the data, it throws the data to the query. On a more technical note it’s a technology that enables near-zero latency queries on the data while “in flight”. To make things more difficult, the data involves multiple and concurrent event sources generating data at high rates.

Well, that’s about it. It's quite easy to notice that Business Intelligence is the prevailing theme here. While all the new features are important and quite powerful, I think the ones related to BI are the most important. Since this post is already quite long, I’ll save the more detailed talk about BI in SQL Server 2008 R2 for future posts.

Well … it turns out there is and its name is DAX (Data Analysis EXpressions). The fundamental purpose of DAX is to help you extend the basic data model of PowerPivot by defining calculated columns and measures.

Some might question why do we need yet another language when we already have so many in Microsoft’s BI world? It’s enough to think about T-SQL, MDX, DMX, RDL just to name a few. As surprising as it sounds, the reality is that we do need a new language when it comes to multidimensional analysis. Isn’t there a language named MDX (Multi-Dimensional EXpressions) already in this domain? one might ask. The answer is obviously positive. MDX is a very powerful and flexible language used in SQL Server’s Analysis Services to extend multidimensional data models. The problem with it is that this power and flexibility come with a price: MDX scripts get very quickly very complicated. In fact, they get so complicated that in my opinion there is no way an information worker or an analyst (who are supposed to work with PowerPivot) will ever be able to master MDX in order to be able to leverage its power with the PowerPivot data model.

Consequently, Microsoft faced a tough question: do we use a flavor of MDX to extend PowerPivot data models or do we introduce yet another language? Eventually, they settled for the second option, which is the best one given the circumstances. Enters DAX, the language specifically designed to meet three major goals:

• Abstract some tough-to-grasp multidimensional concepts
• Provide some primitives similar to MDX for extending the data model
• Shield PowerPivot users from the complicated world of multidimensional models and MDX while still enabling them to extend PowerPivot data models in powerful ways

There is an inherent trade-off generated by DAX’s relative simplicity: it’s not as powerful as MDX. This means there will be things that you can achieve with MDX but you cannot with DAX. Given this, I’d still argue that things which cannot be expressed via DAX will probably not be needed too often by PowerPivot users. On the other hand, using DAX and building on the abstraction level provided by PowerPivot itself they will be able to create fairly complex extensions to the data model without the need to plunge into the details of multidimensional programming with MDX.

You can read more about the Data Analysis Expressions language here.

One of the new rendering extensions available in Reporting Services in SQL Server 2008 R2 is the one that renders reports in the ATOM data feed format. This is an excellent new and standardized way to get the raw data from a report (supposing for instance that you do not need the formatted version) when your only point of connection is the reporting service itself. The ATOM data feed can be consumed by virtually any application that can handle data feeds. What's really cool here is that the new ATOM functionality is nothing more (from an external point of view) than a rendering extension which makes it blend in a very natural way into the overall Reporting Services landscape.

One particularly interesting example of ATOM feed consumer for Reporting Services is the new PowerPivot technology available in Excel and SharePoint 2010. Obviously, it's not the only one. As I mentioned above, anything that understands data feeds can benefit from this new functionality.

So… how do you get the ATOM feed? It’s as simple as using an URL access string like:

http://<server>/ReportServer?/<path>&rs:Command=Render&rs:Format=ATOM&rc:DataFeed=<datafeedname>

Read more about getting data feeds from reports here.

Many of my friends and colleagues ask me what’s in store for 2010 in the Microsoft ecosystem. Among all the things going on in 2010, I think there are three of them that will generate the largest impact: cloud, entertainment, and development. At the same time, they happen to be crucial challenges that need to be met by the Redmond giant.

Starting with 2010, Windows Azure and all the other stuff related to cloud computing goes live (by live I mean we will start using it on a commercial basis). It is a huge investment as well as a significant technological development that will definitely impact dramatically the way we architect and develop software solutions. Technically, I think Microsoft’s cloud computing offer is exceptional. My concern with it is from the commercial point of view, since there is no “entry level” offering to match enthusiasts, hobbyists and beginner developers. I can’t help thinking back on the long history of Windows. Much of its success was (and still is) due to the ease of software development as well as to the hordes of developers and enthusiasts who felt in love with the platform. So, the big challenge for Microsoft in 2010 when it comes to cloud computing is by no means a technical one (I think they are right on the spot with the technical part). The big challenge is finding a way to make the Azure cloud appealing and (why not) sexy for all the categories of developers, in order to get that critical mass that will turn it into a successful platform.

The second big thing in 2010 will be entertainment. And when I say entertainment, I actually say two things: mobile devices and gaming. One makes me cry, the other makes me laugh. Let me explain… For some reason, Microsoft is consistently loosing ground in the mobile market. The new Windows Phone concept, based on Windows Mobile 6.5, is far better then its predecessor, Windows Mobile 6.0/6.1. Unfortunately, it’s still far from competitor offerings. And it’s not the business side of things that has issues but the “coolness factor” and all the other things that make phones the entertainment centers of our daily lives. Piece by piece, Microsoft does have the technologies and devices. There is that phenomenal gizmo called Zune HD which is in my opinion the best candidate for the killer phone of 2010. There is also that fantastic technology called Silverlight which went like fireworks in 2009, gaining incredible traction among software developers as well as designers. All that’s needed is to mix this stuff together and make it lightning fast (Microsoft Zune Phone with Silverlight anyone???). That’s one challenge Microsoft MUST address somehow in 2010. The other entertainment challenge (the one that puts a smile on my face) is the gaming part. With XBOX’s Project Natal (the game console that doesn’t need controllers) Microsoft will impact significantly the world of gaming. Still, 2010 might bring some other über-cool things to gamers like cloud gaming for instance. I know, it sounds a bit far-fetched but a look at www.onlive.com will probably puzzle you a bit :).

Finally, the third big thing in 2010 in the Microsoft ecosystem will be development. A new CLR version in .NET Framework 4 (the first one since version 2.0) as well as a brand new Visual Studio (build with Windows Presentation Foundation) will bring significant improvements to both on-premises and cloud-based software development. Although the promise is great, Microsoft still has to sort out some performance issues (which are quite obvious in the Beta versions). And yes, it’s still 32-bit, unfortunately. A 64-bit version of Visual Studio is another huge challenge Microsoft has to begin addressing in 2010.

Quite obviously there are many more big things that will go on in 2010 in the Microsoft ecosystem, but my strong belief is that the ones I mentioned above will have the largest impact. And, as I mentioned before, they are in the same time some of the biggest challenges ever for Microsoft.