Enhancements to SQL server column stores

Abstract

SQL Server 2012 introduced two innovations targeted for data warehousing workloads: column store indexes and batch (vectorized) processing mode. Together they greatly improve performance of typical data warehouse queries, routinely by 10X and in some cases by a 100X or more. The main limitations of the initial version are addressed in the upcoming release. Column store indexes are updatable and can be used as the base storage for a table. The repertoire of batch mode operators has been expanded, existing operators have been improved, and query optimization has been enhanced. This paper gives an overview of SQL Server's column stores and batch processing, in particular the enhancements introduced in the upcoming release.