SQL server

In preparing for class, I was testing out some simple connection exercises from Excel.[OT: I was pleasantly surprised to note that you can access SQL Server 2005 (using Excel 2007) without setting up an ODBC connection string.] In the process, I could not connect to the SQL server instance on my local machine. I discovered that numerous others continue to face this problem as a google search on the error string will reveal. Having experienced this TYPE of situation since this past summer, I tried one of my tricks: Append the port number (even if it is the default). IT WORKS!

Environment: SQLServer 2005 and Excel 2007
Solution: Add the port number to your server name (serverName,nnnn)

Just a quick note to add to my previous post on connecting to SQL server data from within eclipse. All semester I have been having trouble connecting to an instance of SQL server. Today, I had to work on a machine that had Eclipse but did not have SQL server Management Studio. SQL Explorer plugin to the rescue.

I was helping my class move a project from a semi-normalized design to a fully normalized design. This required splitting the un-normalized table into multiple tables. Rather than re-create new test data, we took the live project data and decided to make it into an exercise in data extraction and transformation. While creation of the base tables was not a major issue, inserting the foreign key values was.