Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Performance Tuning Cookbook

Chapter 13. Table and Index Partitioning

In this chapter we will cover:

• Partitioning a table with RANGE LEFT
• Partitioning a table with RANGE RIGHT
• Deleting and loading bulk data by splitting, merging, and switching partitions (sliding window)

Introduction

If data in a database table keeps growing and the number of records in a table reaches a count in billions or more, data retrieval and data manipulation operations on such a large table may become difficult. Due to very huge data, even simple INSERT, UPDATE, or DELETE operations can take a long time. Tasks such as deleting certain old data and rebuilding indexes become hard to perform. Managing and maintaining query performance becomes a challenge in this situation.

In the olden days of SQL Server, ...