Messy Meta-Described Views

It never ceases to amaze me that there is always that little bit of SQL Server functionality that you didn’t know about. Some of it good and some of it bad, some of it just meh…

The other day I was stumbling around a new environment, when I decided to use the GUI to script out an existing set of views when I saw something that had me scratching my head. Underneath the actual view definition was the following (some names removed to protect the innocent).

----------------------------------
-- note view definition removed --
----------------------------------
GO
EXEC sys.sp_addextendedproperty @name=N'MS_DiagramPane1',
@value=N'[0E232FF0-B466-11cf-A24F-00AA00A3EFFF, 1.00]
Begin DesignProperties =
   Begin PaneConfigurations =
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 0
         NumPanes = 4
         Configuration = "(H (1[40] 4[20] 2[20] 3) )"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 1
         NumPanes = 3
         Configuration = "(H (1 [50] 4 [25] 3))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 2
         NumPanes = 3
         Configuration = "(H (1 [50] 2 [25] 3))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 3
         NumPanes = 3
         Configuration = "(H (4 [30] 2 [40] 3))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 4
         NumPanes = 2
         Configuration = "(H (1 [56] 3))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 5
         NumPanes = 2
         Configuration = "(H (2 [66] 3))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 6
         NumPanes = 2
         Configuration = "(H (4 [50] 3))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 7
         NumPanes = 1
         Configuration = "(V (3))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 8
         NumPanes = 3
         Configuration = "(H (1[56] 4[18] 2) )"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 9
         NumPanes = 2
         Configuration = "(H (1 [75] 4))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 10
         NumPanes = 2
         Configuration = "(H (1[66] 2) )"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 11
         NumPanes = 2
         Configuration = "(H (4 [60] 2))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 12
         NumPanes = 1
         Configuration = "(H (1) )"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 13
         NumPanes = 1
         Configuration = "(V (4))"
      End
      Begin PaneConfiguration = 14
         NumPanes = 1
         Configuration = "(V (2))"
      End
      ActivePaneConfig = 0
   End
   Begin DiagramPane =
      Begin Origin =
         Top = 0
         Left = 0
      End
      Begin Tables =
         Begin Table = "Customer"
            Begin Extent =
               Top = 6
               Left = 38
               Bottom = 114
               Right = 227
            End
            DisplayFlags = 280
            TopColumn = 0
         End
         Begin Table = "Order"
            Begin Extent =
               Top = 6
               Left = 265
               Bottom = 114
               Right = 492
            End
            DisplayFlags = 280
            TopColumn = 0
         End
      End
   End
   Begin SQLPane =
   End
   Begin DataPane =
      Begin ParameterDefaults = ""
      End
   End
   Begin CriteriaPane =
      Begin ColumnWidths = 12
         Column = 1440
         Alias = 900
         Table = 1170
         Output = 720
         Append = 1400
         NewValue = 1170
         SortType = 1350
         SortOrder = 1410
         GroupBy = 1350
         Filter = 1350
         Or = 1350
         Or = 1350
         Or = 1350
      End
   End
End
' , @level0type=N'SCHEMA',@level0name=N'dbo',
@level1type=N'VIEW',@level1name=N'omsPerMonth'
GO
 
EXEC sys.sp_addextendedproperty @name=N'MS_DiagramPaneCount',
@value=1 , @level0type=N'SCHEMA',@level0name=N'dbo',
@level1type=N'VIEW',@level1name=N'omsPM'
GO

So after a few tests it turns out that when you create SQL Server Views using the SQL Server Management Studio View Designer, SSMS automatically generates and adds these properties to the view behind the scenes to aid the Designer for re-editing purposes. Please bear this in mind when generating scripts for deployment into your staging environments, whilst there doesn’t appear to be any performance drawbacks to this extra meta-data, it is messy and (imho) not best practice to redeploy into production.