Will SET TRANSACTION ISOLATION LEVEL Solve blocking ?

  • Hi All,

    I am having a DB which is heavily load and lock when i have lot of user trying to insert or update records in my DB.

    Every store procedure i use for working with update and insert of bunch of data, i used begin transaction

    and 1 of my store procedure lock and process too long, my DB is blocking other users for going into my DB.

    So if i use SET TRANSACTION ISOLATION LEVEL READ UNCOMMITTED everytime i begin transaction, will it solve my blocking problem ?

    Can SET TRANSACTION ISOLATION LEVEL be used after i begin transaction, or i must use it before begin transaction, and after begin transaction can i still change the ISOLATION LEVEL ??

    please help...

    jason

  • Read uncommitted only affects reads, that is selects. Data changes will always lock. Also, be aware of what read uncommitted actually is. See - http://sqlblog.com/blogs/andrew_kelly/archive/2009/04/10/how-dirty-are-your-reads.aspx

    I would suggest having a look at the indexes on those tables and on the queries, make sure that they are as optimal as possible. Queries that run quickly don't lock for long and that may reduce blocking.

    Gail Shaw
    Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server, MVP, M.Sc (Comp Sci)
    SQL In The Wild: Discussions on DB performance with occasional diversions into recoverability

    We walk in the dark places no others will enter
    We stand on the bridge and no one may pass
  • Gail is 100% correct.

    You could look into using snapshot isolation as a way to reduce locking issues. It increases the load on tempdb and some on the CPU, but it should lead to quite a lot less blocking.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • thanks , i will give it a try...

    By the way,

    How to optimize tempdb if i want to use Snapshot Isolation

  • if you follow the ideas from Gail and Grant together , you are done .

    Abhay Chaudhary
    Sr.DBA (MCITP/MCTS :SQL Server 2005/2008 ,OCP 9i)

  • jason (6/17/2009)


    thanks , i will give it a try...

    By the way,

    How to optimize tempdb if i want to use Snapshot Isolation

    There are several white papers on optimizing tempdb available on Microsoft's MSDN web site. Search on 'optimize tempdb.' It's largely a question of seperating tempdb storage from the rest of the system, making sure it's on an appropriate RAID system (if I recall correctly 0 or 10, certainly not 5), having an appropriate number of files associated (see the white papers), that sort of thing.

    "The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood"
    - Theodore Roosevelt

    Author of:
    SQL Server Execution Plans
    SQL Server Query Performance Tuning

  • We resolved our deadlocks problems by setting the following

    ALTER DATABASE @dbname SET ALLOW_SNAPSHOT_ISOLATION ON;

    ALTER DATABASE @dbname SET READ_COMMITTED_SNAPSHOT ON;

  • Will this be an issue when using Read_Committed_Snapshot ?

    http://sqlblog.com/blogs/linchi_shea/archive/2007/10/05/performance-impact-the-potential-cost-of-read-committed-snapshot.aspx

    And also 1 question,

    I have 10 records in my table , and i begin transaction and start update 1 of the row , before commit the transaction, another user is reading another row of data, will it be block by the update ?

  • ALTER DATABASE @dbname SET ALLOW_SNAPSHOT_ISOLATION ON;

    ALTER DATABASE @dbname SET READ_COMMITTED_SNAPSHOT ON;

    After i set these 2 option, do i still need to use SET Transaction Isolation Level Snapshot on each of my statement ?? Or it will automatically use it

  • jason (6/19/2009)


    Will this be an issue when using Read_Committed_Snapshot ?

    http://sqlblog.com/blogs/linchi_shea/archive/2007/10/05/performance-impact-the-potential-cost-of-read-committed-snapshot.aspx%5B/quote%5D

    It depends. The row-versioning isolation levels do come with a cost, the question is whether the improvement in concurrency outweighs this. It is difficult to generalize because there are so many issues involved. A system which is experiencing excessive blocking due to concurrent read and write activity, where reads are more common that writes, and where long-running transactions are the exception - will often be a good candidate for a row-versioning isolation level.

    jason (6/19/2009)


    And also 1 question,

    I have 10 records in my table , and i begin transaction and start update 1 of the row , before commit the transaction, another user is reading another row of data, will it be block by the update ?

    Short answer: no.

    Long answer: I think you need to do some more reading on this subject before you change anything. The point of row-level versioning is that shared locks are not (generally) taken by read operations. In your example, the update will take an update lock which is converted to an exclusive lock just before the data is changed. Since the data reader just needs a schema-stability lock, it will not block waiting to acquire an incompatible shared lock.

    Paul

  • jason (6/19/2009)


    ALTER DATABASE @dbname SET ALLOW_SNAPSHOT_ISOLATION ON;

    ALTER DATABASE @dbname SET READ_COMMITTED_SNAPSHOT ON;

    After i set these 2 option, do i still need to use SET Transaction Isolation Level Snapshot on each of my statement ?? Or it will automatically use it

    There are two different types of row-level versioning available.

    READ_COMMITTED_SNAPSHOT, once enabled on the database, automatically applies to transactions running at the default READ_COMMITTED isolation level. You do not need to change anything else.

    The SNAPSHOT isolation level is different, and requires you to explicitly change the isolation level to take advantage of it.

    See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc917674.aspx and http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/SQL+Server+2005/62464/

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