As you probably know by now SQL Server 2012 was launched last week, Microsoft had an online launch event that was pretty spectacular but  has also drawn some criticism following the event because the online platform initially struggled to cope with the load of 45,000 plus users. You can view the keynote and some of the sessions on the SQL Server launch website   We also had a release to manufacturing (RTM) this week. SQL Server 2012 is available to download on MSDN and has been available on there since the 7th March. SQL Server 2012 is on general release from the 1st April.

If you follow the SQL Server community on twitter, you will no doubt have seen a fair number number of SQL Server professional have downloaded and installed SQL Server 2012 RTM in their ‘sandpit’ or ‘test’ type environments. I have seen a few tweets over the weekend that suggest people have downloaded and installed the new version in their own time, probably on their own test kit. These are the people who are investing in their future and trying to keep ahead of the curve. Not everyone is a surfer though and not everyone likes to be in front of the wave, and not everyone, companies in particular,  like to be on the bleeding edge.

Many of my clients like their SQL Server platform to be stable, SQL Server 2005, SQL Server 2008 and SQ Server 2008 R2 are pretty stable and as such many of my clients have shown no interest in upgrading to SQL Server 2012 any time soon, they may plan to upgrade  in twelve to eighteen  months time but for now they are staying put. Some organisations might prefer to wait for perhaps the first service pack before they would consider upgrading their production systems to the new version, they are of the opinion that any early bugs or major bugs will be fixed with the Service Pack. They have a perception that the product will be more stable by the time the product has a service pack. I have other clients  who want to use the new AlwaysOn features as soon as possible and are currently the process of planning to upgrade.

I have also seen a few people on twitter  asking questions about possible bugs in the RTM release. Don’t look so shocked, we work in the software industry and all software has ‘bugs’ and it should not be a shock that SQL Server has some too. It was these bugs though, that got me thinking and asking some questions, I think it these bugs or perceived these bugs that put off some organisations from upgrading when the RTM version becomes available. So these are my questions…

• Do people have solid plans in place to upgrade to SQL Server 2012?
• If so what is the time scale?

I know organisations planning on doing this in the next few months and I have others who have a ‘policy’ that states they will be waiting until the first service pack before they would consider upgrading. I guess I’m just trying to get a feel for how many people are looking to put SQL Server 2012 in production now or later or more likely somewhere in between.

Please do leave a comment with your timescales or thoughts on this subject. I’d more than interested to hear your views