Database Size?

  • Hello,

    I was checking the size of my database and noticed that it's roughly 3.4 GB. But then i noticed that the Data Files is only taking up 210MB and the Transactional Log is taking close to 4.1GB.

    What exactly is the transactional Log? I set it to increase by 10%. Should i just disable the auto growth of it? If i do that what happens?

    Thank you

  • You need to do some serious reading...  There are tons of posts here and Books Online has complete information on that subject.

    However, the short answer is that if you don't backup the transaction log it will continue to grow, unless you set the recovery model to Simple.

    /*****************

    If most people are not willing to see the difficulty, this is mainly because, consciously or unconsciously, they assume that it will be they who will settle these questions for the others, and because they are convinced of their own capacity to do this. -Friedrich August von Hayek

    *****************/

  • As suggested reading is in order.

    transaction log grows according to your recovery model

    Read selecting a recovery model

    http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/adminsql/ad_bkprst_4l83.asp

    The transaction log is where all transactions against your database are written down first. then committed in batch to your database file.

    It is also used for important recovery situations.

    http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/adminsql/ad_bkprst_4l83.asp

    Since you denoted you have tons of free space in your db you can shrink the files using:

    http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/adminsql/ad_bkprst_4l83.asp

    It is common for transaction log to continue to grow, it is a maintenance item for every database. You may have to shrink it periodically, but setting your recovery model will establish the frequency you'll have to do it.

Viewing 3 posts - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)

You must be logged in to reply to this topic. Login to reply