Physical Database Design and Implementation

Exam Questions

1. You are the database administrator for a local branch of LargeCompany, Corp. You have created a view for a table called MyTable with the following code:

CREATE VIEW vwMyTable AS SELECT * FROM MyTable

After a couple days you receive e-mail messages from clients informing you of the following error message:

Server: Msg 208, Level 16, State 1, Procedure vwMyTable, Line 1
Invalid object name 'MyTable'.
Server: Msg 4413, Level 16, State 1, Line 1
Could not use view or function 'vwMyTable' because of binding errors.

What is the probable cause of this error?

1. MyTable has been removed or renamed from the database, and the view cannot bind to it because it no longer exists.

2. Someone has modified the MyTable table and did not rebind it to the view. The view has the original compilation and could not bind to the table.

3. Someone changed a column name referenced in the view, and now it does not compile properly.

4. Users no longer have access to the MyTable table because of access rights changes. They do have access to the vwMyTable view.

2. You are the database administrator for VeriLong, Corp. You are trying to design a system and optimize it for throughput since it will be used primarily for OLAP services. You are at the stage of deciding how to organize your drives, tables, indexes, and so on. The system contains two RAID controllers with three channels on each controller. Each channel has 40MB/sec throughput. You cannot create logical drives spanning controllers, but you can create logical drives spanning channels on the same controller. Which of the following solutions would provide the best performance?

1. Create a logical drive on the first controller's first channel only. Place the system and the page file on this logical drive. Create a second logical drive on the first controller's second and third channels. Create a third logical drive on the second controller spanning the three channels. When you create the database in the file group, you specify on the second logical drive and a file on the third logical drive for both the database and the transaction log.

2. Create a logical disk spanning all three channels and place the system files, swap file, the SQL Server executable files, and the transaction log on that logical disk. Create the second logical drive spanning the three channels of the second controller, and put the database files on the second logical drive.

3. Create a logical disk spanning all three channels and place the system files, swap file, and the SQL Server executable files on this drive. Create the second drive spanning the three channels of the second controller, and place the transaction log and the database files on this drive.

4. Create a logical drive on the first controller's first channel only. Place the system and the page files on this logical drive. Create a second logical drive on the first controller's second and third channels. Place the database transaction log on the second logical drive. Create a third logical drive on the second controller spanning the three channels, and place the database and index files on the third logical drive.

3. You are the DBA for Implementation, Inc. Your manager has tasked you with setting up an environment that involves a distributed partition view. What configuration must you use to get it to perform correctly?

1. Create remote servers in each server pointing to the other servers in the federated server cluster and disable lazy schema validation.

2. Create linked servers in each server pointing to other servers in the federated server cluster and disable lazy schema validation.

3. Create linked servers in each server pointing to other servers in the federated server cluster and enable lazy schema validation.

4. Create remote servers in each server pointing to the other servers in the federated server cluster and enable lazy schema validation.

4. You are a DBA. You create a table using the following syntax:

CREATE TABLE Students (
StudentID  int    IDENTITY (1,10)
CONSTRAINT Pk_Students   PRIMARY KEY,
LastName  varchar(25)  NOT NULL,
FirstName  varchar(25)  NOT NULL,
MiddleName  varchar(1),
Address  varchar(20),
City    varchar(20),
State    varchar(2),
ZipCode  varchar(5)
)

If the ANSI_NULL_DEFAULT is turned off, what results will this code produce? (Choose all answers that apply.)

1. None of the columns can have a NULL value.

2. The IDENTITY value gets generated automatically, and this column can be updated.

3. The IDENTITY value gets generated automatically, and this column cannot be updated.

4. The IDENTITY value starts at 10 and gets incremented with a value of 1.

5. The IDENTITY value starts at 1 and gets incremented with a value of 10.

5. You are a database administrator for Quils, Inc, a company that performs customer service for clients. One of the databases you manage is used to hold millions of phone call records. After invoicing, you are tasked to delete certain records from the tables, and you need to use system disk resources conservatively. How would you create the database and what kind of settings would you use?

1. Create a database, allow it to automatically grow, and enable the autoclose feature.

2. Create a large database and disable the autogrow feature.

3. Create a database, allow it to automatically grow, and enable the autoshrink feature.

4. Create a small database and use the autogrow feature.

6. As the DBA for Arnolds Drygoods Warehouse, you are planning to create an index for a large table using two columns. Customers of the warehouse need to access data quickly in sorted order, returning all rows, even if there are duplicates. Which indexing strategy would you choose?

1. Unique, composite, and clustered

2. Nonunique, composite, and nonclustered

3. Nonunique, composite, and clustered

4. Nonclustered

7. You are the database administrator for Salvation, Inc. and have just set up your SQL Server to use the full recovery model. You've also been asked to keep down the costs associated with hardware. Which RAID level is best suited to maintaining the transaction log?

1. RAID 0

2. RAID 1

3. RAID 5

4. RAID 10

8. You are a DBA for Emerald Cities, a mail order supply warehouse. You want to add a new column to your "Supply" table. This column cannot have a null value, will have a default of 2, and can only accept integer numbers with values of 2, 4, 6, 8, or 0. Which statement below is true?

1. Columns cannot be added to a table with not null values.

2. It is not possible to add a column and a constraint in one statement.

3. You can achieve your goal by executing the following Transact-SQL statement:

ALTER TABLE Supply ADD (NewCol int not null check (NewCol in (2,4,6,8,0))

4. You can achieve your goal by executing the following Transact-SQL statement:

ALTER TABLE Supply ADD ( NewCol int not null default(2) check (NewCol in (2,4,6,8,0))

9. You are an Enterprise DBA for FixMyCar, a mobile roadside repair and service company, headquartered in Indianapolis, IN. FixMyCar has data centers located in most major metropolitan areas. Data changes are only being made to the corporate database, but customer information is required at all locations. Changes to the database must be replicated from the corporate database to subscriber servers as soon as possible. What kind of replication does this suggest?

1. Transactional replication

2. Transitional replication

3. Merge replication

4. Snapshot replication

10. As the database administrator for FillErUp Gas & Oil, you've decided to create two file groups for your "Stations" database, a primary and a secondary. What are the advantages of taking this approach? (Choose all that apply.)

1. The primary file group can be backed up separately from the secondary file group.

2. A performance benefit is gained even if both the primary and secondary files are on the same physical server.

3. By separating the file groups, both can contain historical data and be marked as read-only.

4. The file groups can be checked for data consistency and integrity separately.

5. If one file group is temporarily unavailable, the database can still be used.

6. The primary file group can be small enough to contain only the system tables and placed on the same partition as the master database, to ensure point-of-failure recovery.