SQL Server Team-based Development - Red Gate Software

Chapter 7: Maintaining a Code Library
The previous chapter took a practical look at how proper code reuse could reduce the
number of bugs in our code, and greatly ease the team development process. It considered
specific examples of the types of code modules (stored procedures versus UDFs, and so
on) that best promote reuse.
The scale of code reuse can vary, from full enterprise utilities, to useful, reusable
functions (see, for example, Inside T-SQL Querying by Itzik Ben-Gan, where he creates
a function, fn_nums, which creates a table of numbers, of varying size, which can be
used anywhere), to small snippets of code that can be reused inside other modules to
standardize the approach to common problems such as error handling.
There are several difficult aspects to building and maintaining a code library. First, you
have to create a place to store the information; you need to write the code in such a way
that it can be reused, and you have to validate that it's going to do what you need it to do,
every time. This chapter will cover a range of ways to generate, test, and share a library
of code modules and snippets amongst the development team, covering the use of SSMS
templates, text editors, wikis, and SQL Prompt. Text editors and wikis bring to the table
powerful search capabilities, but at the expense of needing to store the code outside of
the normal development environment. SSMS templates and SQL Prompt offer the ability
to generate, find, and edit your code directly from a query window, which is probably the
best mechanism for ensuring code reuse throughout the enterprise.
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