Directions Magazine sources have learned that Microsoft has just released, internally, the first public beta of SQL Server 2008 (code named "Katmai") with support for spatial. This Community Technology Preview (CTP) is the long-awaited CTP-5 and should show up on the Microsoft web site as the "November CTP". Interested developers and other users should check this website regularly.

Here are the highlights of CTP-5 with particular emphasis on their support for spatial datatypes:

The new GEOGRAPHY and GEOMETRY datatypes provide spatial data support for location-aware applications. These types can be used to store locations, as well as paths and regions in space, and provide a set of functionality for comparing and manipulating these objects.

Users will utilize the GEOGRAPHY type when working with latitude and longitude coordinates in a true round-earth model; use of the GEOMETRY type will be utilized when working in projected planar surfaces, as well as naturally planar systems such as interior spaces.

These types are supported by new spatial indexes, which provide for fast execution of queries involving spatial data. The query optimizer has been enhanced to build-in knowledge of spatial indexes and types, so that appropriate cost-based plan decisions can be made.

Other specific enhancements to the CTP-5 release include:

Data Collection and Performance Warehouse for Relational Engine Enhancements

Service Broker Enhancements

Registered Servers Enhancements

Synchronous net-changes change tracking for SQL Server T-SQL IntelliSense

Declarative Management Framework (DMF) Enhancements

Declarative Management Framework (DMF) Enhancements

Analysis Services Query and Writeback Performance (FITS)

Robust Report Server Platform

Integration Services - Lookup Enhancements

Analysis Services MDX Query Optimizer - Block Computation

Analysis Services Aggregation Design

Analysis Services Cube Design

Reporting Services Scale Engine and Robust Server Fit and Finish

Transparent Data Encryption

Resource Governor - Limit Specification

Backup Compression

Plan Freezing

Fully Parallel Plans Scale on Partitioned Tables