Community

Tracing call stacks in SQL Server – Installing the Debugging Tools for Windows (WinDbg) on Windows 8.1 and generating debug symbols for SQL Server binaries

Where to get the debugger tools To generate the needed symbols you will need the “Windows Software Development Kit (SDK) for Windows 10” download here: https://dev.windows.com/en-us/downloads/windows-10-sdk and click “Download the standalone SDK” I like to select the Download option and pick “Debugging Tools for Windows” this will download all of the installation files How to install the debugger tools The installation of this software is very straight forward, Then find in the downloaded files \Windows Kits\10\StandaloneSDK\Installers\X64 Debuggers And Tools-x64_en-us.

Tracing call stacks in SQL Server – Introduction

At this fall’s SQLIntersection conference in Las Vegas I attended, Paul Randal’s (t|b)“Performance Troubleshooting Using Latches and Waits” precon. Where at he asked for some assistance compiling data for a project he’s working on. The project that would require installing the “Debugging Tools for Windows” and generating debug symbols for the SQL binaries. I have always intended to work with the debug symbols to find the call stack traces and experiment with what SQL Server does during certain events, like creating a database, inserting a row and such.