What tools are there to generate test data for SQL Server?

Question

As you can see from another question of mine, generating test data is my theme right now.

At this point, I'm still generating my test data by hand. However, this process always generates small amounts of data (usually five-ten rows) since it is a manual process.

Are there any tools to automate this process? Particularly, I'd like to be able to generate 1mil+ rows.

Answer 1

You can use Visual Studio database projects with Data Generator Plans.

A nice video tutorial can be watched here: How Do I: Generate Test Data using Visual Studio Team System Database Edition?

Answer 2

Red Gate SQL Data Generator?

Answer 3

An excellent resource is of course the Redgate SQL Toolbelt, in particular their Data Generator

SQL Data Generator is a fast, simple tool for generating test data.

Using table and column names, field length, data types and other existing constraints SQL Data Generator immediately provides sensible generators. These can then be customized to meet specific requirements.

Ideal for both testing databases and complying with privacy legislation, SQL Data Generator provides test data fast and simply.

Answer 4

I'll answer this the same way I did when this was asked for mysql :

You're often better off doing this yourself, or the data may be too random, and won't have a similar distribution to what your real data will look like. (eg, indexes are good for truly random data ... not so much when there's a limited number of permutations or some values occurs more than 20% of the time)

I typically use Perl scripts to generate my simulated data, and write it out in tab delim files ... I can then either use that database's bulk importing mechanisms to load it, or I can use another script that inserts the records at a given cadence (eg, insert (x) records every (y) seconds, with a little time jitter inserted)