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MyLittleAdmin Web-Based SQL Server Manager Packs a Big Punch

By : Brad McGehee Jan 27, 2005

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When a web hosting company decides to offer Microsoft SQL Server databases as a feature, customers need a way to access their databases. Usually it's through one of the following ways:

MS SQL Enterprise Manager - Many hosts choose to have their customers use the free built-in desktop Enterprise Manager, which has become a familiar way to edit SQL Server. But using Enterprise Manager has several pitfalls. 1. It creates a potential security risk for web hosts; port 1433 has to be open in order for customers to manage their database. 2. It has to be installed on the user's machine, if the user can even acquire the software itself (which is included with the MS SQL installation CD or full download, but is not available separately). 3. It also allows its users to see not only their database, but all databases on the SQL server. While users don't have access to databases other than their own, they already know one piece of the puzzle to getting some else's data... the database name.

Web-Based Tools - Web-based tools, on the other hand, offer more flexibility and control over what the user can and can't see. There are a number of free web-based tools out there, but free tools often lead to poor support, few updates, and are usually incomplete tools. You also run the risk of potential security compromises if the software isn't being constantly revised and updated by the community.

Payware web-based tools are often very expensive and finding a payware solution that is complete, usable, and affordable is quite a challenge. That is, until you look at myLittleTools' myLittleAdmin (visit them on the web at http://www.myLittleTools.net).

 

myLittleTools' myLittleAdmin

One feature that's sure to keep hosted customers using SQL Server happy, and the hosts who have to shell out the bucks for a good tool, is myLittleTools' myLittleAdmin, a web-based Microsoft SQL Server database management tool that brings the familiar Microsoft Enterprise Manager look and feel to your web browser (see Figure 1).

There are two versions of myLittleAdmin. A less expensive web hosting version, which allows you to use myLittleAdmin to access only one database server and has a limited feature set that web hosts need, and an Enterprise version, which has all the bells and whistles and allows connection to multiple database servers through the one installation.

In this Software Spotlight, we'll be briefly discussing the installation and feature set of the Enterprise version since this will give you a good idea of the complete capabilities of this product. This product is so complex we could easily cover 100 pages on it, but for the sake of time, we'll try to highlight the product's strong points. We'll also show you why it's a much better choice than the free Microsoft Web Data Admin.

 

Installation

Installation is a breeze. The software comes ready to be unzipped into your web server web root, and since it is Active Server Pages (ASP)-based, it will easily run on Microsoft platforms running Internet Information Server (IIS) with ASP enabled. Web Data Admin, on the other hand, is confusing to configure because it doesn't give you the option to put the app where you want it. It just installs through an MSI package, and you're left trying to figure out how to access it. I literally spent 20 minutes just trying to figure out how to move the installation to another site.

Once extracted into the web folder of your choice, the only thing I needed to do with myLittleAdmin was ensure the directory I extracted myLittleAdmin into was configured as an application (see Figure 2).

Then, off to tweaking the config file. The config file, contained in the scripts/inc directory, contains all the settings for enabling/disabling the features of myLittleAdmin. You have a ton of flexibility here, as well as the ability to offer varying levels of administrative privileges to allow, say, the system administrator to have full control over just about all the system features of MS SQL while giving the casual web user access to only their database and a limited subset of features.

Features you have control of include turning on and off features for editing databases, tables, views, stored procedures, users, roles, rules, logins, different tools (such as query analyzer, backup wizard, csv import, etc), backup devices, custom skins, and more.

Turning on or off privileges is as simple as putting a 1, 2, or 3 next to the appropriate feature, where 1, 2 and 3 are the privilege levels used to access myLittleAdmin.

Once you've modified the config file to your liking, that's it! All you need to do now is browse to the myLittleAdmin path with your web browser and you're ready to log in.

 

Using myLittleAdmin

Once you go to the myLittleAdmin main page in your web browser, you'll be presented with a couple of different ways to log into the MS SQL server, DSN-less or DSN (Figure 3). DSN-less gives you the most control over how you log into your database. DSN allows you to log in with only the DSN name and a username/password. In either case, you can also log in with a User Level password that grants you extra privileges depending on how you set your config file.