A reliable way to verify T-SQL stored procedures

Question

We're upgrading from SQL Server 2005 to 2008. Almost every database in the 2005 instance is set to 2000 compatibility mode, but we're jumping to 2008. Our testing is complete, but what we've learned is that we need to get faster at it.

I've discovered some stored procedures that either SELECT data from missing tables or try to ORDER BY columns that don't exist.

Wrapping the SQL to create the procedures in SET PARSEONLY ON and trapping errors in a try/catch only catches the invalid columns in the ORDER BYs. It does not find the error with the procedure selecting data from the missing table. SSMS 2008's intellisense, however, DOES find the issue, but I can still go ahead and successfully run the ALTER script for the procedure without it complaining.

So, why can I even get away with creating a procedure that fails when it runs? Are there any tools out there that can do better than what I've tried?

The first tool I found wasn't very useful: DbValidator from CodeProject, but it finds fewer problems than this script I found on SqlServerCentral, which found the invalid column references.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-- Check Syntax of Database Objects
-- Copyrighted work.  Free to use as a tool to check your own code or in 
--  any software not sold. All other uses require written permission.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
-- Turn on ParseOnly so that we don't actually execute anything.
SET PARSEONLY ON 
GO

-- Create a table to iterate through
declare @ObjectList table (ID_NUM int NOT NULL IDENTITY (1, 1), OBJ_NAME varchar(255), OBJ_TYPE char(2))

-- Get a list of most of the scriptable objects in the DB.
insert into @ObjectList (OBJ_NAME, OBJ_TYPE)
SELECT   name, type
FROM     sysobjects WHERE type in ('P', 'FN', 'IF', 'TF', 'TR', 'V')
order by type, name

-- Var to hold the SQL that we will be syntax checking
declare @SQLToCheckSyntaxFor varchar(max)
-- Var to hold the name of the object we are currently checking
declare @ObjectName varchar(255)
-- Var to hold the type of the object we are currently checking
declare @ObjectType char(2)
-- Var to indicate our current location in iterating through the list of objects
declare @IDNum int
-- Var to indicate the max number of objects we need to iterate through
declare @MaxIDNum int
-- Set the inital value and max value
select  @IDNum = Min(ID_NUM), @MaxIDNum = Max(ID_NUM)
from    @ObjectList

-- Begin iteration
while @IDNum <= @MaxIDNum
begin
  -- Load per iteration values here
  select  @ObjectName = OBJ_NAME, @ObjectType = OBJ_TYPE
  from    @ObjectList
  where   ID_NUM = @IDNum 

  -- Get the text of the db Object (ie create script for the sproc)
  SELECT @SQLToCheckSyntaxFor = OBJECT_DEFINITION(OBJECT_ID(@ObjectName, @ObjectType))

  begin try
    -- Run the create script (remember that PARSEONLY has been turned on)
    EXECUTE(@SQLToCheckSyntaxFor)
  end try
  begin catch
    -- See if the object name is the same in the script and the catalog (kind of a special error)
    if (ERROR_PROCEDURE() <> @ObjectName)
    begin
      print 'Error in ' + @ObjectName
      print '  The Name in the script is ' + ERROR_PROCEDURE()+ '. (They don''t match)'
    end
    -- If the error is just that this already exists then  we don't want to report that.
    else if (ERROR_MESSAGE() <> 'There is already an object named ''' + ERROR_PROCEDURE() + ''' in the database.')
    begin
      -- Report the error that we got.
      print 'Error in ' + ERROR_PROCEDURE()
      print '  ERROR TEXT: ' + ERROR_MESSAGE() 
    end
  end catch

  -- Setup to iterate to the next item in the table
  select  @IDNum = case
            when Min(ID_NUM) is NULL then @IDNum + 1
            else Min(ID_NUM)
          end  
  from    @ObjectList
  where   ID_NUM > @IDNum

end
-- Turn the ParseOnly back off.
SET PARSEONLY OFF 
GO

Answer 1

Here is what worked for me:

-- Based on comment from http://blogs.msdn.com/b/askjay/archive/2012/07/22/finding-missing-dependencies.aspx
-- Check also http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb677315(v=sql.110).aspx

select o.type, o.name, ed.referenced_entity_name, ed.is_caller_dependent
from sys.sql_expression_dependencies ed
join sys.objects o on ed.referencing_id = o.object_id
where ed.referenced_id is null

You should get all missing dependencies for your SPs, solving problems with late binding.

Exception: is_caller_dependent = 1 does not necessarily mean a broken dependency. It just means that the dependency is resolved on runtime because the schema of the referenced object is not specified. You can avoid it specifying the schema of the referenced object (another SP for example).

Credits to Jay's blog and the anonymous commenter...