DBCC PDW_SHOWEXECUTIONPLAN (Transact-SQL)

**APPLIES TO:** SQL Server Azure SQL Database Azure SQL Data Warehouse Parallel Data Warehouse

Displays the SQL Server execution plan for a query running on a specific SQL Server SQL Data Warehouse or SQL Server SQL Data Warehouse Parallel Data Warehouse Compute node or Control node. Use this to troubleshoot query performance problems while queries are running on the Compute nodes and Control node.

Once query performance problems are understood for SMP SQL Server queries running on the Compute nodes, there are several ways to improve performance. Possible ways to improve query performance on the Compute nodes include creating multi-column statistics, creating non-clustered indexes, or using query hints.

Transact-SQL Syntax Conventions (Transact-SQL)

Syntax

Syntax for Azure SQL Data Warehouse:

DBCC PDW_SHOWEXECUTIONPLAN ( distribution_id, spid )  
[;]  

Syntax Azure Parallel Data Warehouse:

DBCC PDW_SHOWEXECUTIONPLAN ( pdw_node_id, spid )  
[;]  

Arguments

distribution_id
Identifier for the distribution that is running the query plan. This is an integer and cannot be NULL. Used when targeting SQL Data Warehouse

pdw_node_id
Identifier for the node that is running the query plan. This is an integer and cannot be NULL. Used when targeting an Appliance.

spid
Identifier for the SQL Server session that is running the query plan. This is an integer and cannot be NULL.

Permissions

Requires CONTROL permission on SQL Data Warehouse

Requires VIEW-SERVER-STATE permission on the Appliance.

Examples: [!INCLUDEssSDW]

A. DBCC PDW_SHOWEXECUTIONPLAN Basic Syntax

When running on a SQL Data Warehouse instance, modify the above query to also select the distribution_id.

SELECT [sql_spid], [pdw_node_id], [request_id], [dms_step_index], [type], [start_time], [end_time], [status], [distribution_id]  
FROM sys.dm_pdw_dms_workers   
WHERE [status] <> 'StepComplete' and [status] <> 'StepError'  
order by request_id, [dms_step_index];  

This will return the spid for each actively running distribution. If you were curious as to what distribution 1 was running in session 375, you would run the following command.

DBCC PDW_SHOWEXECUTIONPLAN ( 1, 375 );  

Examples: [!INCLUDEssPDW]

B. DBCC PDW_SHOWEXECUTIONPLAN Basic Syntax

The query that is running too long is either running a DMS query plan operation or a SQL query plan operation.

If the query is running a DMS query plan operation, you can use the following query to retrieve a list of the node IDs and session IDs for steps that are not complete.

SELECT [sql_spid], [pdw_node_id], [request_id], [dms_step_index], [type], [start_time], [end_time], [status]   
FROM sys.dm_pdw_dms_workers   
WHERE [status] <> 'StepComplete' and [status] <> 'StepError'  
AND pdw_node_id = 201001   
order by request_id, [dms_step_index], [distribution_id];  

Based on the results of the preceding query, use the sql_spid and pdw_node_id as parameters to DBCC PDW_SHOWEXEUCTIONPLAN. For example, the following command shows the execution plan for pdw_node_id 201001 and sql_spid 375.

DBCC PDW_SHOWEXECUTIONPLAN ( 201001, 375 );  

See also

DBCC PDW_SHOWPARTITIONSTATS (Transact-SQL)
DBCC PDW_SHOWSPACEUSED (Transact-SQL)