SQL Server 6.5 includes new features that supersede the functionality of some existing features. Although all features from SQL Server 6.0 continue to be supported in 6.5, future versions of SQL Server might not support some statements where the same functionality can be achieved using other means. For example, the following features are supported in 6.5 but might be discontinued in future versions:
If your installation of SQL Server is currently using SQL Server mirroring, it is recommended that you use the mirroring functionality of Windows NT or hardware-based mirroring instead. For more information on Windows NT mirroring, see the Windows NT documentation.
With SQL Server 6.5, the "*=" and "=*" syntax for outer joins can be replaced with the ANSI-standard join syntax: LEFT OUTER JOIN, RIGHT OUTER JOIN, and FULL OUTER JOIN.
Although SELECT FOR BROWSE is supported in 6.5, the functionality of the FOR BROWSE clause in SELECT statements can now be achieved more efficiently by using cursors. For more information about cursors, see the DECLARE CURSOR statement, later in this document. Also see the Microsoft SQL Server Transact-SQL Reference, Programming DB-Library for C, and Programming DB-Library for Visual Basic.