Microsoft® SQL Server™ version 7.0 includes Microsoft Repository, which consists of a set of Microsoft ActiveX® interfaces and information models that are used to define database schema and data transformations as specified by the Microsoft Data Warehousing Framework. DTS supports Repository information stored in the SQL Server msdb database. Repository is the preferred means of storing DTS packages in a data warehousing scenario because it is the only method of providing data lineage for packages.
A goal of the Microsoft Data Warehousing Framework is to provide meaningful integration of multiple products through shared metadata. It combines business and technical metadata to provide an industry standard method for storing the schema of production data sources and destinations. DTS uses Repository to allow transformations, queries, and ActiveX scripts to be reused by heterogeneous applications.
Repository is installed by default in the msdb database. A SQL Server installation can contain multiple repositories. However, DTS supports only a single repository database per server in the SQL Server Enterprise Manager MMC console tree. This Repository must reside in the msdb database.
Packages stored in Repository are available to users that log on to the server with sufficient permissions to view Repository DTS packages.
The names of packages stored in Repository are required to be unique. No two packages with the same name can be stored in Repository. On servers installed with a case-sensitive sort order, names with the same set of characters can be saved if they use a different case for at least one of the letters. For example, two packages with the names abc and Abc can be saved, but not two packages with the names abc and abc. On servers installed with a case-insensitive sort order, the case of the package name is ignored.