How to: Open the Activity Monitor (SQL Server Management Studio)

Use the Activity Monitor component of Microsoft SQL Server Management Studio to get information about users connections to the Database Engine and the locks that they hold. Activity Monitor has three pages. The Process Info page contains information about the connections. The Locks by Process page sorts the locks by the connection. The Locks by Object page sorts the locks by the object name. Click the Filter button to apply a filter, reducing the amount of information displayed.

Use Activity Monitor when troubleshooting database locking issues, and to terminate a deadlocked or otherwise unresponsive process.

To view the Activity Monitor the user needs VIEW SERVER STATE permission on a SQL Server 2005 server.

To view the Activity Monitor the user needs SELECT permission to the sysprocesses and syslocks tables in the master database on a SQL Server 2000 server. Permission to view these tables is granted by default to the PUBLIC database role.

Permission to KILL a process default to the members of the sysadmin and processadmin fixed database roles, and are not transferable.

For descriptions of the columns, see Activity Monitor (Process Info Page) and Activity Monitor (Locks by Process Page).

To open Activity Monitor

  1. In SQL Server Management Studio, connect to the server with Object Explorer, expand Management, and then double-click Activity Monitor.

See Also

Tasks

How to: View Job Activity (SQL Server Management Studio)

Help and Information

Getting SQL Server 2005 Assistance