Commenting (Annotating) your SSIS Package.

In this article, I will discuss what might be one of the most overlooked aspects of all development project – commenting.

The example above is taken from a mildly-complex complex where I connect to SQL Server and export data from a table into a DataReader while providing two DataViews for debugging (read SQL Server to DataReader for more information).

While the ability for a project to achieve its deliverables is the obviously the
most important aspect of development, throughout the life that project it’s
equally important that everyone who may work with it to modify its features be
able to understand its intricacies.

The Business Development Intelligence Studio (BIDS) makes this process very easy.
For every discrete unit of logic in your package (containers and major groups of
actions within them), right-click on the designer and select “Annotate.”
BIDs will then place an empty text box (like in MS Word) which you may edit, move,
and resize to fit your needs – though I highly advise apply some aesthetic
improvements to be merciful to your future readers. For example, you’ll notice I
try to keep the length of my comments short enough so they don’t bleed into the
other comments. Also, I applied some vertical alignment in order for the reader to
easily find each object’s comments easily.

One final point I’ll make about commenting your SSIS package, is to remind you
that you may renamed all of the object you took from the Toolbox and placed on
your designer.
You’ll notice in this example above, for example the first object “OLE DB Source”
would me much more understandable if it was renamed something like “Export from
Customers table.”