Does the New Cardinality Estimator Reduce Bad Parameter Sniffing
No. Next question. Although, that answer can be slightly, ever so slightly, nuanced... Parameter sniffing is a good thing. But, like a good wine, parameter sniffing can go bad. It always comes down to your statistics. A very accurate set of statistics with very little data skew (some values that have radically more/less data than other values) and a very even distribution (most values have approximately similar cardinality), and parameter sniffing is your bestest buddy on the planet (next to a tested backup). But, introduce some data skew, let the stats get wildly out of date, or suffer from seriously uneven distribution, and suddenly your best friend is doing unspeakable things to your performance (kind of like multi-statement table valued user defined functions). SQL Server 2014 has the first upgrade…