Data Transformation Server Services in SQL Server

Data Transformation Services (DTS) is a utility that can transfer data between any OLE-DB data source.
While transferring the data, DTS can also transform the data. Depending on your data sources and your OLE-DB drivers you will have different limitations on that data being transferred.

DTS’s strong point is its ability to perform multiple transformations on data. When transforming data, you can manipulate the source data before it is stored in the destination. This allows you to break complex transformations into multiple steps in order to better manage the transformation process. You can transform multiple data sources independently of one another, combining the results in a final step. On the other hand, DTS can break one record up to multiple destinations.

DTS can move both the schema and data between the source and destination data sources, however, triggers, stored procedures, rules, defaults, constraints, and user-defined data types are not transfered between data sources.
The next lesson will explain how to use the DTS Designer to make a package.