When should I use stored procedures?

Question

When should I be using stored procedures instead of just writing the logic directly in my application? I\'d like to reap the benefits of stored procedures, but I\'d also lik

Answer 1

I used stored procs in 1 of 3 scenarios:

Speed When speed is of the utmost importance, stored procedures provide an excellent method

Complexity When I'm updating several tables and the code logic might change down the road, I can update the stored proc and avoid a recompile. Stored procedures are an excellent black box method for updating lots of data in a single stroke.

Transactions When I'm working an insert, delete or update that spans multiple tables. I wrap the whole thing in a transaction. If there is an error, it's very easy to roll back the transaction and throw an error to avoid data corruption.

The bottom 2 are very do-able in code. However, stored procedures provide an black-box method of working when complex and transaction level operations are important. Otherwise, stick with code level database operations.

Security used to be one of the reasons. However, with LINQ and other ORMs out there, code level DAL operations are much more secure than they've been in the past. Stored procs ARE secure but so are ORMs like LINQ.