Writing Extended Stored Procedures and running them inside database is not a new concept. If comparing CLR code which also runs inside database does same but provides much more flexibility over Extended Stored Procedures.

* While Extended Stored Procedures can written in C++, CLR objects can be written in any .Net compliant language (C#, VB.Net, C++ Managed) i.e. much more reliable.
* As we discussed that CLR code can be written in any .Net compliant language so there will no hassles of managing memory and security.
* SQL Server 2005 comes with a new XML datatype and CLR code can use this effectively.
* With Extended Stored Procedures a developer have very limited set of functions while in CLR a developer has an access to a wide range of .Net class libraries.

I will write more on CLR integration in the future posts, Inshallah.

Happy CLRing,