Brian Swan has a new post to his MSDN blog today about the release of the latest version (3.0 beta) of the SQL Server drivers for PHP. This new release includes three improvements - buffered queries, support for LocalDB and support for high availability/disaster recovery.

A Community Technology Preview (a beta release) of v3.0 of the SQL Server Drivers for PHP was released today (see the announcement on the team blog). You can download it here: Download v3.0 of the SQL Server Drivers for PHP. [...] It's important to note that the latter two features are dependent on the next version of SQL Server (code named "Denali"). A preview of Denali can be downloaded for free here (see notes later in this article about the installation process): Download SQL Server Denali CTP 3.

He gives brief summaries (some with example code) of what these three new features have to offer those using SQL Server in their applications. The "buffered queries" allows you to bring your entire result set into memory, making it simpler to interact with as rows/columns. The LocalDB support gives developers a quick way to have a database without the hassle of a server - just connect right to the SQL Server database file. The high availability feature has been included for a while but has a new name in the upcoming release - SQL Server Always On.