>Lots of people still push that idea. As I understand it, SQL Server 6.5 stored execution plans with Stored Procedures and not dynamic queries. I assume that they studied 6.5 in some institutional setting and like most such people I've met, are unwilling/unable to think for themselves and rely on vague memories of outdated training.

Mike,

I do not beleive that SPs are necessarily faster than SPT queries. However, using SPs does allow for a degree of isolation of the details of the data model implementation from the business layer. SPs allow the DBA to provide an interface to the data that is not dependent on the table names or the field names. This can allow the DBA to restructure the data for optimization without needing any changws to the business layer.

That being said, I do not follow the concept of using only SPs to access data. I follow whatever the system architecture is for the system I am working on. Sometimes it uses SPs exclusively and sometimes it uses a data access layer built in the application to isolate the data from the app. For reporting I see no reason to not use SPT to get the data, other than that the architecture design says not to.