How to Resolve the “transaction log file full” issue?

What is a transaction log?

Every SQL Server database has a transaction log that records all transactions
and the database modifications made by each transaction.

Error what you see?

The transaction log for database 'xxxxxxxxxx' is full. To find out why space
in the
log cannot be reused, see the log_reuse_wait_desc column in sys.databases

Issues arise when the log file is full?

Most common reasons are?

Your database is set to Full Recovery and no Tlog backups are happening
Large inserts or deletes are happening (and it really needs to be that big)
Long running transactions are running (index maintenance or bulk import)
Other Reason(s)
If Always-on, Replication and Mirroring Fails

How to troubleshoot?

SELECT name,log_reuse_wait_desc
FROM sys.databases

DBCC SQLPERF(logspace)
DBCC Opentran
Note: SQL Server itself actually tells us what is going on with the log files in
the log_reuse_wait_desc column of the sys.databases catalog view.

Script to release unused space

USE [AdventureWorks]
GO
DBCC SHRINKFILE (N'AdventureWorks2014_Log' , 0, TRUNCATEONLY)
GO

Some best practices:

• Make sure that you are using the proper recovery model for the database(s)
• Make sure that the log file auto grow settings are not based on percentage but
based on number of MB
• Make sure that you have in place a proper backup procedure for database and log
backups
• Make sure that you have in place log file shrink operations, especially in cases
where the log file can become hugle
• Have in place an automated monitoring and notification process for all disk
drives