Until recently I’d never used the deadlock graph event in Profiler. I’ve been pretty lucky and haven’t had to troubleshoot deadlocks much until now. The deadlock graph turns out to be quite nice!

How the Deadlock Graph Event Works

When you add this event, it uses the TextData column to describe the deadlock in XML. You can copy the contents and parse them, or just read through it to see details on the transactions involved in the deadlock. Profiler also displays a graphical picture of the deadlock. I find the picture is helpful mostly when going through the XML itself, but the whole thing is pretty great.

Comparison to Trace Flag 1222

The XML itself looks to be about the same as you get from trace flag 1222 in the SQL log, but you get the picture and the context of the other events you are profiling in sequence as well.

Important Note

Here is a sample look at how profiler displayed one of our deadlocks: