Microsoft Distributed Transaction Coordinator (MSDTC)

MSDTC is an acronym for Microsoft Distributed Transaction Coordinator. As the name says, MSDTC is a Windows service providing transaction infrastructure for distributed systems. In this case, a transaction means a general way of structuring the interactions between autonomous agents in a distributed system.

The Microsoft Distributed Transaction Coordinator service is a component of modern versions of Microsoft Windows that is responsible for coordinating transactions that span multiple resource managers, such as databases, message queues, and file systems.

The Microsoft Distributed Transaction Coordinator (MSDTC) allows applications to extend or distribute a transaction across two or more instances of SQL Server. The distributed transaction works even when the two instances are hosted on separate computers.

MSDTC is installed for Microsoft SQL Server on-premises, but isn’t available for Microsoft’s Azure SQL Database cloud service.

Configure Distributed Transaction Coordinator in “Component Services”.

To enable Microsoft SQL Server XA transactions:

1. From the Control Panel, open Administrative Tools, and then open Component Services.
2. Expand Component Services, right-click My Computer, and then select Properties.
3. Expand Distributed Transaction Coordinator and right-click Local DTC.
4. Click the MSDTC tab, and then click Security Configuration.
5. Select the Enable XA Transactions check box, and then click OK to restart the Microsoft DTC service.
6. Click OK again to close the Properties dialog box, and then close Component Services.
7. Stop and then restart the Microsoft SQL Server.
8. Note: You may need to restart the server for the change to go into effect.