During the setup process, SQL Server 2017 can pull down and install its own edition of CPython 3.5, the stock Python interpreter available from the Python.org website.

SQL Server 2017 beta release includes some new authentication, security and machine learning enhancements.

Review: SQL Server 2017 adds Python, graph processing and runs on Linux Integration of Python for data science, graph processing for NoSQL-like functionality, and it runs on Linux as well as Windows.

But it was SQL Server’s new machine learning tools that grabbed my attention. Machine learning remains one of Microsoft’s big themes for 2017, and it’s an important segment of SQL Server 2017.