Dynamic Management Views (DMV) and Dynamic Management Functions (DMF) return server state information that can be used to monitor the health of a server instance, diagnose problems, and tune performance. They can exactly tell what is going on with SQL Server and its objects at the moment.There are tow kinds of DMVs and DMFs. Server-scoped dynamic management views and functions. Database-scoped dynamic management views and functions. All dynamic management views and functions exist in the sys schema and follow this naming convention dm_*. When you use a dynamic management view or function, you must prefix the name of the view or function by using the sys schema.
Following are major categories of DMVs and DMVs.
- Common Language Runtime Related Dynamic Management Views
- I/O Related Dynamic Management Views and Functions
- Database Mirroring Related Dynamic Management Views
- Query Notifications Related Dynamic Management Views
- Database Related Dynamic Management Views
- Replication Related Dynamic Management Views
- Execution Related Dynamic Management Views and Functions
- Service Broker Related Dynamic Management Views
- Full-Text Search Related Dynamic Management Views
- SQL Server Operating System Related Dynamic Management Views
- Index Related Dynamic Management Views and Functions
- Transaction Related Dynamic Management Views and Functions
Reference : Pinal Dave (https://blog.sqlauthority.com)), BOL – Dynamic Management Views and Functions
