My favorite event at Microsoft's TechEd 2008 conference held in Orlando this year was a roundtable discussion about automating DBA work with several other SQL Server experts. The session was moderated by Allen White and included myself, Dan Jones (of Microsoft), Steve Jones (of SQL Server Central fame), and Buck Woody (also of Microsoft, though you may have seen his excellent column at http://www.informit.com/). These guys are smart, funny, and experienced.
Maybe you'd like to take a look? Microsoft has posted the video at Tech·Ed Online: Automating DBA Processes.
In addition, I'd like to point out that fellow blogger Jonathan Kehayias has posted a good issue up on Connect for a problem in the SQL 2008 Management Studio tools that I have already been told is a by design issue. You may not realize it, but Microsoft now allows you to vote on which issues you want tackled. Let's build some community support for issues like these - the issue is that SSMS 2008 can’t connect to 2005 Reporting Services Instances by WMI - https://connect.microsoft.com/SQLServer/feedback/ViewFeedback.aspx?FeedbackID=361680.
Thanks so much!
-Kevin
