Merge Replication: Are Snapshots Agents Necessary?

[cathbuzz]

Now that I've put the initial snapshot onto the subscriber, I'm not sure why the snapshot agent would need to run on a schedule afterward. On the other hand, SQL Server 7.0 seems to set this up by default. Was this just configured when the sys admin set it up possibly? Or is there a good reason to keep pushing over snapshots? Seems like a good way to screw up my data

 

[Corran007]

Here this is straight out of books online, but it would be bad to remove the agent

"The Merge Agent applies the initial snapshot jobs held in the publication database tables to the Subscriber. It also merges incremental data changes that occurred at the Publisher or Subscribers after the initial snapshot was created, and reconciles conflicts according to rules you configure or a custom resolver you create."

if you want more info, look up
"Snapshot Agent, merge replication" in bol. there is a whole section on it.