I have a column (col1) with nvarchar(max).
I am trying to do
DECLARE #my_string NVARCHAR(max)
set #my_string = N'test'
UPDATE dbo.tab1
SET col1 = #my_string + ISNULL(col1, N'')
no luck , I have no idea why it is happening. #marc_s
The string value in col1 getting truncated after 250 characters. This happening in both SQL Server 2005 and 2008.
First of all - I'm not seeing this behavior you're reporting. How and why do you think your column gets truncated at 250 characters?? Are you using a tool to inspect the data that might be truncating the output??
You could check the length of the column:
SELECT col1, LEN(col1) FROM dbo.tab1
Is it really only 250 characters long???
Also: you're mixing VARCHAR (in #my_string) and NVARCHAR (col1) which can lead to messy results. Avoid this!
Next: if you want NVARCHAR(MAX), you need to cast your other strings to that format.
Try this:
DECLARE #my_string NVARCHAR(200)
set #my_string = N'test'
UPDATE dbo.tab1
SET col1 = CAST(#my_string AS NVARCHAR(MAX)) + ISNULL(col1, N'')
As I said - in my tests, I didn't need to do this - but maybe it works in your case?
Go to menu - Query --> Query options --> Results --> Text
There is an option Maximun number of characters displayed in each column and mine was defaulted to 256.
Once I set this to 1000 the problem was fixed.
Do you test in SSMS? If so, check in options Query Results > SQL Server > Results to Grid - Maximum characters retrieved > Non XML data. Is there a value 250 or similar?
Related
I have a column in my database containing both numeric and alphanumeric characters.
I only want to get the numeric (6 numbers) from the column.
Example of data:
TEST_123456_Prod
DB111111P
F222222FN
PROD999999_SCF
I want to create a select statement that returns all rows from this column where all but numbers are filtered out.
I´m using SQL Server, so probably Charindex needs to be used, but no idea how.
To strip off all alphanumeric characters you can create a function as:
CREATE FUNCTION [dbo].[RemoveAlphaCharacters](#InputString VARCHAR(1000))
RETURNS VARCHAR(1000)
AS
BEGIN
WHILE PATINDEX('%[^0-9]%',#InputString)>0
SET #InputString = STUFF(#InputString,PATINDEX('%[^0-9]%',#InputString),1,'')
RETURN #InputString
END
GO
and then use it to get desired result as:
select dbo.RemoveAlphaCharacters(databasename)
from T1;
SQL Fiddle
This will work for all of your examples:
SELECT
SUBSTRING(databasename,
PATINDEX('%[0-9]%', databasename),
LEN(databasename) - (PATINDEX('%[0-9]%', REVERSE(databasename)) + PATINDEX('%[0-9]%', databasename)) + 2)
FROM dbs
Here is a SQLFiddle with how the code works.
I'm trying to transfer some old SQL Server data using Excel into SQL Server. It seems that Import/Export Data application automatically sets most data columns to NVARCHAR(255). Problem I have, is one of my columns is supposed to be a DATE type, but all data in it looks like this 18.08.2000 14:48:15.
So, when I try to use this query:
SELECT CONVERT(Date, DATE_TIME, 113)
FROM someTable
I get this error:
Msg 9807, Level 16, State 0, Line 1
The input character string does not follow style 113, either change the input character string or use a different style.
None of the [styles] from CAST and CONVERT (Transact-SQL) are working in my case.
Any advise or help is greatly appreciated.
SOLVED:
UPDATE myTable
SET columnName = CONVERT(NVARCHAR(255),CONVERT(SMALLDATETIME, columnName,105))
ALTER TABLE myTable
ALTER COLUMN columnName SMALLDATETIME
So, if it will ever become useful to anyone, this is the exact code that changes datatype NVARCHAR to DATETIME:
UPDATE myTable
SET columnName = CONVERT(NVARCHAR(255),CONVERT(SMALLDATETIME, columnName,105))
ALTER TABLE myTable
ALTER COLUMN columnName SMALLDATETIME
As far as I can tell - style no. 103 (British/French) should work - no?
DECLARE #input NVARCHAR(255)
SET #input = '18.08.2000 14:48:15'
SELECT CONVERT(DATETIME, #input, 103)
Gives me the output of:
2000-08-18 14:48:15.000
which seems pretty reasonable, no??
If you are using SQL Server 2012, try:
PARSE(Date AS datetime USING 'en-GB')
Or if that doesn't work, try:
PARSE(Date AS datetime USING 'Et-EE')
The Estonian culture specifically uses '.' as a date separator (d.MM.yyyy H:mm:ss) so it should work.
(Both seem to work fine on SQL Fiddle)
I try to calculate md5 hash on a certain value, but I get a weird result.
I run it in two different ways:
SELECT HASHBYTES('md5',ZLA_PASSWORD),ZLA_PASSWORD, len(ZLA_PASSWORD) FROM ZLA_PASSWORD;
SELECT HASHBYTES('md5', '123456');
I get two different results, where only the second one is valid:
0xCE0BFD15059B68D67688884D7A3D3E8C 123456 6
0xE10ADC3949BA59ABBE56E057F20F883E
This is done on an SQL Server 2005.
checking the result of MD5 on 123456 was the same as the second result checking online.
Any ideas?
Thanks!
You have different data types
declare #str1 as varchar(10)
declare #str2 as nvarchar(10)
set #str1 = '123456'
set #str2 = '123456'
select
hashbytes('md5', #str1) as 'varchar',
hashbytes('md5', #str2) as 'nvarchar'
Result
varchar nvarchar
0xE10ADC3949BA59ABBE56E057F20F883E 0xCE0BFD15059B68D67688884D7A3D3E8C
LEN Trims the contents before returning the length (of the trimmed string.)
Most likely your password field is a CHAR field and got whitespace in there.
Try doing a RTRIM before hashing:
SELECT HASHBYTES('md5',RTRIM(ZLA_PASSWORD))
More exactly this should solve the issue:
SELECT HASHBYTES('md5',CAST(ZLA_PASSWORD AS varchar)),ZLA_PASSWORD, len(ZLA_PASSWORD) FROM ZLA_PASSWORD;
Software I'm working with uses a text field to store XML. From my searches online, the text datatype is supposed to hold 2^31 - 1 characters. Currently SQL Server is truncating the XML at 65,535 characters every time. I know this is caused by SQL Server, because if I add a 65,536th character to the column directly in Management Studio, it states that it will not update because characters will be truncated.
Is the max length really 65,535 or could this be because the database was designed in an earlier version of SQL Server (2000) and it's using the legacy text datatype instead of 2005's?
If this is the case, will altering the datatype to Text in SQL Server 2005 fix this issue?
that is a limitation of SSMS not of the text field, but you should use varchar(max) since text is deprecated
Here is also a quick test
create table TestLen (bla text)
insert TestLen values (replicate(convert(varchar(max),'a'), 100000))
select datalength(bla)
from TestLen
Returns 100000 for me
MSSQL 2000 should allow up to 2^31 - 1 characters (non unicode) in a text field, which is over 2 billion. Don't know what's causing this limitation but you might wanna try using varchar(max) or nvarchar(max). These store as many characters but allow also the regular string T-SQL functions (like LEN, SUBSTRING, REPLACE, RTRIM,...).
If you're able to convert the column, you might as well, since the text data type will be removed in a future version of SQL Server. See here.
The recommendation is to use varchar(MAX) or nvarchar(MAX). In your case, you could also use the XML data type, but that may tie you to certain database engines (if that's a consideration).
You should have a look at
XML Support in Microsoft SQL Server
2005
Beginning SQL Server 2005 XML
Programming
So I would rather try to use the data type appropriate for the use. Not make a datatype fit your use from a previous version.
Here's a little script I wrote for getting out all data
SELECT #data = N'huge data';
DECLARE #readSentence NVARCHAR (MAX) = N'';
DECLARE #dataLength INT = ( SELECT LEN (#data));
DECLARE #currIndex INT = 0;
WHILE #data <> #readSentence
BEGIN
DECLARE #temp NVARCHAR (MAX) = N'';
SET #temp = ( SELECT SUBSTRING (#data, #currIndex, 65535));
SELECT #temp;
SET #readSentence += #temp;
SET #currIndex += 65535;
END;
In SQL Server 2005 I am trying to query a varchar(MAX) column which has some rows with text data that exceed the 8192. Yet, In Management Studio I have under Tools --> Options --> Query Results --> Results to Text --> Max numbers of characters displayed in each column = 8192, which is a maximum. Accordingly, it seems the truncation on these rows occurs only due to the limitation imposed by text output.
The only thing I see to get around this is to use a SUBSTRING function to grab say the first 8000 chars, then the next 8000 chars etc. etc. But this is ugly and error prone.
I should mention that SSIS and BCP are not options for me.
Does anyone have a better suggestion? Thanks!
You can export the data to a flat file which will not be truncated. To do this:
Right click the Database
Click Tasks -> Export Data
Select your Data Source (defaults should be fine)
Choose "Flat File Destination" for the Destination type.
Pick a file name for the output.
On the "Specify Table Copy or Query", choose "Write a query to specify the data to transfer"
Paste in your query
Remaining steps should be self explanatory. This will output the file to text and you can open it in your favorite text editor.
I also use XML but a slightly different method that gets around most of the issues with XML entitisation.
declare #VeryLongText nvarchar(max) = '';
SELECT top 100 #VeryLongText = #VeryLongText + '
' + OBJECT_DEFINITION(object_id)
FROM sys.all_objects
WHERE type='P' and is_ms_shipped=1
SELECT LEN(#VeryLongText)
SELECT #VeryLongText AS [processing-instruction(x)] FOR XML PATH('')
PRINT #VeryLongText /*WILL be truncated*/
Make sure that the "XML data" limit in SSMS is set sufficiently high!
Did you try this simple solution? Only 2 clicks away!
At the query window,
set query options to "Results to Grid", run your query
Right click on the results tab at the grid corner, save results as any files
You will get all the text you want to see in the file!!! I can see 130,556 characters for my result of a varchar(MAX) field
My solution was a bit round-about but got me there (as long as the output is less than 65535 characters):
In SQL Management Studio, set the limit for grid results to 65535 (Tools > Options > Query Results > SQL Server > Results to Grid > Non XML data)
Run the query, output to grid
Right-click the results, choose "Save Results As..." and save the results to a file
Open the file in notepad or similar to get the output
UPDATE: To demonstrate that this works, here's some SQL that selects a single 100,000 character column. If I save the grid output to a csv file, all 100,000 characters are there with no truncation.
DECLARE #test nvarchar(MAX), #i int, #line nvarchar(100)
SET #test = ''; SET #i = 100
WHILE #i < 100000
BEGIN
SET #test = #test + STUFF(REPLICATE('_', 98) + CHAR(13) + CHAR(10), 1, LEN(CAST(#i AS nvarchar)), CAST(#i AS nvarchar))
SET #i = #i + 100
END
SELECT #test
Notes:
It doesn't seem to make any difference what the character length setting is, as I orignally thought.
I'm using SQL 2008 R2 (both the server and Management Studio)
It doesn't seem to make a difference if the long column is stored in a local variable (as in this example), or selected from an actual table
I ran in to this trying to export XML. This is the solution I used:
Select the Result to Grid option, right click the link that shows up in the Results pane, then select Save Results As, choose the All Files file type, give the file a name and click Save. All the xml data is saved correctly to a file.
I'm using SSMS 10, and I could't get Torre's solution to work. The export wizard kept thinking the input column was an image:
The data type for "input column "XML_F52E2B61-18A1-11d1-B105-00805F49916B" (26)" is DT_IMAGE
In SSMS if you select data from a row it is limited to a small number of characters, but if you Edit data from a row, the full value will be there. It might not always be there but if you ctrl-a, ctrl-c then past it in an editor it will all be there.
If given a choice I would have the query return the data as "For XML Auto" or "For XML Raw" or "For XML explicit" that way the limitations are much higher and you can do much more with the outputed results.
I usually use XML to get huge debug string as output (using test harness from Luke):
declare #test nvarchar(max), #i int, #line nvarchar(100)
set #test = ''; set #i = 100
while #i < 100000
begin
set #test = #test + stuff(replicate('_', 98) + char(13) + char(10), 1, len(cast(#i as nvarchar)), cast(#i as nvarchar))
set #i = #i + 100
end
-- ctrl+d for "results to grid" then click the xml output
--select cast('<root>' + #test + '</root>' as xml)
-- revised
select #test for xml path(''), type;
Another workaround , use HeidiSql for this tricky queries. It does not have the limits in the field lenght.
The truncation you are talking about only happens in Management Studio. If you pull the column into another app, it will not be truncated.
There's no way you're using Query Analyzer to talk to SQL Server 2005. Do you mean Management Studio?