Tag: SQLQuestions

A lot of the time you’re going to be asked to group items. Sometimes, you have to look at the exact same data in multiple ways. It can be just flat ugly to look at but it does what you need to. Well, today we can talk about a way to make it a bit…… Continue reading Getting Data to Group Better

Sometimes you’ll find a fun little function that can actually help you out a lot with your coding. Today’s function is just that for me. When I first heard about QUOTENAME, I was like “This is rather useless. It just puts brackets around whatever. I can do it just as easily hard-coding the strings.” Truly,…… Continue reading Quoth the Raven… Nevermore

Time for some real talk, my friends. When I first started working with SQL Server, I learned how to program in quite possibly the worst way possible – from “experts” who had just been let go from the company I worked at. For a good month, I walked through every bit of SQL code I…… Continue reading STUFF that can make your life easier

Previously, we talked about the REPLACE and TRANSLATE functions and how similar, but not quite the same they are. Today, I want to talk about yet another function that does something similar but not quite the same. Today, I want to discuss the STUFF function and how it can add or even replace parts of…… Continue reading Ain’t Nothing Like Saying STUFF this & Moving On

Most of us have used the REPLACE function several times in our daily lives. This function, as you may remember, takes one string and replaces it with another, as seen below: Please don’t do this change in Production There is another function within SQL Server that many people think does the same thing, but with…… Continue reading Doing Something with the REPLACE function

In our last session together, one of the many items we talked about was the fact that I asked that you use the DATALENGTH function instead of the LEN function because you could be using UNICODE data. The LEN function is used in SQL to find out – surprise, surprise – the length of a…… Continue reading Unicode Data and Keeping DBAs Happy

One of the many fun things we’re asked to do as a person who works with data is that we’re asked to do some manipulation of data – especially when we’re asked to pad data with 0’s to make a string longer that is numerical. For example, I’ve been asked many times to provide data…… Continue reading Padding Data In Multiple Ways

A lot of times, you’re asked to find where two different tables have the same data. Thankfully, this is a fairly normal ask. Sometimes, though, you’re asked to see if they have the same data in 20 – 30 fields! I don’t know about y’all, but I definitely don’t want to have to type in…… Continue reading Checking Against Multiple Fields The Easy Way

One of the many things that you’ll need to do when working with strings is to compare them. In a perfect world – and we all know that we don’t live in one of those – we would just have to do the simplest of comparison tools – check if they’re equal. Checking if equal…… Continue reading Analogous Strings and Validation Thereof

When we start playing with strings, one of the first functions we work with is the “LIKE” operator. It’s fairly easy to grasp and easy to remember how to deal with. Thus why we’re going to go over it today because there are various possibilities with it. The first, and arguably, what you do most…… Continue reading Getting Strings to Work Like You Think They Would