SQL Server Development and T-SQL

This guide covers SQL Server development and T-SQL programming topics including database migration strategies, advanced T-SQL features, and development best practices.

Key Development Topics

• Database migration strategies - Moving changes from development to production
• Advanced T-SQL features - DDL triggers, VARCHAR(MAX), cursors, and built-in functions
• Data import/export techniques - BULK INSERT, OPENROWSET, and data transformation
• Query optimization - Performance tuning and efficient query patterns
• Data integrity - Duplicate detection and constraint management

Much like regular DML triggers, DDL triggers fire in response to an event happening on the server. However, DDL triggers do not fire in response to UPDATE, INSERT, or DELETE statements on a table or view. Instead, they fire in response to Data Definition Language (DDL) statements that start with the keywords CREATE, ALTER, and DROP. Read more…

Understanding VARCHAR(MAX) in SQL Server 2005

In SQL Server 2000 and SQL Server 7, a row cannot exceed 8000 bytes in size. This means that a VARBINARY column can only store 8000 bytes (assuming it is the only column in a table), a VARCHAR column can store up to 8000 characters and an NVARCHAR column can store up to 4000 characters (2 bytes per unicode character). This limitation stems from the 8 KB internal page size SQL Server uses to save data to disk. Read more…

More Articles

Microsoft SQL Server Cursors

BULK INSERT Data into a SQL Server table from a CSV file

SOUNDEX() helps you find that last name

Detect duplicate rows in a SQL Server table

Filter stored procedure resultset with ISNULL

Import data into SQL Server tables

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