Re^2: Writing It Myself, DWIM, and Expectations

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Re^3: Writing It Myself, DWIM, and Expectations by mpeppler (Vicar) on Sep 14, 2004 at 05:55 UTC
Sybase (and presumably MS-SQL) will silently convert "" to " " as it can't store a zero-length string that is not NULL. Michael	[reply]
Re^4: Writing It Myself, DWIM, and Expectations by Jenda (Abbot) on Sep 14, 2004 at 23:12 UTC
I can't check it at this moment, but I don't think any recent MS SQL (that is 7.0 and up) does this for varchars. I'm sure I would notice. It does change an empty string to a string containing the right number of spaces for char(N) columns, but there it can't do anything better. If I still remember this node tomorrow when I am at work and can try things I'll test it and post an update. Update: Yep, I was right: `create table foo (svarchar varchar(10), schar char(10)) insert into foo (svarchar, schar) values ('', '') insert into foo (schar) values ('') select '>' + svarchar + '<', '>' + schar + '<' from foo` [download] Jenda Always code as if the guy who ends up maintaining your code will be a violent psychopath who knows where you live. -- Rick Osborne	[reply] [d/l]
Re^5: Writing It Myself, DWIM, and Expectations by Anonymous Monk on Oct 09, 2004 at 07:28 UTC
That is the very reason for varchar. And the curious behavior of SQL-92 is because there is no varchar in SQL-92. So you must define your database with char(x) fields and you get the behavior of char(x). Of course.	[reply]