Sql-server – SQL Management Studio – Add-on / Extension to view Column Data Type

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Is there any way (built in) or free/paid add-on/Extension for SQL Management Studio that allows us to know exactly a data type of a column when we are writing a query?

In this specific project I have had situations where by looking a the query result I am not exactly sure of the datatype, if it is a number written in a nvarchar(max) column…. or if it is a tinyint, or int, or bigint, etc….

And I am spending so much time just to drill on the "tree list" to reach a speficic table and expand the Columns node to find out what am I dealing with….

A situation when you have bunch of JOINS (and allias) and sp_help <tablename> would require me always to go to some other query window and type more sql (table names)…. then it would be easier and faster just to have like a tooltip message of the column with extra info.

Best Answer

This is standard functionality of SSMS (and has been for a while, I tested in both SSMS 2014 and SSMS 17.2).

For example when you hover over a column the tooltip shows you the data type:

The intellisense autocomplete also shows the data type when you select a column with your up/down arrows:

Related Solutions

Sql-server – ‘Conversion failed’ error with ORDER BY CASE expression

Your CASE expression can only have one datatype. But yours is mixing datatypes and the highest one is being used (as per datatype precedence). So nvarchar is changed to int based on these rules.

You need a case per datatype or per column

Example:

CASE WHEN @OrderDirection = 'DESC' THEN
                 CASE 
                  WHEN @OrderBy = 'JobNumber' THEN J.JobNumber
                  WHEN @OrderBy = 'CustID' THEN J.CustID
                  WHEN @OrderBy = 'DateIn' THEN J.DateIn
                  WHEN @OrderBy = 'DateDue' THEN J.DateDue
                  WHEN @OrderBy = 'DateOut' THEN J.DateOut
                  WHEN @OrderBy = 'Status' THEN J.MasterJobStatusID 
                  ELSE NULL
                END
            END DESC,
CASE WHEN @OrderDirection = 'DESC' THEN
                 CASE 
                  WHEN @OrderBy = 'OrderNumber' THEN J.OrderNumber
                  ELSE NULL
                END
            END DESC

Sql-server – Copying View in Management Studio

The easiest way if you just want to do a quick CREATE VIEW on your destination server would be to script it out:

Right-click your view
Script View as -> CREATE to -> (select your choice here)

The possible choices as a destination for the CREATE VIEW script can be a new query window, a file, the clipboard, or an agent job. If you need to run this create script at a later date, the file destination is probably your best bet. But if you want to run it immediately, and you have access to the server, just script it to a new query window and connect to your destination instance/database and run the CREATE VIEW script.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Sql-server – ‘Conversion failed’ error with ORDER BY CASE expression

Sql-server – Copying View in Management Studio

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