Question

I have a query like this

@"SELECT 
                                               TABLE_NAME
                                              AS
                                               TABLES
                                            FROM 
                                               INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLE_CONSTRAINTS
                                           WHERE 
                                               CONSTRAINT_TYPE = 'PRIMARY KEY'
                                             AND
                                               TABLE_NAME <> 'dtProperties'
                                        ORDER BY
                                               TABLE_NAME";

Is there any way to convert the tabular form to string formatted form when retrieving list of tables from this query.

Answer 1

Via .NET it is neither – that is just the SSMS display. Based on the previous questions, it sounds like you are just having difficulties reading this column into strings;

Perhaps just something like:

    List<string> list = new List<string>();
    using(var conn = new SqlConnection(connectionString))
    using (var cmd = conn.CreateCommand()) {
        cmd.CommandText = @"
            SELECT TABLE_NAME
            FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLE_CONSTRAINTS
            WHERE CONSTRAINT_TYPE = 'PRIMARY KEY'
            AND TABLE_NAME <> 'dtProperties'
            ORDER BY TABLE_NAME";
        conn.Open();

        using (var reader = cmd.ExecuteReader()) {
            while (reader.Read()) {
                list.Add(reader.GetString(0));
            }
        }
    }

(tested locally; works fine)

If you want something delimited, then perhaps:

string s = string.Join("|", list);

Or something involving a StringBuilder (newlines in this example):

    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
    using(var conn = new SqlConnection(connectionString))
    using (var cmd = conn.CreateCommand()) {
        cmd.CommandText = @"
            SELECT TABLE_NAME
            FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.TABLE_CONSTRAINTS
            WHERE CONSTRAINT_TYPE = 'PRIMARY KEY'
            AND TABLE_NAME <> 'dtProperties'
            ORDER BY TABLE_NAME";
        conn.Open();

        using (var reader = cmd.ExecuteReader()) {
            while (reader.Read()) {
                sb.AppendLine(reader.GetString(0));
            }
        }
    }
    string s = sb.ToString();