Question

I have an Address column in a table that I need to split into multiple columns in a view in SQL Server 2005. I need to split the column on the line feed character, chr(10), and there could be from 1 to 4 lines (0 to 3 line feeds) in the column. Below are a couple of examples of what I need to do. What is the simplest way to make this happen?

Examples:

Address                 Address1      Address2       Address3            Address4
------------        =   -----------   -----------    -----------------   ---------
My Company              My Company     123 Main St.  Somewhere,NY 12345  
123 Main St.         
Somewhere,NY 12345

Address                 Address1       Address2      Address3      Address4
------------        =   ------------   ----------    -----------   ---------
123 Main St.            123 Main St.

Answer 1

this will split the address by using the parsename function and combining that with COALESCE to grab the correct info in the correct column

if you have more than 4 lines this method will NOT work

edit: added the code to reverse the order

    create table #test (address varchar(1000))

    --test data
    insert #test values('My Company
    123 Main St.         
    Somewhere,NY 12345')

    insert #test values('My Company2
    666 Main St.  
    Bla Bla       
    Somewhere,NY 12345')

    insert #test values('My Company2')

    --split happens here
                            select
replace(parsename(address,ParseLen +1),'^','') as Address1,
replace(parsename(address,ParseLen ),'^','') as Address2,
replace(parsename(address,ParseLen -1),'^','') as Address3,
replace(parsename(address,ParseLen -2),'^','') as Address4
from(
select case  ascii(right(address,1)) when 10 then
replace(replace(left(address,(len(address)-1)),'.','^'),char(10),'.')  
else 
replace(replace(address,'.','^'),char(10),'.') end as address,
case  ascii(right(address,1)) when 10 then
len(replace(replace(address,'.','^'),char(10),'.')) -
len(replace(replace(address,'.','^'),char(10),'')) -1
else
len(replace(replace(address,'.','^'),char(10),'.')) -
len(replace(replace(address,'.','^'),char(10),'')) end as ParseLen
 from #test) x