Question

I have created user-defined function that converts a comma-delimited string into a table. I execute this function like so:

select [String] as 'ID' from dbo.ConvertStringToTable('1,2,3,4')

The results from this query look like the following:

ID
--
1
2
3
4

In reality, I want to iterate through each of the rows in this table. However, I cannot figure out how to do this. Can someone show me some sample SQL of how to iterate through the rows of the table?

Answer 1

In SQL SERVER 2000/05/08 you can use a Cursor as shown below.

However before you go down the cursor path you should first look into the problems associated with cursors in SQL Server.

DECLARE @id VARCHAR(10)

DECLARE myCursor CURSOR LOCAL FAST_FORWARD FOR
    SELECT [String] AS 'ID' 
    FROM [dbo].[ConvertStringToTable]('1,2,3,4')
OPEN myCursor
FETCH NEXT FROM myCursor INTO @id
WHILE @@FETCH_STATUS = 0 BEGIN
    PRINT @id
    -- do your tasks here

    FETCH NEXT FROM myCursor INTO @id

END

CLOSE myCursor
DEALLOCATE myCursor