Question

I have the following basic SQL statement which uses the PIVOT command.

SELECT *
FROM

(
--select statement that creates my dataset 
) s

PIVOT (Max(incidentcount) for dept in ([dept1],[dept2])) p

This does what I expect it to do, it gives me a count of incidents per reason with depts as my columns. My problem is the departments that I am using for my columns go from 1-60.
Is there anyway I can tell the query to use the column Department to populate the PIVOT in part. Obviously I want to avoid manually typing each department.

EDIT

This is the sql that creates my dataset that I use in the pivot…

SELECT Details, Department , count(*) NoIncidents
  FROM myincidentdb
  Group by Details,  Department

EDIT 2

Answer 1

You will want to use dynamic sql to PIVOT this, your code will be similar to this:

DECLARE @cols AS NVARCHAR(MAX),
    @query  AS NVARCHAR(MAX)

select @cols = STUFF((SELECT DISTINCT ',' + QUOTENAME(dept) 
                    from yourtablewithDepartments
            FOR XML PATH(''), TYPE
            ).value('.', 'NVARCHAR(MAX)') 
        ,1,1,'')

set @query = 'SELECT *
              from 
              (
                <your query goes here>
              ) src
              pivot 
              (
                max(incidentcount)
                for dept in (' + @cols + ')
              ) piv '

execute(@query)

If you post more details like table structure, etc then this can be refined to meet your needs.

Edit, based on your current query, it looks like you can use the following:

DECLARE @cols AS NVARCHAR(MAX),
    @query  AS NVARCHAR(MAX),
    @colsNull AS NVARCHAR(MAX)

select @cols = STUFF((SELECT distinct ',' + QUOTENAME(department) 
                    from myincidentdb
            FOR XML PATH(''), TYPE
            ).value('.', 'NVARCHAR(MAX)') 
        ,1,1,'')

set @query = 'SELECT  Details, ' + @cols + ' 
              from 
              (
                select Details, Department
                from myincidentdb 
              ) x
              pivot 
              (
                count(Department)
                for Department in (' + @cols + ')
              ) p '

execute(@query)

See SQL Fiddle with Demo