Question

I want to create a SQL Server 2012 Query which inserts a constant list of permission names, e.g. “ViewUsersPermission”, “ModifyUsersPermission” into the table RolePermissions.

This table has two columns: A “RoleID” which is a foreign key to the Roles table, and a varchar column “PermissionTypeName”.

INSERT INTO [dbo].[RolePermissions] ([PermissionTypeName], [RoleID])

   SELECT 'ViewUsersPermission' AS [PermissionTypeName]
   UNION ALL
   SELECT 'ModifyUsersPermission' AS [PermissionTypeName]
   UNION ALL
   SELECT 'ViewRolesPermission' AS [PermissionTypeName]

   INNER JOIN   (SELECT [RoleID] FROM [dbo].[Roles]
                WHERE [Name] = 'Administrator')

I am looking for a better solution. I want to specify a list of permissions types like:

SELECT FROM 'ViewUsersPermission', 'ModifyUsersPermission', 'ViewRolesPermission' 

instead of using the UNION ALL construct.

Answer 1

Assuming you are on at least 2008

SELECT RoleName
FROM   (VALUES('ViewUsersPermission'),
              ('ModifyUsersPermission'),
              ('ViewRolesPermission')) V(RoleName)