Question

I’m looking to split ‘1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15…’ (comma delimited) into a table or table variable.

Does anyone have a function that returns each one in a row?

Answer 1

Here is somewhat old-fashioned solution:

/*     Splits string into parts delimitered with specified character. */ CREATE FUNCTION [dbo].[SDF_SplitString] (     @sString nvarchar(2048),     @cDelimiter nchar(1) ) RETURNS @tParts TABLE ( part nvarchar(2048) ) AS BEGIN     if @sString is null return     declare @iStart int,             @iPos int     if substring( @sString, 1, 1 ) = @cDelimiter      begin         set @iStart = 2         insert into @tParts         values( null )     end     else          set @iStart = 1     while 1=1     begin         set @iPos = charindex( @cDelimiter, @sString, @iStart )         if @iPos = 0             set @iPos = len( @sString )+1         if @iPos - @iStart > 0                       insert into @tParts             values  ( substring( @sString, @iStart, @iPos-@iStart ))         else             insert into @tParts             values( null )         set @iStart = @iPos+1         if @iStart > len( @sString )              break     end     RETURN  END 

In SQL Server 2008 you can achieve the same with .NET code. Maybe it would work faster, but definitely this approach is easier to manage.