Question

What should i know about involving basic data types in SQL Server?

In my database i need

1. Flags/bits, I assume I should use byte
2. 64bit ids/ints
3. a variable length string. It could be 5 letters it could be 10,000 (for desc but i plan to allow unlimited length usernames)

Is there a TEXT type in SQL Server? I dont want to use varchar(limit) unless i could use something ridiculously high like 128k. How do i specify 1byte – 8byte ints?

Answer 1

For 1), use BIT – it’s one bit, e.g. eight of those fields will be stuck into a single byte.

For 2), use BIGINT – 64-bit signed int

For 3), definitely do NOT use TEXT/NTEXT – those are deprecated as of SQL Server 2005 and up.

Use VARCHAR(MAX) or NVARCHAR(MAX) for up to 2 GB of textual information instead.

Here’s the list of the SQL Server 2008 data types:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms187594.aspx