How do I return an empty result set from a procedure using T-SQL?

Question

I'm interested in returning an empty result set from SQL Server stored procedures in certain events.

The intended behaviour is that a L2SQL DataContext.SPName().SingleOrDefault() will result in CLR null value.

I'm presently using the following solution, but I'm unsure whether it would be considered bad practice, a performance hazard (I could not find one by reading the execution plan), or if there is simply a better way:

SELECT * FROM [dbo].[TableName]
WHERE 0 = 1;

The execution plan is a constant scan with a trivial cost associated with it.

The reason I am asking this instead of simply not running any SELECTs is because I'm concerned previous SELECT @scalar or SELECT INTO statements could cause unintended result sets to be served back to L2SQL. Am I worrying over nothing?

Answer 1

That is a reasonable approach. Another alternative is:

SELECT TOP 0 * FROM [dbo].[TableName]

Answer 2

It's an entirely reasonable approach.

To alleviate any worries about performance (whoch you shouldn't have any in the first place - the server's smart enough to avoid table scanning for 1=0), pick a table that's very small and not heavily used - I'm sure your DB schema has one.

Answer 3

If you want to simply retrieve the metadata of a result set w/o any actual row, use SET FMTONLY ON.