T-SQL - text field to nvarchar

Question

I have a 'text' type in a SQL table (BigNote), and a new nvarchar(2000) field (LittleNote).

I need to save the first 2000 characters from the @BigNote into the LittleNote field within a stored procedure. Can someone share some thoughts?

Do I need to check for: - nulls? - the BigNote length and only grab the exact amount?

It is working by just assigning LittleNote = @BigNote, but I want to avoid problems when the text is too big etc...

Once we release an update to the application, we will handle this more elegantly, but in the meantime we need to get a non-Text field with this data in the database.

Answer 1

you could use

LittleNote = CONVERT(NVARCHAR(2000), @BigNote)

or with SUBSTRING

LittleNote = SUBSTRING(@BigNote, 1, 2000)