nvarchar

varchar vs nvarchar performance

I'm working on a database for a small web app at my school using SQL Server 2005. I see a couple of schools of thought on the issue of varchar vs nvarchar: Use varchar unless you deal with a lot of internationalized data, then use nvarchar. Just use nvarchar for everything. I'm beginning to see the merits of view 2. I know that nva...

SQLServer 2005 - Change character in NVarChar

I receive some arguments into a stored procedure. These arguments are NVARCHAR's. I have a problem, when I need to cast some of these values to FLOATS, because they are being received as e.g. @VALUE1 NVARCHAR(100) DECLARE @ChangedValue SET @ChangedValue = CAST(@Value1 AS FLOAT) E.g. @Value1 = "0,001" Gives me a problem, as it expect...

Is VARCHAR like totally 1990s?

VARCHAR does not store Unicode characters. NVARCHAR does store Unicode characters. Today's applications should always be Unicode compatible. NVARCHAR takes twice the amount of space to store it. Point 4 doesn't matter because storage space is extremely inexpensive. Ergo: When designing SQL Server databases today, one should always use...

How to return an nvarchar(max) in a CLR UDF?

Assuming following definition: /// <summary> /// Replaces each occurrence of sPattern in sInput with sReplace. This is done with the /// CLR: new RegEx(sPattern, RegexOptions.Multiline).Replace(sInput, sReplace). The result of the replacement is /// the return value. /// </summary> [SqlFunction(IsDeterministic = true)] public static S...

Is there a reason why I shouldn't use NVARCHAR in Sql Server?

I'm designing a database scheme right now and I figure just to be safe I should use nvarchar for my textual column's datatypes (for unicode support). While I don't expect non-english text I figure it would be better to have support it from the begining just in case. Is there any reason why I should stick with plain varchar? Performance...

When must we use NVARCHAR/NCHAR instead of VARCHAR/CHAR in SQL Server?

Is there a rule when we must use the Unicode types? I have seen that most of the European languages (German, Italian, English, ...) are fine in the same database in VARCHAR columns. I am looking for something like: If you have Chinese --> use NVARCHAR If you have German and Arabic --> use NVARCHAR What about the collation of the...

Data Type of a field

Hey guys and gals, I have a field in a table that I will be storing different kinds of data in it, Like: X-Large, Medium, Small....or I might store: 22-March-2009, 1 Year, 2 Years, 3 Years...or 06Months, 12 Months, 1 Year, or I might store: "33-36", "37-40"...and that data is not fixed, i might need in the future to add new categories......

French Text stored in SQL Server Appears Wrong, how to make it appear correctly

I've got a table that is comprised of the following structure. CREATE TABLE [dbo].[tblData]( [ID] [numeric](18, 0) NOT NULL, [QID] [varchar](25) NOT NULL, [Data] [nvarchar](255) NULL, CONSTRAINT [PK_tblData] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED ( [ID] ASC, [QID] ASC ) ) ON [PRIMARY] In the above example, the column...

Declaring an nvarchar in VB/Matching an nvarchar in a SQL query

I'm working on an ASP.NET application that uses VB. I'm using a SQLReader/SQLCommand/SQLConnection within the VB file to try to pull data values. I was mystified to find out that the reason why the query wasn't returning any values, and someone here showed me how to troubleshoot the query to verify things were being returned, which they...

How much of a page is occupied by nvarchar(X)?

What are the storage requirements for nvarchar(X)? So for example, if the value in a column is much smaller than X, how much is actually stored in the database page? ...

How BIG do you make your Nvarchar()

When designing a database, what decisions do you consider when deciding how big your nvarchar should be. If i was to make an address table my gut reaction would be for address line 1 to be nvarchar(255) like an old access database. I have found using this has got me in bother with the old 'The string would be truncated'. I know that ...

Limiting NVARCHAR size in SQLServer?

I was wondering what would be the consequences of setting NVARCHAR fields to MAX instead of a specific size in SQL Server 2008, and limiting the input from the application's logic. Also, would these be a bad design practice? ...

How can Hibernate map the SQL data-type nvarchar(max)?

I have a column in my SQL-2005 database that used to be a varchar(max), but it has been changed to an nvarchar(max). Now I need to update my hibernate mapping file to reflect the change, and this is what it used to be: <element type="text" column="Value"/> When I try to run the application, the following error appears: org.hib...

Fulltext search (sql server 2005) works only on some fields..

OK this is the situation.. I am enabling fulltext search on a table but it only works on some fields.. CREATE FULLTEXT CATALOG [defaultcatalog] CREATE UNIQUE INDEX ui_staticid on static(id) CREATE FULLTEXT INDEX ON static(title_gr LANGUAGE 19,title_en,description_gr LANGUAGE 19,description_en) KEY INDEX staticid ON [defaultcatalog] WIT...

SQL nvarchar Performance

I'm storing localized strings in a single datatable using MS Sql (2008 or whatever). Most of the strings are short and can be represented with varchar(200), while about 10% are much longer require something like varchar(5000). My question is, is there a performance advantage when retrieving shorter strings if I break this into two tables...

NVARCHAR sizes in SQL Server 2005

In SQL Server 2005 (not 7.0), is there any reason to use NVARCHAR(255) instead of 256 or some other number? Is there any optimal size, and is there any reason to use powers of two? (I will be storing Unicode data, so I have to use NVARCHAR) ...

What is the difference between String and nvarchar(5000) in SQL?

I am doing my first database project in PostgreSQL or Oracle. I would like to get an answer for my question. ...

NVarchar(MAX) for short strings

Hello, I am interested is NVarchar(MAX) a good data type is I want to store short unicode strings which are 1-50 characters long, but most of them (more than 90%) are 5-10 characters long? The column will not be used in comparison and ordering queries. It might be added to index as included column. Expected rows count - more than 10M. ...

OLEDB comparison problem nvarchar against ntext (SQLServer 2005)

I have table Tbl1( SomeName nvarchar(64) ) Over OLEDB I'm trying to select SELECT 1 FROM Tbl1 WHERE SomeName = ? binding 3 character unicode as parameter causes: DB_E_ERRORSINCOMMAND(0x80040E14L) "The data types nvarchar and ntext are incompatible in the equal to operator" I have already tried following input bindings: 1) ... cu...

Sql trying to change case letter and group similar nvarchar values

Hi you guys. I am using sql server 2008 and I'm trying to build a query for displaying some overall results from a single sql table. I want to display count(fieldname) for each date, for example I want to know how often the name "izla" is repeated in the table for each date but it could be also "IZLA" or "Izla", so i must find a way to...