Very Computer

Why is it inexpensive apps like Excel/Access/Foxpro let you import text
data directly, but the expensive RDBMSs like SQL Server and Oracle make
you grunt thru some bcp routine????

Anyway, I would like to be able to load data from flat files and I'm
looking for a canned bcp file or special procedure I can run on SQL
Server 6.5.

Thanx

bcp database.[user].table in filename -Uuser -Sserver -c

And if you want to get specific, it's easy to specify almost ANY delimiter
you like. Many of my developers have standard SQL select scripts with pipes
(|) in the select statement piping straight into a bcp to another server
(This was before the advent of BCP's from views)

To answer your complaint though - Sybase seem to have made a corporate
decision not to provide 'nice' tools for their system, rather to concentrate
their efforts on providing a multi-user, scalable, powerful, efficient,
highly configurable data servers than can handle large volumes of data (ie.
Gigabyte databases are considered 'small' - The db's you refer to would fall
over/grind somewhat with a few hundred megabytes). Sybase's open client
library allows anybody who wants to, to provide a better tool.

If you really don't like bcp, and need to use your mouse some more, then
there are some other tools out there (DB Artisan is one I've heard good
things about). Somebody else can probably sing the relative
advantages/disadvantages, and this groups FAQ may well have URL references.

Quote:>Anyway, I would like to be able to load data from flat files and I'm
>looking for a canned bcp file or special procedure I can run on SQL
>Server 6.5.

Hope that helps,

Regards,

Richard
(My opinions are just that - my opinions).

(But maybe you should check this on a MSSQLSERVER newsgroup)

Quote:

> Thanx

Ramon

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#              Ramon L. Vennik               #
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