I need to concatenate several columns of a table into a single value, then show that value in an asp dropdownlist. The SQL code I'm issuing is as follows:
SELECT UserID, CustomerNum, UserName + ' - ' + UserAddress + ',' + UserCity + ' ' + UserState AS UserInfo
FROM Users
WHERE (CustomerNum = @CustomerNum)
ORDER BY UserName
I then set 'UserInfo' as the text field in the dropdownlist.
This generally works, except occasionally one of the columns in the database is null (for example, UserState). When that happens, the entire concatenation is null, and I get an empty entry in the dropdownlist.
Is there something in SQLServer that will allow me to ignore those NULL results, or will I have to code something up in the DataBind event?
Thanks
For the nullable columns do something like this.
ISNULL(UserState, '')
wrap coalesce around it
COALESCE(UserName,'') + ' - ' +
COALESCE(UserAddress,'') + ',' +
COALESCE(UserCity,'') + ' ' +
COALESCE(UserState,'') AS UserInfo
For SQL Server, you have three choices:
- IsNull - This is the oldest and most compatible method, though it doesn't exist in SQL Server Compact Edition (don't know if that's relevant). It takes two arguments and returns the first of the two that is non-null, or null if both are.
- Coalesce - This is newer and preferred for new development. Similar to
IsNull
, but can take more than two arguments. Like IsNull
, it will return the first non-null argument, or null if all are.
- CONCAT_NULL_YIELDS_NULL - This is a database option that can be set to
ON
or OFF
. The meaning should be self-explanetory, but here's an MSDN link.
Use the NULL concatenation to your advantage, this will remove unnecessary separator characters:
SELECT
UserID, CustomerNum
,ISNULL(UserName+' - ','')
+ISNULL(UserAddress+', ','')
+ISNULL(UserCity+' ','')
+ISNULL(UserState,'') AS UserInfo
FROM Users
WHERE CustomerNum = @CustomerNum
ORDER BY UserName
working example:
DECLARE @Users table (userID int, CustomerNum int,UserName varchar(20), UserAddress varchar(20), UserCity varchar(20), UserState varchar(20))
INSERT @Users VALUES (1,111,'Sam','123 First St.', 'city name', 'state name')
INSERT @Users VALUES (2,111,null,'123 First St.', 'city name', 'state name')
INSERT @Users VALUES (3,111,'Sam',null, 'city name', 'state name')
INSERT @Users VALUES (4,111,'Sam','123 First St.', null, 'state name')
INSERT @Users VALUES (5,111,'Sam','123 First St.', 'city name', null)
INSERT @Users VALUES (6,111,null,null, 'city name', 'state name')
SELECT
UserID, CustomerNum
,ISNULL(UserName+' - ','')
+ISNULL(UserAddress+', ','')
+ISNULL(UserCity+' ','')
+ISNULL(UserState,'') AS UserInfo
FROM @Users
--WHERE CustomerNum = @CustomerNum
ORDER BY userID
OUTPUT:
UserID CustomerNum UserInfo
----------- ----------- -------------------------------------------
1 111 Sam - 123 First St., city name state name
2 111 123 First St., city name state name
3 111 Sam - city name state name
4 111 Sam - 123 First St., state name
5 111 Sam - 123 First St., city name
6 111 city name state name
(6 row(s) affected)
You can do this:
SELECT UserID, CustomerNum, UserName + ' - ' +
ISNULL(UserAddress + ',','') + ISNULL(UserCity,'') + ' ' + ISNULL(UserState,'')
AS UserInfo
FROM Users
WHERE (CustomerNum = @CustomerNum) ORDER BY UserName
If you want to ignore null results (exclude them) you can add what i have below to your WHERE
. ISNULL
or COALESCE
can be used to select empty strings for the null columns as described above if that's what you need to do.
...
WHERE UserName is not null
AND UserAddress is not null
AND UserCity is not null
AND UserState is not null