How can I get column names from a table in SQL Ser

Question

I would like to query the name of all columns of a table. I found how to do this in:

• Oracle
• MySQL
• PostgreSQL

But I need to know: how can this be done in Microsoft SQL Server (2008 in my case)?

Answer 1

select *
from INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS
where TABLE_NAME='tableName'

This is better than getting from sys.columns because it shows DATA_TYPE directly.

Answer 2

Summarizing the Answers

I can see many different answers and ways to do this but there is the rub in this and that is the objective.

Yes, the objective. If you want to only know the column names you can use

SELECT * FROM my_table WHERE 1=0
or
SELECT TOP 0 * FROM my_table

But if you want to use those columns somewhere or simply say manipulate them then the quick queries above are not going to be of any use. You need to use

SELECT * FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS WHERE TABLE_NAME = N'Customers'

one more way to know some specific columns where we are in need of some similar columns

SELECT * FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS WHERE COLUMN_NAME like N'%[ColumnName]%' and TABLE_NAME = N'[TableName]'

Answer 3

You can obtain this information and much, much more by querying the Information Schema views.

This sample query:

SELECT *
FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS
WHERE TABLE_NAME = N'Customers'

Can be made over all these DB objects:

• CHECK_CONSTRAINTS
• COLUMN_DOMAIN_USAGE
• COLUMN_PRIVILEGES
• COLUMNS
• CONSTRAINT_COLUMN_USAGE
• CONSTRAINT_TABLE_USAGE
• DOMAIN_CONSTRAINTS
• DOMAINS
• KEY_COLUMN_USAGE
• PARAMETERS
• REFERENTIAL_CONSTRAINTS
• ROUTINES
• ROUTINE_COLUMNS
• SCHEMATA
• TABLE_CONSTRAINTS
• TABLE_PRIVILEGES
• TABLES
• VIEW_COLUMN_USAGE
• VIEW_TABLE_USAGE
• VIEWS

Answer 4

you can use this query

SELECT *
FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS
WHERE COLUMN_NAME like N'%[ColumnName]%' and TABLE_NAME = N'[TableName]'

Answer 5

SELECT TOP (0) [toID]
      ,[sourceID]
      ,[name]
      ,[address]
  FROM [ReportDatabase].[Ticket].[To]

Simple and doesnt require any sys tables

Answer 6

--This is another variation used to document a large database for conversion (Edited to --remove static columns)

SELECT o.Name                   as Table_Name
     , c.Name                   as Field_Name
     , t.Name                   as Data_Type
     , t.length                 as Length_Size
     , t.prec                   as Precision_
FROM syscolumns c 
     INNER JOIN sysobjects o ON o.id = c.id
     LEFT JOIN  systypes t on t.xtype = c.xtype  
WHERE o.type = 'U' 
ORDER BY o.Name, c.Name

--In the left join, c.type is replaced by c.xtype to get varchar types