Today, we are excited to share with you the story of two exceptional bloggers who have embarked on a collaborative journey to explore and enhance their knowledge of SQL Server. This unique partnership has resulted in a series of insightful blog posts that are not only informative but also a testament to the power of collaboration in the SQL community.

The two bloggers we are referring to are Brad Schulz from “SELECT Blog FROM Brad.Schulz CROSS APPLY SQL.Server()” and Adam Haines from “Demystifying SQL Server”. We highly recommend bookmarking their blogs for future reference as they are a treasure trove of SQL Server knowledge.

It all began when Adam attempted to answer a question on the MSDN SQL Forum about transforming delimited values into columns. He shared his findings in a blog post titled “Converting Delimited String of Values” on his blog. This caught Brad’s attention, and the two bloggers started bouncing ideas off each other, constantly improving their articles.

Adam then delved into a series on concatenating column values, exploring the intricacies and nuances of this operation. His blog posts, “Concatenating Column Values – Part 1” and “Concatenating Column Values – Part 2”, provided valuable insights into this topic.

Not to be outdone, Brad decided to dig deeper into the internals of the XML method used in Adam’s posts. He shared his findings in a comprehensive blog post titled “Delimited String Tennis, Anyone?” and followed it up with a final post titled “Delimited String Tennis Again – The Final Serve”.

Their collaboration didn’t stop there. Adam continued his exploration by starting a series on unpacking or parsing out delimited characters. His blog posts, “Splitting Delimited String – Part 1” and “Splitting Delimited String – Part 2”, shed light on this often challenging task.

Through their combined efforts, Brad and Adam discovered that both the XML method and number table approach can achieve similar results. However, they found that the XML method requires specific coding techniques to ensure optimal performance. Additionally, they observed that a permanent number table consistently outperforms an inline number table, albeit with different resource requirements.

For developers looking for a straightforward solution, the number table approach is recommended as it is relatively easier to implement. The blog posts by Brad and Adam provide a step-by-step guide that even those with limited XML knowledge can follow.

We highly encourage you to explore the aforementioned blog posts. They are not only easy to understand but also serve as a source of inspiration for SQL enthusiasts. We would like to express our gratitude to Brad and Adam for allowing us to share their journey and for inspiring the SQL community with their collaborative efforts.

Happy exploring and may your SQL Server knowledge continue to grow!