socialmedian: Always include size when using varchar, nvarchar, char and nchar

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Always include size when using varchar, nvarchar, char and nchar

Source: Data Management

Nov 06, 2009

Summary

There are several string data types in SQL Server. There are varchar, nvarchar, char, and nchar. Most front end languages do not require you to identify the length of string variables, and SQL Server is no exception. When you do not specify the length of your string objects in SQL Server, it applies its own defaults. For most things, the default length is one character. This applies to columns, parameters, and locally declared variables. The notable exception is with the cast and convert functions which default to 30 characters.

How to detect this problem:

SQL 2005 (and up)

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