Post reply

BCP produces garbled output

  • January 21, 2013 at 8:20 am

    #273059

    Hello,

    I have created a stored procedure that produces output for specific tables in our database. The output for one of the files is garbled. I have to have it fixed.

    The strategy I'm employing is to first create a view that contains a select statement that chooses all the fields in the table; i.e., select field1, field2, field3, etc. Then my routine calls BCP by selecting from the view. My command resembles this:

    bcp "select * from Database.OurSchema.BCP_View" queryout "c:\temp\bcp\MyTable.CSV" -SSQLServerName -t"|" -r"" -T -c

    Note: the "r" parameter is actually: -r Quote Backslash n Quote

    I have been painstakingly adding one field at a time to the view until the output becomes garbled. When it does, I skip that field and try to add the one following. The same result occurs; the output is garbled.

    This suggests that there is a limit to the number of fields BCP can be used for. Add one more to the limit and you get junk.

    This table has a lot of null data. However, It is fine with null data up until it reaches the point where the data becomes garbled. Also, there is no unusual characters in string fields of this table at all.

    I've been searching for an option to fix this matter without success. Does anyone have an idea how to use BCP to produce non-garbled output for a table with many fields?

    thanks,

  • January 21, 2013 at 8:35 am

    #1579278

    Update: I can add additional, non-null fields after the point where the data is garbled. This indicates that it isn't a field number limit problem.

    BCP just doesn't seem to like a group of four null fields that show up fine (i.e., as "NULL") in SSMS.

  • January 21, 2013 at 8:46 am

    #1579285

    The fields where BCP begins to fail are numeric, with null values. I have found if I change the view to use "IsNull", that BCP works fine with it. In other words, select Field1, Field2...., IsNull(Field20, 0.0) as Field20, ...

    I don't know why BCP doesn't like null values in numeric fields. However, it seems that I have a work-around to this matter.

  • January 21, 2013 at 9:48 am

    #1579310

    Update: I am now using Isnull for all data of type numeric and money. I'm still getting garbled output, which begins when I add to my select list a particular field of type char (which is NULL in my table).

    However, if I comment out a bunch of fields early in the select list and retain that particular field of type char, the output looks fine! :w00t:

    So apparently BCP does have a maximum length per line issue. Does anyone have an idea how to tell BCP to accept a real wide line of output?

    thanks,

  • April 26, 2016 at 12:23 pm

    #1874749

    Thanks! This saved me a load of grief

  • April 26, 2016 at 8:06 pm

    #1874833

    Thanks for bringing this back up. I've always meant to ask what the OP meant by "garbled" and how many characters the limit seemed to be and what was being used to determine that the resulting file was actually "garbled", mostly because I've never experienced such problems with it. I've very successfully exported more than 135 columns and more than 1,200 characters wide with it to be used for telephone ordering and billing and that was almost 2 decades ago and continue to do so.

    --Jeff Moden

    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.

    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

  • April 27, 2016 at 5:14 am

    #1874892

    In my case, it had to do with the number of columns with NULL values. More than 4 seemed to cause the issue, not so much the number of columns (my table had 82)

  • April 27, 2016 at 6:39 am

    #1874910

    bsadowsky (4/27/2016)

    In my case, it had to do with the number of columns with NULL values. More than 4 seemed to cause the issue, not so much the number of columns (my table had 82)

    Thanks for the feedback on that. I've got to give that a try and find out what's up on that.

    --Jeff Moden

    RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for Row-By-Agonizing-Row.
    First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
    ________Stop thinking about what you want to do to a ROW... think, instead, of what you want to do to a COLUMN.

    Change is inevitable... Change for the better is not.

    Helpful Links:
    How to post code problems
    How to Post Performance Problems
    Create a Tally Function (fnTally)

Viewing 8 posts - 1 through 7 (of 7 total)

You must be logged in to reply to this topic. Login to reply