I assume that the text you are comparing could be greater then 8000 char.  If not, a redefinition to varchar(8000) could solve your problem.

C# .Net is the way to go. 

I have developed in everything from COBOL to FORTRAN, and VB3 to VB .Net and I have found that you can hardly beat C# for...

#4

Select

 CV1.EventNumber,

 isnull(CV1.EventData + ' ','')  +  isnull(CV2.EventData,'') EventDateTimeString

from

 ComponentInst CI,

 ComponentVal CV1,

 ComponentVal CV2

where

 CI.EventNumber = CV1.EventNumber

 and CV1.EventNumber = CV2.EventNumber

 and CV1.EventLabel = 'StartDate'

 and CV2.EventLabel = 'StartTime'