How to output properly formated select to an excel file

[sonname]

I have the following snippet where I output to an excel file. The problem is that not each field fits into its own cell. The whole output goes into one cell. Is there a way that you can output a query to an excel file and it basically shows up the way that it does when you run it from query analyzer in grid view.

DECLARE @cmd VARCHAR(2048)

SET @cmd = 'OSQL -SLOCALHOST -dPubs '
+ ' -Ume -Ppw'
+ ' -Q"set nocount on SELECT * FROM Authors"'
+ ' -oc:\authors.xls'

EXEC master..xp_cmdshell @cmd, NO_OUTPUT

 

[Eyespi20]

The best way to output to Excel is with a Data Transfer job.
Margaret

 

[carlen]

alternativley a work around would be selecting the defined columns eg column1 column2 column3 or whatever is in your table and appending a comma to the end of the result
then using a csv as your output file which excel will use nicely.

nb u may want to use isnull incase there is no output to keep column aligned eg

isnull(column1,'') + ',',isnull(column2,'') + ','