nText - what is the maximum this column can hold? 1

[BiancaJ]

If I set the length of the column to 16, does it mean only up to 16 characters can be stored in the column of type nTEXT?

Thanks,

Bianca

 

[tlbroadbent]

16 is the size of a text pointer that is stored in the row. The pointer points to the text root structure or the actual locatyion of the text, ntext or image data. The Ntext data type can hold about 1GB of characters. The text and image data types hold about 2GB. Do you really need that much storage for the text? In SQL 7 and 2000, varchar and char data can hold 8000 characters. nchar and nvarchar hold 4000 characters. Check the following link for more maximum capacity information.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/en-us/architec/8_ar_ts_8dbn.asp

If you want to get the best answer for your question read faq183-874 and faq183-3179.
Terry L. Broadbent - DBA
SQL Server Page:

http://tlbroadbent.home.attbi.com/sql/sql_articles.htm

 

[BiancaJ]

Thanks Terry

If I would like to store content in the SQL Server under the above column - is that a bad idea?

The amount of content will be more than nVarChar can hold.

The average column may hold over 50K characters and there will be around 100 records.

Bianca

 

[tlbroadbent]

Text, NText and Image data require special handling. It is much easier to deal with varchar or char data. These can be selected and manipulated by simple SQL comamnds. There are special commands for using the text and image data types - Readtext, Writetext and Updatetext. SQL BOL contains details. If you want to get the best answer for your question read faq183-874 and faq183-3179.
Terry L. Broadbent - DBA
SQL Server Page:

http://tlbroadbent.home.attbi.com/sql/sql_articles.htm