Related
I am using SQL Server trying to replace each recurring "[BACKSPACE]" in a string and the character that came before the word [BACKSPACE] to mimic what a backspace would do.
Here is my current string:
"This is a string that I would like to d[BACKSPACE]correct and see if I could make it %[BACKSPACE] cleaner by removing the word and $[BACKSPACE] character before the backspace."
Here is what I want it to say:
"This is a string that I would like to correct and see if I could make it cleaner by removing the word and character before the backspace."
Let me make this clearer. In the above example string, the $ and % signs were just used as examples of characters that would need to be removed since they are before the [BACKSPACE] word that I want to replace.
Here is another before example:
The dog likq[BACKSPACE]es it's owner
I want to edit it to read:
The dog likes it's owner
One last before example is:
I am frequesn[BACKSPACE][BACKSPACE]nlt[BACKSPACE][BACKSPACE]tly surprised
I want to edit it to read:
I am frequently surprised
Without a CLR function that provides Regex replacement the only way you'll be able to do this is with iteration in T-SQL. Note, however, that the below solution does not give you the results you ask for, but does the logic you ask. You state that you want to remove the string and the character before, but in 2 of your scenarios that isn't true. For the last 2 strings you remove ' %[BACKSPACE]' and ' $[BACKSPACE]' respectively (notice the leading whitespace).
This leading whitespace is left in this solution. I am not entertaining fixing that, as the real solution is don't use T-SQL for this, use something that supports Regex.
I also assume this string is coming from a column in a table, and said table has multiple rows (with a distinct value for the string on each).
Anyway, the solution:
WITH rCTE AS(
SELECT V.YourColumn,
STUFF(V.YourColumn,CHARINDEX('[BACKSPACE]',V.YourColumn)-1,LEN('[BACKSPACE]')+1,'') AS ReplacedColumn,
1 AS Iteration
FROM (VALUES('"This is a string that I would like to d[BACKSPACE]correct and see if I could make it %[BACKSPACE] cleaner by removing the word and $[BACKSPACE] character before the backspace."'))V(YourColumn)
UNION ALL
SELECT r.YourColumn,
STUFF(r.ReplacedColumn,CHARINDEX('[BACKSPACE]',r.ReplacedColumn)-1,LEN('[BACKSPACE]')+1,''),
r.Iteration + 1
FROM rCTE r
WHERE CHARINDEX('[BACKSPACE]',r.ReplacedColumn) > 0)
SELECT TOP (1) WITH TIES
r.YourColumn,
r.ReplacedColumn
FROM rCTE r
ORDER BY ROW_NUMBER() OVER (PARTITION BY r.YourColumn ORDER BY r.Iteration DESC);
dB<>fiddle
I've had a crack to see if I can get this to work using the traditional tally-table method without any recursion.
I think I have something that works - however the recursive cte version is definitely a cleaner solution and probably better performing, however throwing this in as just an alternative non-recursive way.
/* tally table for use below */
select top 1000 N=Identity(int, 1, 1)
into dbo.Digits
from master.dbo.syscolumns a cross join master.dbo.syscolumns
with w as (
select seq = Row_Number() over (order by t.N),
part = Replace(Substring(#string, t.N, CharIndex(Left(#delimiter,1), #string + #delimiter, t.N) - t.N),Stuff(#delimiter,1,1,''),'')
from Digits t
where t.N <= DataLength(#string)+1 and Substring(Left(#delimiter,1) + #string, t.N, 1) = Left(#delimiter,1)
),
p as (
select seq,Iif(Iif(Lead(part) over(order by seq)='' and lag(part) over(order by seq)='',1,0 )=1 ,'', Iif( seq<Max(seq) over() and part !='',Left(part,Len(part)-1),part)) part
from w
)
select result=(
select ''+ part
from p
where part!=''
order by seq
for xml path('')
)
Here's a simple RegEx pattern that should work:
/.\[BACKSPACE\]/g
EDIT
I have no way to test this right now on my chromebook, but this seems like it should work for T-SQL in the LIKE clause
LIKE '_\[BACKSPACE]' ESCAPE '\'
I am facing to an issue that I cannot update or replace some characters in my database.
Here is how this text look like in my column when I retrieve it:
As you can see, there is an unknown characters between 'master' and 'degree' which I cannot even paste it here.
I also tried to update and replace it with below code (I cannot paste that two vertical lines here since they are not supported in any browser and I am not sure what they are, Please see the picture above to see what is in my SQL statement).
begin transaction
update gm_desc set projdesc=replace(projdesc,'%â s%','') where projdesc like '%âs%' and proposalno = '15-149-01'
You can see the real SQL Statement here:
I tried to update, or replace it but I cannot do it. The update statement successfully works but I still see that weird special charters. I would be appreciate to help me.
Here's a scalar-valued function which removes all non-alphanumeric characters (preserves spaces) from a string.
Hopefully it helps!
dbfiddle
create function dbo.get_alphanumeric_str
(
#string varchar(max)
)
returns varchar(max)
as
begin
declare #ret varchar(max);
with nums as (
select 1 as n
union all select n+1 from nums
where n < 256
)
select #ret = replace(stuff(
(
select '' + substring(#string, nums.n, 1)
from nums
where patindex('%[^0-9A-Za-z ]%', substring(#string, nums.n,1)) = 0
for xml path('')
), 1, 0, ''
), ' ', ' ')
option (MAXRECURSION 256)
return #ret;
end
Usage
select dbo.get_alphanumeric_str('Helloᶄ âWorld 1234⅊⅐')
Returns: Hello World 1234
How it works
The nums CTE is just to get a list of numbers (you can set the maximum of 256 to a higher value if your strings are longer; n.b. option (MAXRECURSION n) is for this CTE but has to be placed at the query)
The stuff essentially iterates through the string, using the list of numbers above and extracts a substring of length 1; each of these chars are checked if they match the [^0-9A-Za-z ] regex group (0-9 all digits, A-Za-z all letters both lower and upper case, and a single space character)
If they match, patindex() should return 0; i.e. index zero.
Use replace(string, ' ', ' ') for the space character as the xml path returns a special encoding, see this question.
Use a binary collation for accented characters; see this answer
I am doing some data clean-up and need to Capitalize the first letter of City names. How do I capitalize the second word in a City Like Terra Bella.
SELECT UPPER(LEFT([MAIL CITY],1))+
LOWER(SUBSTRING([MAIL CITY],2,LEN([MAILCITY])))
FROM masterfeelisting
My results is this 'Terra bella' and I need 'Terra Bella'. Thanks in advance.
Ok, I know I answered this before, but it bugged me that we couldn't write something efficient to handle an unknown amount of 'text segments'.
So re-thinking it and researching, I discovered a way to change the [MAILCITY] field into XML nodes where each 'text segment' is assigned it's own Node within the xml field. Then those xml fields can be processed node by node, concatenated together, and then changed back to a SQL varchar. It's convoluted, but it works. :)
Here's the code:
CREATE TABLE
#masterfeelisting (
[MAILCITY] varchar(max) not null
);
INSERT INTO #masterfeelisting VALUES
('terra bellA')
,(' terrA novA ')
,('chicagO ')
,('bostoN')
,('porT dE sanTo')
,(' porT dE sanTo pallo ');
SELECT
RTRIM
(
(SELECT
UPPER([xmlField].[xmlNode].value('.', 'char(1)')) +
LOWER(STUFF([xmlField].[xmlNode].value('.', 'varchar(max)'), 1, 1, '')) + ' '
FROM [xmlNodeRecordSet].[nodeField].nodes('/N') as [xmlField]([xmlNode]) FOR
xml path(''), type
).value('.', 'varchar(max)')
) as [MAILCITY]
FROM
(SELECT
CAST('<N>' + REPLACE([MAILCITY],' ','</N><N>')+'</N>' as xml) as [nodeField]
FROM #masterfeelisting
) as [xmlNodeRecordSet];
Drop table #masterfeelisting;
First I create a table and fill it with dummy values.
Now here is the beauty of the code:
For each record in #masterfeelisting, we are going to create an xml field with a node for each 'text segment'.
ie. '<N></N><N>terrA</N><N>novA</N><N></N>'
(This is built from the varchar ' terrA novA ')
1) The way this is done is by using the REPLACE function.
The string starts with a '<N>' to designate the beginning of the node. Then:
REPLACE([MAILCITY],' ','</N><N>')
This effectively goes through the whole [MAILCITY] string and replaces each
' ' with '</N><N>'
and then the string ends with a '</N>'. Where '</N>' designates the end of each node.
So now we have a beautiful XML string with a couple of empty nodes and the 'text segments' nicely nestled in their own node. All the 'spaces' have been removed.
2) Then we have to CAST the string into xml. And we will name that field [nodeField]. Now we can use xml functions on our newly created record set. (Conveniently named [xmlNodeRecordSet].)
3) Now we can read the [xmlNodeRecordSet] into the main sub-Select by stating:
FROM [xmlNodeRecordSet].[nodeField].nodes('/N')
This tells us we are reading the [nodeField] as nodes with a '/N' delimiter.
This table of node fields is then parsed by stating:
as [xmlField]([xmlNode]) FOR xml path(''), type
This means each [xmlField] will be parsed for each [xmlNode] in the xml string.
4) So in the main sub-select:
Each blank node '<N></N>' is discarded. (Or not processed.)
Each node with a 'text segment' in it will be parsed. ie <N>terrA</N>
UPPER([xmlField].[xmlNode].value('.', 'char(1)')) +
This code will grab each node out of the field and take its contents '.' and only grab the first character 'char(1)'. Then it will Upper case that character. (the plus sign at the end means it will concatenate this letter with the next bit of code:
LOWER(STUFF([xmlField].[xmlNode].value('.', 'varchar(max)'), 1, 1, ''))
Now here is the beauty... STUFF is a function that will take a string, from a position, for a length, and substitute another string.
STUFF(string, start position, length, replacement string)
So our string is:
[xmlField].[xmlNode].value('.', 'varchar(max)')
Which grabs the whole string inside the current node since it is 'varchar(max)'.
The start position is 1. The length is 1. And the replacement string is ''. This effectively strips off the first character by replacing it with nothing. So the remaining string is all the other characters that we want to have lower case. So that's what we do... we use LOWER to make them all lower case. And this result is concatenated to our first letter that we already upper cased.
But wait... we are not done yet... we still have to append a + ' '. Which adds a blank space after our nicely capitalized 'text segment'. Just in case there is another 'text segment' after this node is done.
This main sub-Select will now parse each node in our [xmlField] and concatenate them all nicely together.
5) But now that we have one big happy concatenation, we still have to change it back from an xml field to a SQL varchar field. So after the main sub-select we need:
.value('.', 'varchar(max)')
This changes our [MAILCITY] back to a SQL varchar.
6) But hold on... we still are not done. Remember we put an extra space at the end of each 'text segment'??? Well the last 'text segment still has that extra space after it. So we need to Right Trim that space off by using RTRIM.
7) And dont forget to rename the final field back to as [MAILCITY]
8) And that's it. This code will take an unknown amount of 'text segments' and format each one of them. All using the fun of XML and it's node parsers.
Hope that helps :)
Here's one way to handle this using APPLY. Note that this solution supports up to 3 substrings (e.g. "Phoenix", "New York", "New York City") but can easily be updated to handle more.
DECLARE #string varchar(100) = 'nEW yoRk ciTY';
WITH DELIMCOUNT(String, DC) AS
(
SELECT #string, LEN(RTRIM(LTRIM(#string)))-LEN(REPLACE(RTRIM(LTRIM(#string)),' ',''))
),
CIPOS AS
(
SELECT *
FROM DELIMCOUNT
CROSS APPLY (SELECT CHARINDEX(char(32), string, 1)) CI1(CI1)
CROSS APPLY (SELECT CHARINDEX(char(32), string, CI1.CI1+1)) CI2(CI2)
)
SELECT
OldString = #string,
NewString =
CASE DC
WHEN 0 THEN UPPER(SUBSTRING(string,1,1))+LOWER(SUBSTRING(string,2,8000))
WHEN 1 THEN UPPER(SUBSTRING(string,1,1))+LOWER(SUBSTRING(string,2,CI1-1)) +
UPPER(SUBSTRING(string,CI1+1,1))+LOWER(SUBSTRING(string,CI1+2,100))
WHEN 2 THEN UPPER(SUBSTRING(string,1,1))+LOWER(SUBSTRING(string,2,CI1-1)) +
UPPER(SUBSTRING(string,CI1+1,1))+LOWER(SUBSTRING(string,CI1+2,CI2-(CI1+1))) +
UPPER(SUBSTRING(string,CI2+1,1))+LOWER(SUBSTRING(string,CI2+2,100))
END
FROM CIPOS;
Results:
OldString NewString
--------------- --------------
nEW yoRk ciTY New York City
This will only capitalize the first letter of the second word. A shorter but less flexible approach. Replace #str with [Mail City].
DECLARE #str AS VARCHAR(50) = 'Los angelas'
SELECT STUFF(#str, CHARINDEX(' ', #str) + 1, 1, UPPER(SUBSTRING(#str, CHARINDEX(' ', #str) + 1, 1)));
This is a way to use imbedded Selects for three City name parts.
It uses CHARINDEX to find the location of your separator character. (ie a space)
I put an 'if' structure around the Select to test if you have any records with more than 3 parts to the city name. If you ever get the warning message, you could add another sub-Select to handle another city part.
Although... just to be clear... SQL is not the best language to do complicated formatting. It was written as a data retrieval engine with the idea that another program will take that data and massage it into a friendlier look and feel. It may be easier to handle the formatting in another program. But if you insist on using SQL and you need to account for city names with 5 or more parts... you may want to consider using Cursors so you can loop through the variable possibilities. (But Cursors are not a good habit to get into. So don't do that unless you've exhausted all other options.)
Anyway, the following code creates and populates a table so you can test the code and see how it works. Enjoy!
CREATE TABLE
#masterfeelisting (
[MAILCITY] varchar(30) not null
);
Insert into #masterfeelisting select 'terra bella';
Insert into #masterfeelisting select ' terrA novA ';
Insert into #masterfeelisting select 'chicagO ';
Insert into #masterfeelisting select 'bostoN';
Insert into #masterfeelisting select 'porT dE sanTo';
--Insert into #masterfeelisting select ' porT dE sanTo pallo ';
Declare #intSpaceCount as integer;
SELECT #intSpaceCount = max (len(RTRIM(LTRIM([MAILCITY]))) - len(replace([MAILCITY],' ',''))) FROM #masterfeelisting;
if #intSpaceCount > 2
SELECT 'You need to account for more than 3 city name parts ' as Warning, #intSpaceCount as SpacesFound;
else
SELECT
cThird.[MAILCITY1] + cThird.[MAILCITY2] + cThird.[MAILCITY3] as [MAILCITY]
FROM
(SELECT
bSecond.[MAILCITY1] as [MAILCITY1]
,SUBSTRING(bSecond.[MAILCITY2],1,bSecond.[intCol2]) as [MAILCITY2]
,UPPER(SUBSTRING(bSecond.[MAILCITY2],bSecond.[intCol2] + 1, 1)) +
SUBSTRING(bSecond.[MAILCITY2],bSecond.[intCol2] + 2,LEN(bSecond.[MAILCITY2]) - bSecond.[intCol2]) as [MAILCITY3]
FROM
(SELECT
SUBSTRING(aFirst.[MAILCITY],1,aFirst.[intCol1]) as [MAILCITY1]
,UPPER(SUBSTRING(aFirst.[MAILCITY],aFirst.[intCol1] + 1, 1)) +
SUBSTRING(aFirst.[MAILCITY],aFirst.[intCol1] + 2,LEN(aFirst.[MAILCITY]) - aFirst.[intCol1]) as [MAILCITY2]
,CHARINDEX ( ' ', SUBSTRING(aFirst.[MAILCITY],aFirst.[intCol1] + 1, LEN(aFirst.[MAILCITY]) - aFirst.[intCol1]) ) as intCol2
FROM
(SELECT
UPPER (LEFT(RTRIM(LTRIM(mstr.[MAILCITY])),1)) +
LOWER(SUBSTRING(RTRIM(LTRIM(mstr.[MAILCITY])),2,LEN(RTRIM(LTRIM(mstr.[MAILCITY])))-1)) as [MAILCITY]
,CHARINDEX ( ' ', RTRIM(LTRIM(mstr.[MAILCITY]))) as intCol1
FROM
#masterfeelisting as mstr -- Initial Master Table
) as aFirst -- First Select Shell
) as bSecond -- Second Select Shell
) as cThird; -- Third Select Shell
Drop table #masterfeelisting;
This is a recreational pursuit, and is not homework. If you value academic challenges, please read on.
A radio quiz show had a segment requesting listeners to call in with words that have their characters in alphabetical order, e.g. "aim", "abbot", "celt", "deft", etc. I got these few examples by a quick Notepad++ (NPP) inspection of a Scrabble dictionary word list.
I'm looking for an elegant way in T-SQL to determine if a word qulifies for the list, i.e. all its letters are in alpha order, case insensitive.
It seemed to me that there should be some kind of T-SQL algorithm possible that will do a SELECT on a table of English words and return the complete list of all words in the Srcabble dictionary that meets the spec. I've spent considerable time looking at regex strings, but haven't hit on anything that comes even remotely close. I've thought about the obvious looping scenario, but abandoned it for now as "inelegant". I'm looking for your ideas that will obtain the qualifying word list,
preferably using
- a REGEX expression
- a tally-table-based approach
- a scalar UDF that returns 1 if the input word meets the requirement, else 0.
- Other, only limited by your creativity.
But preferably NOT using
- a looping structure
- a recursive solution
- a CLR solution
Assumptions/observations:
1. A "word" is defined here as two or more characters. My dictionary shows 55 2-character words, of which only 28 qualify.
2. No word will have more than two concecutive characters that are identical. (If you find one, please point it out.)
3. At 21 characters, "electroencephalograms" is the longest word in my Scrabble dictionary
(though why that word is in the Scrabble dictionary escapes me--the board is only a 15-by-15 grid.)
Consider 21 as the upper limit on word length.
4. All words LIKE 'Z%' can be dismissed because all you can create is {'Z','ZZ', ... , 'ZZZ...Z'}.
5. As the dictionary's words' initial character proceedes through the alphabet, fewer words will qualify.
6. As the word lengths get longer, fewer words will qualify.
7. I suspect that there will be less than 0.2% of my dictionary's 60,387 words that will qualify.
For example, I've tried NPP regex searches like "^a[a-z][b-z][b-z][c-z][c-z][d-z][d-z][e-z]" for 9-letter words starting with "a", but the character-by-character alphabetic enforcement is not handled properly. This search will return "abilities" which fails the test with the "i" that follows the "l".
There's several free Scrabble word lists available on the web, but Phil Factor gives a really interesting treatment of T-SQL/Scrabble considerations at https://www.simple-talk.com/sql/t-sql-programming/the-sql-of-scrabble-and-rapping/ which is where I got my word list.
Care to give it a shot?
Split the word into individual characters using a numbers table. Use the numbers as one set of indices. Use ROW_NUMBER to create another set. Compare the two sets of indices to see if they match for every character to see if they match. If they do, the letters in the word are in the alphabetical order.
DECLARE #Word varchar(100) = 'abbot';
WITH indexed AS (
SELECT
Index1 = n.Number,
Index2 = ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY x.Letter, n.Number),
x.Letter
FROM
dbo.Numbers AS n
CROSS APPLY
(SELECT SUBSTRING(#Word, n.Number, 1)) AS x (Letter)
WHERE
n.Number BETWEEN 1 AND LEN(#Word)
)
SELECT
Conclusion = CASE COUNT(NULLIF(Index1, Index2))
WHEN 0 THEN 'Alphabetical'
ELSE 'Not alphabetical'
END
FROM
indexed
;
The NULLIF(Index, Index2) expression does the comparison: it returns a NULL if the the arguments are equal, otherwise it returns the value of Index1. If all indices match, all the results will be NULL and COUNT will return 0, which means the order of letters in the word was alphabetical.
I did something similar to Andriy. I created a numbers table with value 1-21. I use it to create one set of data with the individual letters order by the index and the a second set ordered alphabetically. Joined the sets to each other on the letter and numbers. I then count nulls. Anything over 0 means it is not in order.
DECLARE #word VARCHAR(21)
SET #word = 'abbot'
SELECT Count(1)
FROM (SELECT Substring(#word, number, 1) AS Letter,
Row_number() OVER ( ORDER BY number) AS letterNum
FROM numbers
WHERE number <= CONVERT(INT, Len(#word))) a
LEFT OUTER JOIN (SELECT Substring(#word, number, 1) AS letter,
Row_number() OVER ( ORDER BY Substring(#word, number, 1)) AS letterNum
FROM numbers
WHERE number <= CONVERT(INT, Len(#word))) b
ON a.letternum = b.letternum
AND a.letter = b.letter
WHERE b.letter IS NULL
Interesting idea...
Here's my take on it. This returns a list of words that are in order, but you could easily return 1 instead.
DECLARE #WORDS TABLE (VAL VARCHAR(MAX))
INSERT INTO #WORDS (VAL)
VALUES ('AIM'), ('ABBOT'), ('CELT'), ('DAVID')
;WITH CHARS
AS
(
SELECT VAL AS SOURCEWORD, UPPER(VAL) AS EVALWORD, ASCII(LEFT(UPPER(VAL),1)) AS ASCIICODE, RIGHT(VAL,LEN(UPPER(VAL))-1) AS REMAINS, 1 AS ROWID, 1 AS INORDER, LEN(VAL) AS WORDLENGTH
FROM #WORDS
UNION ALL
SELECT SOURCEWORD, REMAINS, ASCII(LEFT(REMAINS,1)), RIGHT(REMAINS,LEN(REMAINS)-1), ROWID+1, INORDER+CASE WHEN ASCII(LEFT(REMAINS,1)) >= ASCIICODE THEN 1 ELSE 0 END AS INORDER, WORDLENGTH
FROM CHARS
WHERE LEN(REMAINS)>=1
),
ONLYINORDER
AS
(
SELECT *
FROM CHARS
WHERE ROWID=WORDLENGTH AND INORDER=WORDLENGTH
)
SELECT SOURCEWORD
FROM ONLYINORDER
Here it is as a UDF:
CREATE FUNCTION dbo.AlphabetSoup (#Word VARCHAR(MAX))
RETURNS BIT
AS
BEGIN
SET #WORD = UPPER(#WORD)
DECLARE #RESULT INT
;WITH CHARS
AS
(
SELECT #WORD AS SOURCEWORD,
#WORD AS EVALWORD,
ASCII(LEFT(#WORD,1)) AS ASCIICODE,
RIGHT(#WORD,LEN(#WORD)-1) AS REMAINS,
1 AS ROWID,
1 AS INORDER,
LEN(#WORD) AS WORDLENGTH
UNION ALL
SELECT SOURCEWORD,
REMAINS,
ASCII(LEFT(REMAINS,1)),
RIGHT(REMAINS,LEN(REMAINS)-1),
ROWID+1,
INORDER+CASE WHEN ASCII(LEFT(REMAINS,1)) >= ASCIICODE THEN 1 ELSE 0 END AS INORDER,
WORDLENGTH
FROM CHARS
WHERE LEN(REMAINS)>=1
),
ONLYINORDER
AS
(
SELECT 1 AS RESULT
FROM CHARS
WHERE ROWID=WORDLENGTH AND INORDER=WORDLENGTH
UNION
SELECT 0
FROM CHARS
WHERE NOT (ROWID=WORDLENGTH AND INORDER=WORDLENGTH)
)
SELECT #RESULT = RESULT FROM ONLYINORDER
RETURN #RESULT
END
Anyone have a t-sql function that takes a querystring from a url and returns a table of name/value pairs?
eg I have a value like this stored in my database:
foo=bar&baz=qux&x=y
and I want to produce a 2-column (key and val) table (with 3 rows in this example), like this:
name | value
-------------
foo | bar
baz | qux
x | y
UPDATE: there's a reason I need this in a t-sql function; I can't do it in application code. Perhaps I could use CLR code in the function, but I'd prefer not to.
UPDATE: by 'querystring' I mean the part of the url after the '?'. I don't mean that part of a query will be in the url; the querystring is just used as data.
create function dbo.fn_splitQuerystring(#querystring nvarchar(4000))
returns table
as
/*
* Splits a querystring-formatted string into a table of name-value pairs
* Example Usage:
select * from dbo.fn_splitQueryString('foo=bar&baz=qux&x=y&y&abc=')
*/
return (
select 'name' = SUBSTRING(s,1,case when charindex('=',s)=0 then LEN(s) else charindex('=',s)-1 end)
, 'value' = case when charindex('=',s)=0 then '' else SUBSTRING(s,charindex('=',s)+1,4000) end
from dbo.fn_split('&',#querystring)
)
go
Which utilises this general-purpose split function:
create function dbo.fn_split(#sep nchar(1), #s nvarchar(4000))
returns table
/*
* From https://stackoverflow.com/questions/314824/
* Splits a string into a table of values, with single-char delimiter.
* Example Usage:
select * from dbo.fn_split(',', '1,2,5,2,,dggsfdsg,456,df,1,2,5,2,,dggsfdsg,456,df,1,2,5,2,,')
*/
AS
RETURN (
WITH Pieces(pn, start, stop) AS (
SELECT 1, 1, CHARINDEX(#sep, #s)
UNION ALL
SELECT pn + 1, stop + 1, CHARINDEX(#sep, #s, stop + 1)
FROM Pieces
WHERE stop > 0
)
SELECT pn,
SUBSTRING(#s, start, CASE WHEN stop > 0 THEN stop-start ELSE 4000 END) AS s
FROM Pieces
)
go
Ultimately letting you do something like this:
select name, value
from dbo.fn_splitQuerystring('foo=bar&baz=something&x=y&y&abc=&=whatever')
I'm sure TSQL could be coerced to jump through this hoop for you, but why not parse the querystring in your application code where it most probably belongs?
Then you can look at this answer for what others have done to parse querystrings into name/value pairs.
Or this answer.
Or this.
Or this.
Please don't encode your query strings directly in URLs, for security reasons: anyone can easily substitute any old query to gain access to information they shouldn't have -- or worse, "DROP DATABASE;". Checking for suspicious "keywords" or things like quote characters is not a solution -- creative hackers will work around these measures, and you'll annoy everyone whose last name is "O'Reilly."
Exceptions: in-house-only servers or public https URLS. But even then, there's no reason why you can't build the SQL query on the client side and submit it from there.