Should we end stored procedures with the GO statement? - sql

Question

Should we end stored procedures with GO statement, if so what are the advantages of using GO?
CREATE PROCEDURE uspGetAddress #City nvarchar(30)
AS
SELECT *
FROM AdventureWorks.Person.Address
WHERE City = #City
GO

Answer 1

The statement go, per the documentation
Signals the end of a batch of Transact-SQL statements to the SQL Server utilities.
...
GO is not a Transact-SQL statement; it is a command recognized by the sqlcmd and osql
utilities and SQL Server Management Studio Code editor.
SQL Server utilities interpret GO as a signal that they should send the current batch
of Transact-SQL statements to an instance of SQL Server. The current batch of statements
is composed of all statements entered since the last GO, or since the start of the
ad-hoc session or script if this is the first GO.
A Transact-SQL statement cannot occupy the same line as a GO command. However, the line
can contain comments.
Users must follow the rules for batches. For example, any execution of a stored procedure
after the first statement in a batch must include the EXECUTE keyword. The scope of
local (user-defined) variables is limited to a batch, and cannot be referenced after a
GO command.
A stored procedure definition, per the documentation for create procedure, comes with restrictions. it must be the first (and only) statement in the batch:
The CREATE PROCEDURE statement cannot be combined with other Transact-SQL statements in
a single batch.
That means the body of stored procedure ends with the batch. Adding GO in your source file is good practice. Especially since it's common to do things prior to and following the creation of a stored procedure. You'll often see source files that look something like this:
if (object_id('dbo.foobar') is not null ) drop procedure dbo.foobar
GO
-- dbo.foobar --------------------------------------------
--
-- This stored procedure does amazing and wonderful things
----------------------------------------------------------
create procedure dbo.foobar
as
...
{a sequence of amazing and wonderful SQL statements}
...
return 0
GO
grant execute on dbo.foobar to some_schema
GO
And the value for GO is adjustable in Sql Server Management Studio's options. If you'd like to use something like jump instead of go, you can (bearing in mind that you're almost certainly going to give yourself grief in doing so.).

Answer 2

No, you should end your procedure with RETURN.
CREATE PROCEDURE uspGetAddress #City nvarchar(30)
AS
SELECT *
FROM AdventureWorks.Person.Address
WHERE City = #City
RETURN
The GO is really meant to separate commands in a sql script.

Answer 3

Just wanted to point out that without a GO at the end of your stored procedure, any T-SQL after the supposed end of the procedure body will still be included in the body of the proc.
For example
CREATE PROCEDURE Foo
BEGIN
SELECT * FROM dbo.Bar;
END
DROP TABLE dbo.Bar;
In this example, running EXEC dbo.Foo will end up dropping the table even though it is after the END. To avoid that, you need to place a GO after the END.

Answer 4

I prefer to surround the body of the stored procedure with begin and end statements:
CREATE PROCEDURE uspGetAddress (
#City nvarchar(30)
) AS
BEGIN
SELECT *
FROM AdventureWorks.Person.Address
WHERE City = #City;
END;
GO is a not a T-SQL command. It is understood by the tools that run scripts. As the documentation describes:
GO is not a Transact-SQL statement; it is a command recognized by the
sqlcmd and osql utilities and SQL Server Management Studio Code
editor.
SQL Server utilities interpret GO as a signal that they should send
the current batch of Transact-SQL statements to an instance of SQL
Server. The current batch of statements is composed of all statements
entered since the last GO, or since the start of the ad hoc session or
script if this is the first GO.
By the way, in your case, a user-defined table function might be more appropriate than a stored procedure.