MS SQL Server 2012 returning blank text? - sql

Question

I execute this inside MS SQL Server Management Studio:
SELECT TOP 2 * FROM searchdb.dbo.tblnames;
I get back two posts with full information.
When I execute the same on a webpage I however get all information except for text, which is blank.
The type of the text columns in the database are:
ntext
The connection string I'm using:
Driver={SQL Server};Server=localhost;Database=searchdb;Uid=myuser;Pwd=mypass;
I've also tried with:
Driver={SQL Server Native Client 11.0};Server=localhost;Database=searchdb;Uid=myuser;Pwd=mypass;
Getting the same result. I don't know the difference between "SQL Server" and "SQL Server Native Client 11.0", just that "SQL Server" has a newer date in the list of ODBC Data Sources.
What's going on? Why is it returning blank text? How do I fix this?
Edit: Here is the code I'm using on the ASP web pages:
Set Conn = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Connection")
Conn.Open "Driver={SQL Server};Server=localhost;Database=searchdb;Uid=myuser;Pwd=mypass;"
Set RecSet = Conn.Execute("SELECT TOP 2 * FROM tblnames;")
Response.Write "ID: "& RecSet("ID") &"<br>"
Response.Write "Name: "& RecSet("name") &"<br>"
Response.Write "Mark: "& RecSet("mark") &"<br>"
RecSet.MoveNext
Response.Write "ID: "& RecSet("ID") &"<br>"
Response.Write "Name: "& RecSet("name") &"<br>"
Response.Write "Mark: "& RecSet("mark") &"<br>"
Set RecSet = Nothing
Both the ID and Mark columns have "int" data type and show up fine, while the "name" column is blank.
Edit 2:
Users with less than 10 reputation can't answer their own question
for 8 hours after asking. You can answer 3/15/2014 4:16:50 AM. Until
then please use comments, or edit your question instead.
It's dumb that you have to make an account on stackoverflow (didn't have to before), and that you can't answer your own questions on a new account. And I hope some mod doesn't edit this post. If things are wrong with your system it's important that people can point it out.
Anyways, here is the answer:
Self-answered:
I changed my connection string to:
Provider=SQL Server Native Client 11.0;Server=localhost;Database=searchdb;Uid=myuser;Pwd=mypass;
Now everything works fine.
I have no idea why it didn't work correctly when I used that one as "Driver" but whatever. Note that just "Provider=SQL Server" didn't work at all, while "Driver={SQL Server}" worked exactly the same as "Driver={SQL Server Native Client 11.0}" (that is, with blank text).
No idea how Provider is different than Driver. "Provider" isn't even mentioned anywhere in Control Panel > Administrative Tools > ODBC Data Sources.
After some testing it seems like both Driver and Provider is just as fast as each other too, so there's no benefit from using Driver, it is just broken.

Answer 1

It looks like changing your query to use a column list, rather than the asterisk, could take care of the issue. Also, I read that your ntext field should be the last column in your list. Seems strange, but it's worth a shot.
Resources:
http://databases.aspfaq.com/database/how-do-i-deal-with-memo-text-hyperlink-and-currency-columns.html
SQL Server text column affects results returned to classic ASP
EDIT:
You also might try converting the ntext to an nvarchar in your sql statement.
SELECT TOP 2 ID, Mark, CONVERT(NVARCHAR(MAX), Name) [Name] FROM tblNames