I need to split string in select statement and insert to table - sql

Question

I have a data in one table. I need to copy it to another table. One of the column is text delimited string. So what I'm thinking to select all columns insert get indentity value and with subquery to split based on delimiter and insert it to another table.
Here is the data example
ID Name City Items
1 Michael Miami item|item2|item3|item4|item5
2 Jorge Hallandale item|item2|item3|item4|item5
copy Name, City to one table get identity
and split and copy Items to another table with Identity Column Value
So output should be
Users table
UserID Name City
1 Michael Miami
2 Jorge Hallandale
...
Items table
ItemID UserID Name
1 1 Item
2 1 Item2
3 1 Item3
4 1 Item4
5 2 Item
6 2 Item2
7 2 Item3
8 2 Item4
Not really sure how to do it with T-SQL. Answers with examples would be appreciated

Answer 1

You may create you custom function to split the string in T-Sql. You could then use the Split function as part of a JOIN with your base table to generate the final results for your INSERT statement. Have a look at this post. Hope this help.

Answer 2

You can do this using xml and cross apply.
See the following:
DECLARE #t table (ID int, Name varchar(20), City varchar(20), Items varchar(max));
INSERT #t
SELECT 1,'Michael','Miami' ,'item|item2|item3|item4|item5' UNION
SELECT 2,'Jorge' ,'Hallandale','item|item2|item3|item4|item5'
DECLARE #u table (UserID int identity(1,1), Name varchar(20), City varchar(20));
INSERT #u (Name, City)
SELECT DISTINCT Name, City FROM #t
DECLARE #i table (ItemID int identity(1,1), UserID int, Name varchar(20));
WITH cte_Items (Name, Items) as (
SELECT
Name
,CAST(REPLACE('<r><i>' + Items + '</i></r>','|','</i><i>') as xml) as Items
FROM
#t
)
INSERT #i (UserID, Name)
SELECT
u.UserID
,s.Name as Name
FROM
cte_Items t
CROSS APPLY (SELECT i.value('.','varchar(20)') as Name FROM t.Items.nodes('//r/i') as x(i) ) s
INNER JOIN #u u ON t.Name = u.Name
SELECT * FROM #i
See more here:
http://www.kodyaz.com/articles/t-sql-convert-split-delimeted-string-as-rows-using-xml.aspx

Answer 3

Can you accomplish this with recursion? My T-SQL is rusty but this may help send you in the right direction:
WITH CteList AS (
SELECT 0 AS ItemId
, 0 AS DelimPos
, 0 AS Item_Num
, CAST('' AS VARCHAR(100)) AS Item
, Items AS Remainder
FROM Table1
UNION ALL
SELECT Row_Number() OVER(ORDER BY UserID) AS ItemId
, UserID
, CASE WHEN CHARINDEX('|', Remainder) > 0
THEN CHARINDXEX('|', Remainder)
ELSE LEN(Remainder)
END AS dpos
, Item_num + 1 as Item_Num
, REPLACE(Remainder, '|', '') AS Element
, right(Remainder, dpos+1) AS Remainder
FROM CteList
WHERE dpos > 0
AND ItemNum < 20 /* Force a MAX depth for recursion */
)
SELECT ItemId
, Item
FROM CteList
WHERE item_num > 0
ORDER BY ItemID, Item_Num