SqlDatLen&

Returns the actual length, in bytes, of the data in a column.

Syntax

SqlDatLen& ( sqlconn%, column% )

where

sqlconn%

Is a SQL Server connection. The value of sqlconn% is returned by SqlOpen%.

column%

Is the number of a column. The first column is number 1.

Returns

The actual length of the data in a specified column. If the column has a null value, SqlDatLen& returns 0. If the column number is out of range, SqlDatLen& returns -1. Calling SqlDatLen& after SqlNextRow% or SqlGetRow% returns regrow.

Remarks

For numeric datatypes such as smallint and float, SqlDatLen& returns the maximum printable width, not the length of the string that would be returned by SqlData$. For example, if you store the value 10,000 in a smallint column, SqlDatLen& returns 6 (the storage size of the smallint datatype). The length of the string returned by SqlData$, in this case 5, is determined by using the Visual Basic LEN function.

You obtain the maximum possible length for the data in a column by calling SqlColLen%. The data itself is returned by SqlData$.

Example

'Put the statement into the command buffer.
Result% = SqlCmd%(Sqlconn%, "SELECT name FROM sysobjects")

'Send the statement to SQL Server and start execution.
Result% = SqlExec%(Sqlconn%)

'Process the statement results.
Result% = SqlResults%(Sqlconn%)

'Print the data length of each row.
RowNum% = 0
DO UNTIL SqlNextRow%(Sqlconn%) = NOMOREROWS
   RowNum% = RowNum%  1
   PRINT "Row"; RowNum%;" data length is ";
   PRINT SqlDatLen&(Sqlconn%, 1)
LOOP

Output:

Row 1 data length is 10
Row 2 data length is 10
   .
   .
   .
Row 103 data length is 13

See Also

SqlColLen%, SqlColName$, SqlColType%, SqlData$, SqlNumCols%