This small query gives you the tables, views and columns having characters likely not translating directly to ORM identifiers because they contain other characters than a-zA-Z0-9:
select *
from INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS c
where 1=0
or c.TABLE_NAME LIKE '%[^a-zA-Z0-9_]%'
or c.COLUMN_NAME LIKE '%[^a-zA-Z0-9_]%'
Regular identifiers
Comply with the rules for the format of identifiers. Regular identifiers are not delimited when they are used in Transact-SQL statements.
SELECT *
FROM TableX
WHERE KeyCol = 124
Delimited identifiers
Are enclosed in double quotation marks (“) or brackets ([ ]). Identifiers that comply with the rules for the format of identifiers might not be delimited. For example:
SELECT *
FROM [TableX] --Delimiter is optional.
WHERE [KeyCol] = 124 --Delimiter is optional.
Identifiers that do not comply with all the rules for identifiers must be delimited in a Transact-SQL statement. For example:
SELECT *
FROM [My Table] --Identifier contains a space and uses a reserved keyword.
WHERE [order] = 10 --Identifier is a reserved keyword.
Both regular and delimited identifiers must contain from 1 through 128 characters. For local temporary tables, the identifier can have a maximum of 116 characters.
Rules for Regular Identifiers
The names of variables, functions, and stored procedures must comply with the following rules for Transact-SQL identifiers.
The first character must be one of the following:
A letter as defined by the Unicode Standard 3.2. The Unicode definition of letters includes Latin characters from a through z, from A through Z, and also letter characters from other languages.
The underscore (_), at sign (@), or number sign (#).Certain symbols at the beginning of an identifier have special meaning in SQL Server. A regular identifier that starts with the at sign always denotes a local variable or parameter and cannot be used as the name of any other type of object. An identifier that starts with a number sign denotes a temporary table or procedure. An identifier that starts with double number signs (##) denotes a global temporary object. Although the number sign or double number sign characters can be used to begin the names of other types of objects, we do not recommend this practice.
Some Transact-SQL functions have names that start with double at signs (@@). To avoid confusion with these functions, you should not use names that start with @@.
Subsequent characters can include the following:
Letters as defined in the Unicode Standard 3.2.
Decimal numbers from either Basic Latin or other national scripts.
The at sign, dollar sign ($), number sign, or underscore.
The identifier must not be a Transact-SQL reserved word. SQL Server reserves both the uppercase and lowercase versions of reserved words. When identifiers are used in Transact-SQL statements, the identifiers that do not comply with these rules must be delimited by double quotation marks or brackets. The words that are reserved depend on the database compatibility level. This level can be set by using the ALTER DATABASE statement.
Embedded spaces or special characters are not allowed.
Supplementary characters are not allowed.When identifiers are used in Transact-SQL statements, the identifiers that do not comply with these rules must be delimited by double quotation marks or brackets.
Note
Some rules for the format of regular identifiers depend on the database compatibility level. This level can be set by using ALTER DATABASE.
It’s a question of readability. There is no difference in performance. Old versions of SQL Server were silly enough to look up meta data, but not any more.
SELECT foo FROM bar WHEREEXISTS(SELECT*FROM baz WHERE baz.id = bar.id);SELECT foo FROM bar WHEREEXISTS(SELECT1FROM baz WHERE baz.id = bar.id);
I am not considering NULL or “fun variants” which don’t seem intuitive to me.
SELECT foo FROM bar WHERE EXISTS (SELECT NULL FROM baz WHERE baz.id = bar.id);
SELECT foo FROM bar WHERE EXISTS (SELECT 1/0 FROM baz WHERE baz.id = bar.id);
The question popped up in comments just now. I researched the manuals of the most popular RDBMS:
A search on SO for code:"EXISTS (SELECT 1" yields 5,048 results.
A search on SO for code:"EXISTS (SELECT *" yields 5,154 results. Updated links and counts 07.2015.
So SELECT * has the popular vote and the big commercial RDBMS on its side.
I find SELECT 1 more intuitive. It’s like saying “if at least one exists”.
Is SELECT * more intuitive?
The subtle difference between -q and -Q: the latter will exit after executing the command (regardless of the SQL server version; I think this was introduced in SQL Server 2005 or 2000).
Inside the command, you can use single ' quotes for strings.
C:\Users\jeroenp>sqlcmd /?
Microsoft (R) SQL Server Command Line Tool
Version 10.50.2500.0 NT x64
Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
usage: Sqlcmd [-U login id] [-P password]
[-S server] [-H hostname] [-E trusted connection]
[-N Encrypt Connection][-C Trust Server Certificate]
[-d use database name] [-l login timeout] [-t query timeout]
[-h headers] [-s colseparator] [-w screen width]
[-a packetsize] [-e echo input] [-I Enable Quoted Identifiers]
[-c cmdend] [-L[c] list servers[clean output]]
[-q "cmdline query"] [-Q "cmdline query" and exit]
[-m errorlevel] [-V severitylevel] [-W remove trailing spaces]
[-u unicode output] [-r[0|1] msgs to stderr]
[-i inputfile] [-o outputfile] [-z new password]
[-f | i:[,o:]] [-Z new password and exit]
[-k[1|2] remove[replace] control characters]
[-y variable length type display width]
[-Y fixed length type display width]
[-p[1] print statistics[colon format]]
[-R use client regional setting]
[-b On error batch abort]
[-v var = "value"...] [-A dedicated admin connection]
[-X[1] disable commands, startup script, enviroment variables [and exit]]
[-x disable variable substitution]
[-? show syntax summary]
The trick comes down to enabling the PreferExternalManifest registry setting and then create a manual manifest for the application that forces the application to use “bitmap scaling” by basically telling it does not support “XP style DPI scaling”.
You name manifest file named after the exe and stored it in the same directory as the exe.
After that, you also have to rename the exe to a temporary name and then back in order to refresh the cache.
A quote from the trick:
In Windows Vista, you had two possible ways of scaling applications: with the first one (the default) applications were instructed to scale their objects using the scaling factor imposed by the operating system. The results, depending on the quality of the application and the Windows version, could vary a lot. Some scaled correctly, some other look very similar to what we are seeing in SSMS, with some weird-looking GUIs. In Vista, this option was called “XP style DPI scaling”.
The second option, which you could activate by unchecking the “XP style” checkbox, involved drawing the graphical components of the GUI to an off-screen buffer and then drawing them back to the display, scaling the whole thing up to the screen resolution. This option is called “bitmap scaling” and the result is a perfectly laid out GUI.
In order to enable this option in Windows 10, you need to merge this key to your registry:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SideBySide]
"PreferExternalManifest"=dword:00000001
Then, the application has to be decorated with a manifest file that instructs Windows to disable DPI scaling and enable bitmap scaling, by declaring the application as DPI unaware. The manifest file has to be saved in the same folder as the executable (ssms.exe) and its name must be ssms.exe.manifest. In this case, for SSMS 2014, the file path is “C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SQL Server\120\Tools\Binn\ManagementStudio\Ssms.exe.manifest”.
Paste this text inside the manifest file and save it in UTF8 encoding:
This file contains hidden or bidirectional Unicode text that may be interpreted or compiled differently than what appears below. To review, open the file in an editor that reveals hidden Unicode characters. Learn more about bidirectional Unicode characters
This “Vista style” bitmap scaling is very similar to what Apple is doing on his Retina displays, except that Apple uses a different font rendering algorithm that looks better when scaled up. If you use this technique in Windows, ClearType rendering is performed on the off-screen buffer before upscaling, so the final result might look a bit blurry.The amount of blurriness you will see depends on the scale factor you set in the control panel or in the settings app in Windows 10. Needless to say that exact pixel scaling looks better, so prefer 200% over 225% or 250% scale factors, because there is no such thing as “half pixel”.
It will spot declared but unused variables, but it appears it doesn’t do code coverage or execution path to spot stuff like variables being used without being initialized.
The Wiert Corner - irregular stream of stuff 