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SQL Server FAQ - Categories of Data Types Used by SQL Server

By: FYIcenter.com

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How Many Categories of Data Types Used by SQL Server?

A data type is an attribute that specifies the type of data that the object can hold: integer data, character data, monetary data, date and time data, binary strings, and so on. In SQL Server 2005, each column, local variable, expression, and parameter has a related data type.

Data types in SQL Server 2005 are organized into the following categories:

• Exact Numerics - BIGINT, INT, SMALLINT, TINYINT, BIT, DECIMAL, NUMERIC, MONEY, and SMALLMONEY.
• Approximate Numerics - FLOAT, and REAL.
• Date and Time - DATETIME and SMALLDATETIME.
• Character Strings - CHAR, VARCHAR, and TEXT.
• Unicode Character Strings - NCHAR, NVARCHAR, and NTEXT
• Binary Strings - BINARY, VARBINARY, and IMAGE.
• Other Data Types - CURSOR, SQL_VARIANT, TABLE, UNIQUEIDENTIFIER, TIMESTAMP, and XML.

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1. What Is SQL Language?
2. What Is Transact-SQL Language?
3. What Is a Transact-SQL Statement?
4. How To Start and End Transact-SQL Statements?
5. How To Enter Comments in Transact-SQL Statements?
6. What Is a Transact-SQL Statement Batch?
7. What Happens to a Statement Batch If There Is a Compilation Error?
8. How To Use GO Command in "sqlcmd"?
9. How To Create User Messages with PRINT Statements?
10. How Many Categories of Data Types Used by SQL Server?
11. What Are Exact Numeric Data Types?
12. What Are Approximate Numeric Data Types?
13. What Are Date and Time Data Types?
14. What Are Character String Data Types?
15. What Are Unicode Character String Data Types?
16. What Are Binary String Data Types?
17. What Are the Differences between CHAR and NCHAR?
18. What Are the Differences between CHAR and VARCHAR?
19. What Are the Differences between DECIMAL and FLOAT?