from existing value Update column using comma-separated values in SQL Server

Question

from existing value Update column using comma-separated values in SQL Server

tbl 
id name rev_code
1  aaa  rev1,rev2,rev3
2  bbb  rev2,rev3
3  ccc  rev1,rev2
4  ddd  rev3,rev2

i want update where rev_code='rev3' need to add end of with , like rev1,rev2,rev3,rev5

expecting output

id name rev_code
1  aaa  rev1,rev2,rev3,rev5
2  bbb  rev2,rev3,rev5
3  ccc  rev1,rev2
4  ddd  rev3,rev2,rev5

Answer 1

Your best option would be to normalize your database:
Get rid of that rev_code column and turn it into a new table, linked with a foreign key constraint to the current table.

If that's impossible, you can do something like this:

UPDATE tbl
SET rev_code = rev_code + ',rev5'
WHERE ','+ rev_code + ',' LIKE '%,rev3,%'
AND ','+ rev_code + ',' NOT LIKE '%,rev5,%'

Answer 2

Stop storing comma separated values in a column it violates First Normal form . Consider changing your database design

At worst case use this update to get the result

UPDATE Yourtable
SET    [rev_code] = [rev_code] + ',rev5'
WHERE  Charindex('rev3', [rev_code]) > 0 

Answer 3

Try this,

UPDATE table1 SET rev_code=rev_code +',rev5' 
where  rev_code like '%rev3%' and Charindex('rev5', [rev_code])= 0 

edited:

 UPDATE table1 SET rev_code= rev_code +',rev5' 
 where rev_code  IS NOT NULL and rev_code like '%rev3%' and Charindex('rev5', [rev_code])= 0

Check rev_code column size.

And as @Zohar Peled said, it is a bad idea while storing comma separated values.

Is storing a delimited list in a database column really that bad?

Answer 4

Try this, this will rev5 for the rev_code if there is rev3 and rev5 already not exists.

UPDATE tbl 
SET    rev_code = rev_code + ',rev5'
WHERE  rev_code NOT LIKE '%rev5%' AND rev_code LIKE '%rev3%'

Answer 5

Ouch...you have your db design wrong so i will first suggest to create additional one-to-many table where you would store fields: originalTableRecordId | rev_code

then you find all records in that table that have particular rev_code value and add new one to those that meet criteria.

If you cant change your db structure then you have to go with either "WHERE rev_code like '%rev3%' " (which will be awfully slow) or with fulltext search (which is a huge overkill)

Answer 6

how about:

UPDATE table 
SET rev_code = rev_code+',rev5' 
WHERE rev_code LIKE '%rev3%' (OR RIGHT(rev_code,4) = 'rev3')