How to speed up a very slow query creating HTML commands

Question

Hi, I’m generating HTML code that I will later send via dbmail (@body_format ='HTML'). There are about 11K records in the table and it takes over 9 hours to run. Any suggestions on how to increase throughput? or am I just stuck with it
declare @html_3 varchar (max) = ' '
select @@html_3 = @html_3 + '<tr> <td>' + cast (RegionID as varchar) + '</td><td>'
                + RegionName + '</td><td>'
                 + cast (FileID as varchar) + '</td><td>'
                 + cast (FileNum as varchar) + '</td><td>'
              + FileStatus + '</td><td>'
     + DeliveryStatus + '</td><td>'
     +TaskName + '</td><td>'
      + cast (EventStartDate as varchar) + '</td><td>'
  + cast (DeliveryEventLogID as varchar) + '</td><td>'
 + DeliveryServer + '</td><td>'
 + IISServer + '</td><td>'
 + UserName + '</td><td>'
 + DeliverEvent + '</td><td>'
 + NotificationEvent + '</td><td>'
 + DeliveryComments + '</td><td>'
               + PronoComments + '</td></tr>'
from ##PronoDetailRpt
print @html_3

Answer 1

If you have only 11K records, and if what you posted is the entire query, it should take nowhere near 9 hours to complete, even on a wimpy server. It might be that some other process is blocking your global temporary table.  
Look at the process that is populating the
##PronoDetailRpttable. Is that running simultaneously as you are trying to run this query?
Try selecting a single record from the table. Does that complete in a short time? i.e., run SELECT TOP (1) * FROM ##PronoDetailRpt;
Run sp_who2 in a separate window while this query is running to see if there is anything blocking this
query. There is a BlkBy column that will give you this information.
EDIT: By the way, always specify a length for VARCHAR.  So instead of CAST (RegionID AS VARCHAR) use something like CAST (RegionID AS VARCHAR(32)) where the length is larger than the longest string you expect, or if you don't know how long it
could be, use CAST (RegionID AS VARCHAR(MAX))