Using Group BY with text fields

Question

Hi,
Is there any way around the problem of not being able to
GROUP BY a text field???
I have tried using the CAST (name AS VARCHAR(8000)) but it
doesn't return the full value of the field...... I am getting about
250 characters returned....
Is there any way around this? ,

Answer 1

I am assuming MS SQL Server. According to SQL Server Books
Online:
Note: Columns of type text, ntext, and image cannot be used in
group_by_expression.
For GROUP BY clauses that do not contain CUBE or ROLLUP, the
number of group_by_expression items is limited by the GROUP BY
column sizes, the aggregated columns, and the aggregate values
involved in the query. This limit originates from the limit of
8,060 bytes on the intermediate work table that is needed to
hold intermediate query results. A maximum of 10 grouping
expressions is permitted when CUBE or ROLLUP is specified.
Phil