This is basicaly the concatenation of strings (like a sum for numeric).

An alternative could be:

declare @tblNames table([Name] varchar(100))

insert @tblNames values ('Lucian')

insert @tblNames values ('Terry')

insert @tblNames values ('Jane')

select SUBSTRING((SELECT ',' + rtrim([Name])FROM @tblNames

FOR XML PATH('')) , 2, 7998) AS Name_List

Result would be Lucian,Terry,Jane

This is usefull when you need to aggregate a column and together with this concatenate a string column. ex.

if exists(select 1 from information_schema.tables where table_name = 'tblTest')

drop table tblTest

Create table tblTest(id int , Category varchar(3),

AnyNumber int, SCode varchar(255))

insert tblTest(Id, Category, AnyNumber, SCode)

select 1, 'Air', 15, 'SCode0' Union All

select 1, 'Air', 15, 'SCode1' Union All

select 1, 'Acc', 10, 'AccSCode1' Union All

select 1, 'Acc', 10, 'AccSCode2' Union All

select 2, 'Air', 9, 'AirSCode4' Union All

select 2, 'Air', 15, 'AirSCode5' Union All

select 3, 'Air', 20, 'AirSCode6' Union All

select 3, 'Air', 13, 'AirSCode7' Union All

select 3, 'Trf', 14, 'TrfSCode1' Union All

select 3, 'Trf', 16, 'TrfSCode2'

--select * from tblTest

select T.Id, Category,

sum(T.AnyNumber) as SumNbr

,SUBSTRING((SELECT ',' + rtrim(SCode)FROM tblTest T2

WHERE T.Id = T2.Id and T.Category = T2.Category

FOR XML PATH('')) , 2, 7998) AS List_SCodes

from tblTest T

group by Id, Category

drop table tblTest

Give result:

(10 row(s) affected)

Id Category SumNbr List_SCodes

----------- -------- ----------- ----------------------------------------------------------

1 Acc 20 AccSCode1,AccSCode2

1 Air 30 SCode0,SCode1

2 Air 24 AirSCode4,AirSCode5

3 Air 33 AirSCode6,AirSCode7

3 Trf 30 TrfSCode1,TrfSCode2

(5 row(s) affected)