Sorry, I had forgotten to answer that one !

DECLARE @Exists  AS INT

DECLARE @TableName  AS SYSNAME

DECLARE @sql  AS NVARCHAR(1000) --MUST BE UNICODE

SET @TableName = 'SysObjects' --works

SET...

The sysdepends table (that this sproc uses) is not always reliable

Sysdepends is NEVER reliable.  Let me put this this way : I have a db with about 1000 objects...

DBCC FREEPROCCACHE

Will drop all execution plans.

If you can't post the code, can you show us the execution plans??? Maybe we'll be able to spot something obvious!

The index might be usefull if only an index scan is required (without a bookmark lookup).  It will have to scan the same amount of ROWS, but with only 2-3...

I'll be sure to get that fixed first time in the morning !

How the heck is that supposed to change anything???

BTW, I hope you have an index of both SSN (clustered if possible) and also on DateID.  Without those 2 you can...

6000 seconds???

I bet you can shorten it up to less than 10 on sql server... maybe even less than one.

Keep us posted on that one too

No problem.  We all started somewhere and even after 3 years I'm still learning something new every so often.  Don't get discouraged if you don't see the end of it...

Thanx for the vote of trust .

Hmm unfortunately not.

How do I know when col1 ends and col2 starts?

Based on your data there's no way to be sure (unless you mean 5 characters and not 50)

Please provide...

Please post your version of the query... we might be able to figure out why.

I also heard about 3rd party tools that did just that.  I have no experience with them so I can't really comment or recomment any of them.

2nd part of the reply was :

Did you mean this:

WHERE clearedate IS NULL

Ok, let us know what transpires.

Or as I assumed.... change the datatype of the column to use that feature.  Message us if you need help to do either.