In SQL can I return a tables with a varying number of columns

Posted by Matt on Stack Overflow See other posts from Stack Overflow or by Matt
Published on 2011-01-05T03:11:23Z Indexed on 2011/01/05 3:53 UTC
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I have a somewhat more complicated scenario, but I think it should be possible.

I have a large SPROC whose result is a set of characteristics for a set of persons.

So the Table would look something like this:

Property |	 Client1 	 Client 2	 Client3
-----------------------------------------------------------
Sex      |	 M       	 F      	  M
Age      |	 67      	 56     	  67
Income   |	 Low     	 Mid    	  Low

It's built using cursors, iterating over different datasets.

The problem I am facing is that there is a varying number of Clients and Properties, so an equally valid result over different input sets might be:

Property |	 Client1 	 Client 2
-------------------------------------------
Sex      |	 M       	 F   
Age      |	 67      	 56  
Weight   |	 122     	 122 

The different number of properties is easy, those are just extra rows.

My problem is that I need to declare a temporary table with a varying number of columns.

There could be 2 clients or 100. Every client in guaranteed to have every property ultimately listed.

What SQL structure would statisfy this and how can I declare it and insert things into it?

I can't just flip the columns and rows either because there is a variable number of each.

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