Get table names from database
SELECT TABLE_NAME FROM information_schema.tables
Show table structure
EXEC sp_columns <tablename>
Limit output to x lines
SELECT top <x> * FROM <tablename
The magic number in the convert function determines the datestyle: 120 == ODBC canonical.
More about converting http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa226054%28v=sql.80%29.aspx][here
Select events that are active at a certain time:
SELECT event, starttime, endtime FROM TABLE WHERE CONVERT(datetime,'2012-08-04 12:00:00',120) BETWEEN starttime AND endtime
Error message: “Unicode data in a Unicode-only collation or ntext data cannot be sent to clients using DB-Library (such as ISQL) or ODBC version 3.7 or earlier.”
can be resolved by adding tds_version = 8.0 to your odbc.ini
(the Why is nicely summarised e.g. by Ubuntitis http://www.ubuntitis.com/?p=64)