sp_db_vardecimal_storage_format (Transact-SQL)

[ @dbname= ] 'database_name'

Is the name of the database for which the storage format is to be changed. database_name is sysname, with no default. If the database name is omitted, the vardecimal storage format status of all the databases in the instance of SQL Server are returned.

[ @vardecimal_storage_format = ] {'ON'|'OFF'}

Specifies whether the vardecimal storage format is enabled. @vardecimal_storage_format can be ON or OFF. The parameter is varchar(3), with no default. If a database name is provided but @vardecimal_storage_format is omitted, the current setting of the specified database is returned. This argument has no effect on SQL Server 2008 or later versions.

0 (success) or 1 (failure)

If the database storage format cannot be changed, sp_db_vardecimal_storage_format returns an error. If the database is already in the specified state, the stored procedure has no effect.

If the @vardecimal_storage_format argument is not provided, returns the columns Database Name and the Vardecimal State.

sp_db_vardecimal_storage_format returns the vardecimal state but cannot change the vardecimal state.

sp_db_vardecimal_storage_format will fail in the following circumstances:

• There are active users in the database.

• The database is enabled for mirroring.

• The edition of SQL Server does not support vardecimal storage format.

To change the vardecimal storage format state to OFF, a database must be set to simple recovery mode. When a database is set to simple recovery mode, the log chain is broken. Perform a full database backup after you set the vardecimal storage format state to OFF.

Changing the state to OFF will fail if there are tables using vardecimal database compression. To change the storage format of a table, use sp_tableoption. To determine which tables in a database are using vardecimal storage format, use the OBJECTPROPERTY function and search for the TableHasVarDecimalStorageFormat property, as shown in the following example.

USE AdventureWorks ;
GO
SELECT name, object_id, type_desc
FROM sys.objects 
 WHERE OBJECTPROPERTY(object_id, 
   N'TableHasVarDecimalStorageFormat') = 1 ;
GO

The following code enables compression in the AdventureWorks database, confirms the state, and then compresses decimal and numeric columns in the Sales.SalesOrderDetail table.

USE master ;
GO

EXEC sp_db_vardecimal_storage_format 'AdventureWorks', 'ON' ;
GO

-- Check the vardecimal storage format state for
-- all databases in the instance.
EXEC sp_db_vardecimal_storage_format ;
GO

USE AdventureWorks ;
GO

EXEC sp_tableoption 'Sales.SalesOrderDetail', 'vardecimal storage format', 1 ;
GO

Reference

Concepts