Call procedure for each row without using cursors and loops?

Question

I need to apply a procedure on every record's NVARCHAR(MAX) field in a table. The procedure will receive a large string and split it into several shorter strings (less than 100 chars). The procedure will return a result set of smaller string. These strings will be inserted into a different table (each in its own row).

How can I apply this procedure in a set-based fashion to the whole table, so that I can insert the results into another table?

I've found some similar questions on SO, however they didn't need to use the INSERT INTO construct. This means UDF and TVF functions are off the table. EDIT: functions do not support DML statements. I wanted to use INSERT INTO inside the function.

Alternatively, is there a set-based way of using a stored procedure? SELECT sproc(Text) FROM Table didn't work.

Answer 1

I am not sure of your exact logic to split the string, but if possible you can make your split function an inline TVF (Heres one I made earlier):

CREATE FUNCTION dbo.Split(@StringToSplit NVARCHAR(MAX), @Delimiter NCHAR(1))
RETURNS TABLE
AS
RETURN
(   
    SELECT  Position = Number,
            Value = SUBSTRING(@StringToSplit, Number, CHARINDEX(@Delimiter, @StringToSplit + @Delimiter, Number) - Number)
    FROM    (   SELECT  TOP (LEN(@StringToSplit) + 1) Number = ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY a.object_id)
                FROM    sys.all_objects a
            ) n
    WHERE   SUBSTRING(@Delimiter + @StringToSplit + @Delimiter, n.Number, 1) = @Delimiter
);

Then you can simply use this in your insert statement by using cross apply with the TVF:

DECLARE @T1 TABLE (ID INT IDENTITY, TextToSplit NVARCHAR(MAX) NOT NULL);
DECLARE @T2 TABLE (T1ID INT NOT NULL, Position INT NOT NULL, SplitText NVARCHAR(MAX) NOT NULL);

INSERT @T1 (TextToSplit) 
VALUES ('This is a test'), ('This is Another Test');

INSERT @T2 (T1ID, Position, SplitText)
SELECT  t1.ID, s.Position, s.Value
FROM    @T1 t1
        CROSS APPLY dbo.Split(t1.TextToSplit, N' ') s;

SELECT  *
FROM    @T2;