code template in management studio

Question

Can I find in management studio the Following feature?

I want to write a specific word and that it be replaced by a statement specifies. Ex: I write "ss" and replace "select * from" or write "johnid" and is replaced by "where id = '555 '"   In Toad for Oracle You might still in: "option - behsvior - template code - code template" http://www.toadworld.com/Blogs/tabid/67/EntryId/343/Customizing-Toad-Code-Templates.aspx

Answer 1

There is nothing I know of built into Management Studio that will behave exactly like you are suggesting. There are some shortcuts you can advantage of in Tools > Options > Environment > Keyboard > Query Shortcuts, but these run the code rather than paste them into your window, so you can't use them as partial syntax completion. For example if you assign SELECT * FROM to Ctrl+9, then open a new query window and press Ctrl+9, you have an empty query window and the following error message:

Msg 102, Level 15, State 1, Line 1
Incorrect syntax near 'FROM'.

Chris already mentioned templates, so I won't treat those.

In SQL Server 2012 you can use a new feature (well, an old feature recycled from Visual Studio) called Snippets, which I think is a lot more powerful than the Template feature (I wrote about them here, and someone else did a decent job here). But I still don't think it's quite what you're after - there's a menu system to go through to insert a snippet, and so far in my research I've been unable to assign a keyboard shortcut -- even though there is an empty element in the Snippet XML called <Shortcut></Shortcut>, and most of the people who talk about this feature mention it, but I've yet to see a working snippet that used it (and I have tried many variations to get it work like it does in Visual Studio with no luck).

You can also use 3rd party tools, such as Mladen Prajdic's free SSMS Tools Pack. For what you want to do, I think this is the best fit, since it allows you to do real expansions snippets where the replacement text is put into your code based on the keyword you typed ad further keystrokes. However if you're using SQL Server 2012, at the time of posting we're still waiting on a compatible release for that version of SSMS. You may also want to look into Red-Gate's SQL Prompt, but I'd try Mladen's free tool first if you can. I'm sure there are other alternatives you can turn up with a standard search.

Answer 2

This feature is present in these free add-ins: SSMSBoost or SSMS Tools Pack

Answer 3

Use Template Explorer

SQL Server provides a variety of templates. Templates are boilerplate files containing SQL scripts that help you create objects in a database. The first time the template explorer is opened, a copy of the templates are placed in the user’s folder in C:\Users, under AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\SQL Server Management Studio\110\Templates.

You can browse the available templates in Template Explorer, then open a template to incorporate the code into a code editor window. You can also create custom templates.