In SQL Server, how do I generate a CREATE TABLE statement for a given table?

Question

I've spent a good amount of time coming up with solution to this problem, so in the spirit of this post, I'm posting it here, since I think it might be useful to others.

If anyone has a better script, or anything to add, please post it.

Edit: Yes guys, I know how to do it in Management Studio - but I needed to be able to do it from within another application.

Answer 1

I've modified the version above to run for all tables and support new SQL 2005 data types. It also retains the primary key names. Works only on SQL 2005 (using cross apply).

select  'create table [' + so.name + '] (' + o.list + ')' + CASE WHEN tc.Constraint_Name IS NULL THEN '' ELSE 'ALTER TABLE ' + so.Name + ' ADD CONSTRAINT ' + tc.Constraint_Name  + ' PRIMARY KEY ' + ' (' + LEFT(j.List, Len(j.List)-1) + ')' END
from    sysobjects so
cross apply
    (SELECT 
        '  ['+column_name+'] ' + 
        data_type + case data_type
            when 'sql_variant' then ''
            when 'text' then ''
            when 'ntext' then ''
            when 'xml' then ''
            when 'decimal' then '(' + cast(numeric_precision as varchar) + ', ' + cast(numeric_scale as varchar) + ')'
            else coalesce('('+case when character_maximum_length = -1 then 'MAX' else cast(character_maximum_length as varchar) end +')','') end + ' ' +
        case when exists ( 
        select id from syscolumns
        where object_name(id)=so.name
        and name=column_name
        and columnproperty(id,name,'IsIdentity') = 1 
        ) then
        'IDENTITY(' + 
        cast(ident_seed(so.name) as varchar) + ',' + 
        cast(ident_incr(so.name) as varchar) + ')'
        else ''
        end + ' ' +
         (case when UPPER(IS_NULLABLE) = 'NO' then 'NOT ' else '' end ) + 'NULL ' + 
          case when information_schema.columns.COLUMN_DEFAULT IS NOT NULL THEN 'DEFAULT '+ information_schema.columns.COLUMN_DEFAULT ELSE '' END + ', ' 

     from information_schema.columns where table_name = so.name
     order by ordinal_position
    FOR XML PATH('')) o (list)
left join
    information_schema.table_constraints tc
on  tc.Table_name       = so.Name
AND tc.Constraint_Type  = 'PRIMARY KEY'
cross apply
    (select '[' + Column_Name + '], '
     FROM   information_schema.key_column_usage kcu
     WHERE  kcu.Constraint_Name = tc.Constraint_Name
     ORDER BY
        ORDINAL_POSITION
     FOR XML PATH('')) j (list)
where   xtype = 'U'
AND name    NOT IN ('dtproperties')

Update: Added handling of the XML data type

Update 2: Fixed cases when 1) there is multiple tables with the same name but with different schemas, 2) there is multiple tables having PK constraint with the same name