ToString (Database Engine)

Returns a string with the logical representation of this. ToString is called implicitly when a conversion from hierarchyid to a string type occurs. Acts as the opposite of Parse (Database Engine).

Syntax

-- Transact-SQL syntax
node.ToString  ( ) 
-- This is functionally equivalent to the following syntax
-- which implicitly calls ToString():
CAST(node AS nvarchar(4000))

-- CLR syntax
string ToString  ( ) 

Return Types

SQL Server return type: nvarchar(4000)

CLR return type: String

Remarks

Returns the logical location in the hierarchy. For example, /2/1/ represents the fourth row (Microsoft SQL Server) in the following hierarchical structure of a file system:

/        C:\
/1/      C:\Database Files
/2/      C:\Program Files
/2/1/    C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server
/2/2/    C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio
/3/      C:\Windows

Examples

A. Transact-SQL example in a table

The following example returns both the OrgNode column as both the hierarchyid data type and in the more readable string format:

SELECT OrgNode,
OrgNode.ToString() AS Node
FROM HumanResources.EmployeeDemo
ORDER BY OrgNode ;
GO

Here is the result set.

OrgNode   Node
0x        /
0x58      /1/
0x5AC0    /1/1/
0x5B40    /1/2/
0x5BC0    /1/3/
0x5C20    /1/4/
...

B. Converting Transact-SQL values without a table

The following code example uses ToString to convert a hierarchyid value to a string, and Parse to convert a string value to a hierarchyid.

DECLARE @StringValue AS nvarchar(4000), @hierarchyidValue AS hierarchyid
SET @StringValue = '/1/1/3/'
SET @hierarchyidValue = 0x5ADE

SELECT hierarchyid::Parse(@StringValue) AS hierarchyidRepresentation,
 @hierarchyidValue.ToString() AS StringRepresentation ;
GO

Here is the result set.

hierarchyidRepresentation StringRepresentation

------------------------- -----------------------

0x5ADE /1/1/3/

C. CLR example

The following code snippet calls the ToString() method:

this.ToString()

See Also

Reference

hierarchyid (Transact-SQL)

Concepts

hierarchyid Data Type Method Reference

Hierarchical Data (SQL Server)