Lots of developers write code in flash with the help of intellisense. But when coding t-sql is scripts, there is no built-in intellisense on query analyzer or SSMS. You will have to use a 3rd party tool to have intellisense on your query analyzer.
But if you can't find 3rd party intellisense tool usefull 'cause some tools eats all your memories or something, there's a lot of cool stuff in query analyzer or SSMS, like using the object browser and dragging the column folder of the table to list all the columns seperated by a comma.

And also you can use a keyboard shortcut.
In Tools>Customize on QA or Tools>Options>Environment>Keyboard on SSMS, you can write a sql statement and assign it on a shortcut ket that will execute whenever you press the shortcut key.

For example:
Input the statement "select [name] from sysobjects where xtype = 'S'" on CTRL+5 and it will list all the stored procedure when you press CTRL+5.
The cool part is, when you highlight a word on the editor, it will serve as a parameter at the sql statement you write on a shortcut key. Like when you put sp_helptext on one of the shortcut keys, you can just highlight a SP or UDF or View name on the editor and press the shortcut key to view the code.
here's the sql statements I used on the shortcuts.

CTRL+3 -- list all the tables
select TableName=o.name, [Rows]=max(i.[rows]),o.id,(select count(*) from syscolumns where id=o.id) as ColCount from sysobjects o join sysindexes i on o.id=i.id where xtype='u' and OBJECTPROPERTY(o.id, N'IsUserTable')=1 group by o.name, o.id order by TableName

CTRL+4 -- list all the views
select Table_Name, 'VIEW' as Type from INFORMATION_SCHEMA.Tables where Table_type = 'VIEW' order by Table_Type

CTRL+5 -- list all the SP
select [name], 'Stored Procedure' as Type from sysobjects where xtype = 'P' and status >= 0 order by type desc, [name]

CTRL+6 -- list all the UDF
select [name], 'Function' as Type from sysobjects where xtype in  ('TF','FN','IF') and status >= 0 order by type desc, [name]

CTRL+7 -- for viewing the code of SP, UDF, View (requires parameter {highlighted text on editor})
sp_helptext

CTRL+8 -- to list all the column of a table (requires tablename parameter {highlighted text on editor})
sp_MShelpcolumns

I also create a SP:

CREATE PROCEDURE _sp_Select_From
    @objTable varchar(255)
    , @Order1 varchar(255) = 1
    , @Order2 varchar(255) = 2
    , @Order3 varchar(255) = 3
as
    exec ('select * from ' + @objTable + ' order by ' + @Order1 + ', ' + @Order2 + ', ' + @Order3)

and assign it on CTRL+9 to show the data on a table.

And I created a SP:

CREATE PROCEDURE _sp_PrintColumns
     @ObjName varchar(8000)
as

    set nocount on
    declare @TotalParams int, @cntr int, @ObjID int, @ColName varchar(50), @ColValue varchar(50), @ColTypeID int, @ColType varchar(50), @TempColumnName varchar(50)

    set @ObjID = (select [id] from [dbo].sysobjects where [name] = @ObjName)

    if @ObjID is NULL or @ObjID = ''
        begin
            select 'object not found'
            return
        end

    set @TempColumnName = ''
    set @TotalParams = (select top 1 colid from [dbo].syscolumns where [id] = @ObjID order by colid desc)
    set @cntr = 1

    print '--' + @ObjName
    while @cntr <= @TotalParams
        begin
            set @TempColumnName = @ColName
            select top 1 @ColName = [name]
                , @ColTypeID = xtype
            from [dbo].syscolumns where [id] = @ObjID and colid = @cntr
            set @ColType = (select distinct top 1 [Type_Name] from master.dbo.spt_datatype_info where ss_dtype = @ColTypeID)

            if @TempColumnName<> ''
                print ', ' + @ColName
            else
                print @ColName

            set @cntr = @cntr + 1
        end

and assign it on CTRL+0 to list all the columns of a table or parameters of SP and UDF seperated by a newline and a comma.

And it helps me a lot and makes me more productive.

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Posted 09-27-2006 3:32 PM by clintz