Error = [Microsoft][ODBC Driver 11 for SQL Server]Warning: BCP import with a format file will convert empty strings in delimited columns to NULL

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Apparently,according to Microsoft this is not an error but just a warning and can be safely ignored.(Detailed discussion and work around here)

In my case, I was parsing the BCP console output for string "Error" and reporting that the process failed. Since I am using the Process class of .NET framework to call the BCP command in C# code, I had to add code to check for process exit code 0 and suppress this specific warning.

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nobody
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nobody

Apparently, this user prefers to keep an air of mystery. #SOreadytohelp

Updated on July 25, 2022

Comments

  • nobody
    nobody almost 2 years

    I upgraded our Windows Server from 2008 to 2012 and the SQL Server from 2008 to 2014. I have a process that uses the BCP command to export data from the database. The command is below:

    bcp "exec db_name.dbo.table_name 20160204, 0" queryout D:\myfolder\201602\20160204\output.txt -c -T -S  SERVER_NAME
    

    Before the upgrade

    2016-02-02 04:05:16,038 [2492] INFO  - 
    Starting copy...
    1000 rows successfully bulk-copied to host-file. Total received: 1000
    

    After the upgrade

    2016-02-05 04:04:37,006 [15872] INFO  - 
    Starting copy...
    SQLState = S1000, NativeError = 0
    Error = [Microsoft][ODBC Driver 11 for SQL Server]Warning: BCP import with a format file will convert empty strings in delimited columns to NULL.
    1000 rows successfully bulk-copied to host-file. Total received: 1000
    

    Though the output file has been created, the Error/Warning is something that is undesirable in the log. Is there a way to suppress this warning?

  • weir
    weir almost 7 years
    Very helpful information. I addressed this by using the following regex when parsing BCP console output: \s+error(?!.*warning:)